Premier League 2017-18 Opening Week: Chelsea 2-3 Burnley
Down 3-0 at the break, Chelsea rallied in the second to score two goals but also finished with 9 players on the field after Cahill (14′) and Fabregas (82′) saw red. Chelsea’s summer has not been the greatest and the club might be looking at a difficult season after winning the Premier League last year. The passivity of its defense, naive in some instances highlighted flaws in the squad while its las season’s best striker Diego Costa has requested a trade and been banned from the first team.
Coach Conte comments on a horrific start of the season :
“For sure it was a key moment because after Gary’s red card we lost our composure and conceded three goals. We need to improve a lot in that aspect. It can happen, this type of situation, but we must pay attention and think there is the rest of the game to try to do our best. Instead we conceded three goals and in the second half it was very difficult to change the result, despite the great will and desire of my players, which I was very proud of. Today I saw two faces: one positive, in the second half, and one negative, in the first half.
Now we have to work, we know this. That is the only way for me and my players. I’m not worried because we have to trust in our work. Today there were three injured players, Pedro, Hazard and Bakayoko, and Moses was banned. I don’t know if Pedro will have recovered for the next game but for sure we will have two players banned, Cahill and Fabregas.”
On new signing Alvaro Morata: ‘I think Alvaro has good space to improve, he’s working very well and working very hard to quickly find good fitness and adapt himself to our style of football. For sure he played very well, he scored a goal and played a good game.”
