There was a moment against Brighton where Christian Pulisic had his shirt pulled in the area before he got a shot away. Is there a reluctance from referee’s to give fouls for these incidents?
“There is a balance referees have got to strike. On the one hand, there was an argument that they were giving penalties that were too soft. And on the other, the flip side to that, is we don’t get those you are talking about. It’s a tricky one and I’ve got enough problems myself without worrying about the referee’s problems. But we obviously wanted the penalty in that incident.”
How wary do you have to be coming up against a side fighting to survive in the Premier League another year?
“You always have to be wary in the Premier League. You can’t say it’s the greatest league in the world and then think there are easy games. There aren’t. Forest got a fantastic result against Liverpool before the break and I have huge respect for Steve Cooper and the job he has done there. He is a fantastic coach.
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"So they’ll be ready and the atmosphere will be hostile I’m sure. It’s their first year back in the Premier League for a long, long time and every game – especially Chelsea coming to town – is a big game for them. So they’ll be motivated, have quality, and be fighting for the points. So we have to be ready.”
A new year is almost upon us, what do you hope 2023 has in store for Chelsea?
“We want to keep improving, that’s the simple answer. We’ve had a challenging time, some ups and downs in terms of the previous year. That is normal I think in any football club but we want to try to stabilise and improve. We want to make our supporters happy because we know the last few weeks before the break wasn’t nice for us. Results suffered and performances weren’t where we want them to be. So we have to do better than that.”
How difficult is it trying to reshape your team without Reece James – and was there anything you learned from the first spell without him this season?
“If you go back to the Newcastle game, we had no Kepa, no Reece, no Wesley [Fofana], no Ben Chilwell, we lost Marc Cucurella with illness overnight, lost Ruben Loftus-Cheek after two minutes, had no [N’Golo] Kante, lost Cesar Azpilicueta after 20 minutes, and also had no Raheem Sterling. That was simply the period we were in, and we still have quite a few guys that are out.
"But that is the challenge of being in multiple competitions; there were multiple games in a short space of time with the World Cup coming up. Something I reflected upon during the break was when Ben, for example, gets injured, the effect that has on everyone. They are looking and thinking, ‘could I be next? Could I miss the World Cup?’ So it was difficult.
"Again, I’m not making excuses. I’m just telling you want I think of the situation. We have to deal with it. The break hasn’t been a positive one for us and I could’ve made lots of excuses had the result [against Bournemouth] not gone our way because we had four [senior] players for the first two weeks, then players dripping back in and the break people think we have to work with the players isn’t there. But you can’t make those excuses, you just have to win. And we did [against Bournemouth] so that’s good.”
Some of those names you mentioned that missed Newcastle are back, so in terms of playing without Reece, does that make it a little easier to deal with?
“Absolutely. I think when we played the Milan away game, we had Reece, N’Golo was getting close and we were thinking he could be available, but then he has an injury at the backend of his rehab and then we lose Reece, we go from a healthy position to a not so healthy position.
"Our job is to try to get as many people back as we can. It’s been a real tough period, as challenging as there has been in my time as a coach. But we’re Chelsea and people don’t want to hear those reasons/excuses. We have got to get on with it and try our best to find the answers.”
Denis Zakaria is a player who didn’t feature often in the first half of the season but started against Bournemouth and played well. Do you feel he is a player that can step up for you during the second half of this season?
“Whenever Denis has played, he’s not let us down. He played in the Champions League against Zagreb and scored, so he’s shown his quality. I’ve said before, he has had to be patient because we have some good options in the midfield.
"It has to be remembered we didn’t lose for the first few games so it was hard for him to get that opportunity. But he has remained professional, worked really hard and it’s why he got his reward [against Bournemouth] with a decent performance and a contribution to a win.”
Are Mateo Kovacic and Hakim Ziyech going to be back for Nottingham Forest, and what’s the situation with Edouard Mendy?
“Both of those guys will be back. Mendy we are not sure, we’ll have to see in the next few days. He has a problem with his bone [around his shoulder] that he picked up at the World Cup. He may still need a bit of time.
”You’ve listed all of the injuries you’ve had to contend with and a few are setbacks with Reece, Wesley and N’Golo. Can you put your finger on why that is? Is it just bad luck?
“There is a little bit of bad luck but I don’t think you should throw it to something you can’t do anything about. There is an element of luck, of course, but then there are other things that happen. But that is for us to try to learn from and get better with. Again, it’s been a challenging season and I don’t know how pre-season was because I wasn’t here. I can’t comment on that.
"Sometimes you have these situations; Liverpool had one earlier in the season. So it can happen, especially when you are playing so many games in a short space of time. But without knowing the full extent of pre-season, it’s hard for me to comment.”
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