Mauricio Pochettino has declared there will be no excuses for Chelsea next season, as he looks for his side to bounce back from their 12th-placed finish last term. The west London side is in the midst of a heavy transition, with uncertainty over how the squad will look on the opening day of the season, but admitting that is not part of the Blues boss' thinking now that pre-season is underway.
The Blues have already sold Mason Mount, Kai Havertz, Mateo Kovacic, Edouard Mendy and Kalidou Koulibaly and it is expected that more will depart the club before the summer is out. In the opposite direction, Nicolas Jackson and Christopher Nkunku have arrived to begin to replenish first-team numbers.
Pochettino wants to instil a competitive edge in his team from the off however, with some players already back in action at Cobham. The 51-year-old appears to want his side to have an intensity that Frank Lampard lamented his side lacked. The Chelsea boss expects to press from the outset.
He said: "Yes, of course. Now we need to be competitive in the training ground or we are not going to arrive on time. I don’t want to make excuses to the players to say first of all we need time to rebuild, we need time to work, we need, we need, we need. No, no excuses and we start to work hard, to manage and drive the way that we want. No excuses. The competition doesn’t wait for anyone and now we are going to start again against Liverpool in the first game to be ready to win, and if not we are going to struggle for sure.
After a tumultuous season and more upheaval, many would suggest there could be excuses for Pochettino to point to, particularly having lost a number of experienced heads. He did not appear concerned however.
He said: "With experience or without experience you can win or lose. If not, it’s not a rule. The most important thing whether [we have] experience or no experience, we need to get the right balance in the squad, in the team, to try to feel good, feel strong. I think we have players with experience for how we are going to cook and put the ingredients together and work really well."
Is there a risk to his reputation?
He said: "No, but I love the risk. I love, you know, to be on the top with the expectations to be here, and I think for me it's a challenge. It's a big challenge, that I want to feel, I want to feel the adrenaline again, to be there and fighting for big things. This football club, because of the history, is about winning big trophies. I want to prove myself, that I can deal with that."
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With Chelsea having overseen four different managers in the first 12 months of Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital's ownership of the club, it would be understandable if not everyone had trust in the premiership of the club.
The Blues boss would be happy to welcome the club's owners into the dressing room, and would like to see players shake hands with their employers when they meet, much like his Tottenham side did with Daniel Levy, as a show of respect between parties. Central to everything is that in his domain, Pochettino will be the central figure however.
He said: "First of all we need to understand they own the football club and we need to respect that. Another thing is to talk about how we need to behave because that is an important thing. The culture that England, football in England. My responsibility also is to help and altogether add our knowledge and capacity to create a culture of everyone knows how to behave in different situations. Of course for me, more than welcome if the owner comes to the dressing room, to the training ground, but like I said, always they need to communicate myself, I need to know and to prepare, you know, the people... because here it's really special this type of thing in England.
"Maybe in other countries it's different, but here it's this way, the coach or the head coach or the manager [laughs] I don't want to do nothing but have you know some influence in all the football club for the fans, for the players for the staff for everyone, and for the media also, and of course altogether we need to create this. And we are there to guide, to guide all the people that is involved in this football club, to try to create the best performing, to try and work and perform in the best way.
"For me, I am more than happy if they are close to us, but they are the owners, the players, the fans, the media... the coach, the head coach or the manager is who decides the thing, how it's going to work, no, on the dressing room, on the pitch, on the training ground. Also with the sporting director, altogether, to create the line altogether."
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