If anybody was wondering whether Chelsea have disappointed in defending their title this season, Antonio Conte has some information for them. “In the last 10 games we have won eight, drew only one and lost one game, against West Ham‚” he said. “If someone asks me if I’m ready to sign for these results in the next 10 matches, I’m ready. There is a team winning every game right now, but at the same time you have to concede that other teams are trying their best and in the last 10 games we have done a good job.”
With Manchester City apparently already over the horizon in the Premier League, Chelsea will at some point have to surrender their title of champions. But there has been no crisis at Stamford Bridge in Conte’s second season and this was a highly professional victory over a Southampton side who delivered a performance that belied their own challenging form.
Marcos Alonso decided the match with a free-kick in first-half injury time. His left-foot strike was delivered with typical precision, bending first outside then inside Fraser Forster’s right post, bouncing at the last moment and arcing over the keeper’s outstretched arm into the net. Conte described Alonso as “a specialist in that situation” before bemoaning a lack of sharpness elsewhere in his side. Chelsea created numerous chances throughout and should have won by more.
Southampton played with belief and determination despite their slim total of four league wins. They could argue their defensive efforts were just as significant in keeping the scoreline tight and could even have snatched a point had Charlie Austin converted a one-on-one within a minute of coming on.
Another name on the bench provoked a talking point: Virgil van Dijk was not selected by Mauricio Pellegrino with two weeks until the January transfer window opens.
“It was a difficult game and we were a little bit unlucky in the way that we conceded, during injury time‚” Pellegrino said. “Chelsea created clear chances but the idea was to be in the game till the end and we were there.”
On Van Dijk, he added: “We had played three games in six days. It’s really difficult to keep the same condition when it’s Wednesday night to Saturday afternoon, with less than three days to recover. I changed a lot of players and Virgil was just one of them.”
So far, so boilerplate, but when pressed on the issue the Argentinian was unable to confirm the club will reject offers for the Dutch defender, something they did repeatedly during the summer.
Van Dijk is still a target for Liverpool, and Manchester City as well, and Pellegrino said “I cannot control the market and I am not the owner of the player. All I can do is relay my opinion, after that the board can decide what is best for the team. I would recommend to try to keep our best players at the club. The club was quite clear on this at the beginning of the season and I have the same opinion now.”
Conte was asked about Van Dijk but did the graceful thing, refusing to comment on another club’s player. He was happier when allowed to air the bee stuck in his bonnet: time-wasting on the part of his opponents. The Chelsea manager was particularly frustrated about the time taken by Forster at his goal-kicks.
“Every time the ball went out it was maybe one minute before the game restarted‚” he said. “It’s important to pay great attention to wasting time. This happened and I hope something can change.” He went on to make a suggestion as to future practice. “To book the goalkeeper early is very important because then the game is faster‚” he said
Perhaps Conte’s time and motion studies came in useful, given that Alonso’s free kick came in the third minute of first-half added time. A late booking for the wing-back means he will miss the midweek Carabao Cup quarter-final with Bournemouth, which also became the object of Conte’s fastidious grumbling.
“For sure I prefer to have all players available and for sure there is a problem because [Davide] Zappacosta is recovering from bad flu,” he said. “But it can happen and we must be ready to overcome this difficulty.”
The title may be all but gone, but Conte’s footballing obsession endures.
Comments (…)
Sign in or create your Guardian account to join the discussion