Frank Lampard questioned his players’ mental state after Chelsea lost the chance to go top of the Premier League by sliding to a second successive defeat. Although they did not play well, Oliver Giroud put Chelsea on the way for victory against Wolves by scoring early in the second half. Daniel Podence levelled the score soon after that, and Pedro Neto scored the winning goal in the injury time.
“We should have understood the game out,” Lampard said. “If you’re not playing good, which we were not, you should hold on, not allow counterattacks.”
He indicated some Chelsea players might have become careless after savouring a 14-games unbeaten streak before Saturday’s defeat against Everton. He also advised his players to reflect on that before Monday’s game in their home ground against West Ham. “Perhaps the players can think about that. If you don’t show your best game, you lose. This is the Premier League.”
Lampard carried on that his players must show more judgement to respond to various challenges during matches and also suggested some had not paid attention about Wolves’ counterattacking power.
“We had sufficient players to deal with it, but we were not fairly prepared to counterattack. We kept Thiago Silva on the back foot, we had enough numbers to deal with it, but we didn’t handle the situation well enough.”
He offered some diminution by indicating the busy schedule may have absorbed from their energy levels. “There could be some exhaustion,” he said.
“ I still think there is a lot of work to be done with the team, so I would not say I am heavily surprised because my knowledge of the Premier League tells me that if you fall your standards, which we have in two matches, and specifically away from home, you will lose games, so a big lesson for my players.”
