Azpilicueta acknowledges Chelsea were not good enough against Everton

Chelsea captain Cesar Azpilicueta has acknowledged that the Blues were not good enough to secure a victory over Everton over the weekend. The west London side had the chance to pile more misery on the Toffees, who had lost three league games on the bounce but that was clearly not the case with the Merseyside outfit running out 3-1 victors.

Each of the Toffees’ goals resulted from defensive errors from the Blues and speaking after the game, Azpilicueta accepted that the players could not cope with the physicality of the Toffees in key moments, he told: “We did not start very well because we knew they could have a reaction in the stadium with a new manager but we didn’t cope well enough. We should have done much better in a game like this. In the first five minutes we gave away a goal from a cross, which we knew they were dangerous from, and after that we were in trouble. We conceded again early in the second half and in those key moments we weren’t strong enough to cope with them.”

With the defeat, the Blues have won just one of their four league matches after the international break and they are currently holding a slender five-point gap over Manchester United and Wolverhampton Wanderers in the race for the final Champions League spot. They are scheduled to host an injury-plagued Bournemouth side at home next weekend but prior to that, they face a must-win game against Lille in the Champions League group stage.

The Blues are currently third with eight points on the table and they need a victory over the French outfit to progress to the next round. Should they manage only a draw, they would need to depend on Ajax beating Valencia at the Amsterdam Arena. A stalemate for Valencia would see them progress with the second spot on the head-to-head record.