Enzo Maresca reveals what he could have done better at Chelsea as Pedro Neto makes Benfica vow

Enzo Maresca is not feeling pressure from the Chelsea board as the head coach accepted he needs to improve after back-to-back defeats against Brighton and Manchester United.

The Blues have been beaten in two consecutive Premier League games after going down to 10 men in both with Maresca’s substitutions after the red cards - deemed to be too negative - receiving strong criticism. Chelsea have just three wins from their opening eight games in all competitions this season, but football.london understands club chiefs have no plans to sack Maresca and retain full belief in his leadership.

Maresca has now got to set his side up to face Benfica and the returning Jose Mourinho on Tuesday evening, with the Portuguese side the visitors to west London for the second league phase fixture. Despite the struggles recently, and plenty inside Stamford Bridge booing Chelsea off at the full-time whistle of Saturday's defeat to Brighton, Maresca is not feeling the pressure.

“For sure, I think after reviewing the last two games, Man Utd and Brighton with 10 players, for sure I could have done better probably in terms of [my] decisions,” the Italian explained. “No doubt, but also for me it's like a learning process to play with 10 players because I think for any manager it's not something normal.

“Unfortunately for us it happened two times. And the stats is that in the last almost six months we lost five games, four of them with a red card. Newcastle, Flamengo, Man Utd and Brighton.

“And the only game that we lost 11 versus 11 was Bayern Munich away. So that's why I said for me personally there is not any reason that we need to panic knowing that football is a crazy world.

“If you lost five games in six months and you need to say things to defend yourself, that means that it's a crazy world. So I don't think we need to defend ourselves in this moment because the reality is that I have a very good feeling with the squad we have.”

Maresca continued: “So for sure we like winning games, there is no doubt. But also the reality is that there is not any pressure. The pressure we have is the pressure that we know that being at Chelsea as a player, as a manager you need to win games, no doubt.

“But at the same moment the reality is that for different reasons, injuries and red cards, we lost five games in almost six months. But at the same time I think it's something not bad.”

Meanwhile, Pedro Neto has pinned a lot of the blame on the players for making individual mistakes and costing Chelsea crucial points. “The environment of the club is really positive,” Neto said. “A lot of our points lost is of our own mistakes.

“Not blaming everyone, but our own mistakes have taken points from us. The players are really positive, and tomorrow we have an opportunity to show what we can do.”

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