Chelsea captain Cesar Azpilicueta insists they cannot afford to pin their Champions League qualification hopes on winning the Europa League despite falling off the pace in the race for the top four domestically.
A fourth away defeat in five matches in Sunday’s 2-0 loss at Everton leaves Maurizio Sarri’s side three points adrift of fourth-placed Arsenal in the Premier League.
However, had they not dropped five points in their last two games against the Toffees and Wolves, Chelsea would currently be third.
Having got the easier side of the draw in Europe, facing Sparta Prague in the quarter-finals with the winners of Benfica and Entracht Frankfurt awaiting in the semis, it would seem that competition represents the Blues’ best chance of gaining entry to the Champions League.
However, Azpilicueta said they had not given up on a top-four finish.
“We missed a chance to get points and every time you don’t get the three points you put yourself in a more difficult position,” he said.
“There is still a lot of games to play and we are going to fight because we cannot miss Champions League qualification.
“I don’t see just the Europa League as the only way of being in the Champions League, because Chelsea’s place is not to be sixth in the Premier League so I cannot accept this.
“There is a way of going into the Champions League, it is a trophy, and we will play until the end but we are not in a position in the league where you can say we are not going to reach the Champions League spots.
“If we had won the (last) two games we would be third going into the international break and we could have said we were already in the Champions League.
“Obviously with five more points we could have been much better.”
Of greater concern for Sarri and Chelsea is the way the side capitulated under the first spell of pressure at Goodison Park after dominating the first half without scoring.
The manager voiced his worries about the mental strength of his players, highlighted by the fact only once this season in the Premier League have they recovered from going behind to win – the 4-1 victory over Cardiff in September.
“The reality is that the numbers are there. From 30 games only one we came back in the Premier League,” Sarri said.
“It is frustrating. It is not the first game where we played very well in the first half and we didn’t kill the game and then in the second half are in trouble from the first minute. That was the case against Everton.
“It is difficult to understand how we cannot keep the consistency during the game and in the season as well.
“We have had a couple of good results but we’ve had bad results and obviously that scenario puts you in a more difficult position.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here