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CHELSEA FC ;REACTION: MORE PRESSURE POINTS

/noticias.info/ Sat, 5th Apr 2008
With three weekend points in the bag, Avram Grant can turn his mind to beating the Turkish champions on Tuesday, but also keep an eye on Manchester United's attempt to match Chelsea's result today.

The two-goal win over Manchester City, courtesy of Richard Dunne's own-goal and an accomplished finish by Salomon Kalou, his 11th of the season, has taken Chelsea two points behind the leaders. We have five more games to play, three at home; Man United have six, two at Old Trafford.

'If you ask Sir Alex or Man United, I think they will say we have put them under pressure all the last three months,' Grant said shortly after Saturday afternoon's win, explaining: 'because we have won a lot of games, close to 80 per cent, which is the record of champions.

'Man United are also doing very well; I don't think they will win every game until the end of the season, but we need first do our job. We did our job today so we can anticipate a good result tomorrow.'

'We deserved to win this game,' the Chelsea manager claimed. 'We started very well, we were leading 1-0, then we made a very good attack but we didn't give the final pass.

'Man City reacted very well, they are a good team with a good manager, and they were good for the rest of the first half - but the second half we scored and we deserved more goals.'

For Grant, who spoke on Friday about the need to see the wider picture at this stage with regards to physical and mental condition of players, the three points also justified a selection that saw over half the names changed from Istanbul.

'We had to do it,' insisted Grant. 'First we trust our squad. We do not forget that during December and January almost all the big players were out so these squad players helped bring us to the place we are now.

'So we trust them - and you cannot play with players every three games, especially when we came back from Turkey. The body is not a machine.'

Man City boss Sven Goran Eriksson also rung the changes - four in total - as he reacted to a poor defeat against Birmingham in their last match.

'We took a little step forward from last weekend, there was much improvement,' said the former England manager, 'but we were too slow at the start and showed too much respect maybe to Chelsea and let them score rather early.

'Then after that if you take the first half, we played good football, created the more chances.'

Eriksson also believed his side had been okay after restart until Kalou's 52nd minute goal. Only then did their heads go down a little.

'To play 2-0 down against Chelsea is very tough.

'If I had ten pounds, I would put it on Man United to win the league because I can't see how they are out of form. It is the opposite, I think they are playing very well, but Chelsea are playing very well as well.

'In Turkey, their first half during the week was fantastic and how they could lose that game is very difficult to understand.'

'I never know beforehand what the result will be, otherwise I would gamble and be a millionaire,' said Grant, keeping the betting theme going as he looked forward to Tuesday's match - but I know what I expect and I know what we can do.

'Fenerbahçe are a good team in my opinion. I know that we can win but I know that it will not be easy.'






The Man City v Chelsea game can be seen in full on Chelsea TV at 6pm on Sunday. Highlights will be available on Chelsea Plus.
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