Harry Diamond
Frank Lampard has criticised his side’s ‘mentality’ after Chelsea suffered a shock 3-2 defeat to West Ham at the London Stadium.
Andriy Yarmolenko’s late winner on the break condemned Chelsea to a derby defeat against the struggling Hammers, the Ukrainian international punishing the west London side on the counter-attack as the Blues pushed for a winner.
An entertaining contest saw Chelsea take the lead through Willian’s penalty, before Tomas Soucek – who had an earlier goal controversially ruled out for offside against Michail Antonio – headed the hosts level on the stroke of half-time.
Antonio put West Ham in front after bundling home from close range in the second half, only for Willian’s fine free-kick to draw the sides level once more. Chelsea’s desire for a winning goal saw Lampard’s side exposed and fall to a dramatic defeat, however, and the Blues’ boss could not hide his disappointment after dropping vital points in the race to secure Champions League football.
“It’s the story of our season. It’s been a good season but there have been so many of these moments,” Lampard told Sky Sports.
”We had an opportunity today to go through but you have to do every part of the game to get results. If you switch off or make one or two errors then you will encourage teams. Players have to show an extra mentality to get through these games.
“I get to see this group closely and I’ve seen us play great games then have moments where there’s the opportunity to capitalise and that’s the difference at the moment. We have work to do.
“There’s without a doubt a good group of players in there but then when you analyse the consistency, you feel a game like this is coming. Again, that shows there’s work to do.
“If we are opening up to try and score that winning goal then we have to be prepared to run back the other way and defend. And defend better.
“We are two points ahead of Manchester United, who have been playing fantastic and are on a great run, Wolves are having a great season and they’re behind us, Leicester have had a great season and we’re just behind them.
“It’s about perspective. We are upset because we wanted to win the game, we’re footballers and we’re in a good position. So there’s no point in being down but I can’t help but say the truth today which is that it’s a game we should have won tonight.”
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