Conte hails professional effort, sets sights on a trophy or two for Chelsea this season

Chelsea are into the last eight in FA Cup for the second year running and just three wins away from winning it for the first time since 2012. Meanwhile, the Premier League is down to six teams with Chelsea holding all the aces with our eight-point lead at the top. Things are looking good for a trophy or two to make its way to Stamford Bridge this season.

But we shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves.

“In the league we are doing and great job in staying on top of the table and now we are in the FA Cup quarter-final and I am pleased for this ,but after this game it is important to understand that nothing is easy. It will be very difficult to win both competitions but we want to try to win some trophies.”

Chelsea last won a league and FA Cup double in 2010 under another Italian manager, Carlo Ancelotti. John Terry remains the only player to still be playing from that team; now just a backup, he got his usual cup-game runout in this one.

“[Terry and Fàbregas] played very well. It is not easy when you don’t play a lot, and John and Cesc and all the players showed me they have good form and it means they are good professionals. It is great to have these type of players in my squad because I can count on them.”

While Terry and Fàbregas were two of the seven changes from last weekend’s 1-1 draw at Burnley, Conte left no doubt about his intentions to win today by fielding a first-choice lineup in attack.

“It was the toughest game we have played in this competition so far for sure. But we all knew it would be, above all after the results this afternoon. I tried to warn the changing room about the difficulty of this game, and of this completion. I like to repeat that in England in every game in every competition there does not exist an easy game It is the truth.”

-Antonio Conte; source: Chelsea FC

Conte then credited Wolves for their “great intensity” but also his own players for defending “well”. Meanwhile, Paul Lambert called Chelsea “relentless”.

“For some team to stop them is going to be really difficult. I'm proud of my team because we made this game what it was. We were fantastic.”

“They're relentless. Some of their top lads didn't play for them but look at their team. I thought it might be a tad weaker but look at that their front three [Costa, Eden Hazard, Willian] alone. It's going to be one hell of a team to stop them from getting both trophies.”

-Paul Lambert; source: Independent

We were perhaps a few inches away from seeing a very different result play out today (if Saville’s shot doesn’t hit the post), but on a day when all the other Premier League teams struggled in the FA Cup and we witnessed 2.5 giant-killings, Chelsea played just well enough to get the job done with the 2-0 win.

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