It’s a Premier League season like no other thus far, with head-turning and head-scratching results the order of the day up and down the table. Still, when Chelsea went up 2-0 on Timo Werner’s second goal of the day yesterday, we surely figured that even if the goals were surely not done for the game, we would be able to hold on to the lead.
Alas.
It was especially unfortunate that it was Kai Havertz’s turnover in deep midfield, having dropped to collect the ball but taking a slightly lackadaisical touch that was duly punished by Saints’ press and led to the visitors’ first goal.
But the 21-year-old owned up to that mistake in his post-match assessment, while lamenting the fact that twice from that point on, we failed to hold a one-goal lead.
“We’re very frustrated about the result. We had 42 good minutes in the first half but then I made a mistake and we conceded a goal, which changed the game a little bit.
“We got it to 3-2 and then we have to take the result and get the win at home but we didn’t do it. Now we have to stick together and hopefully we can do better next time.”
The message of unity has been a common refrain during these early season run of mixed results, alongside the usual cliches of working hard and learning from our mistakes.
As ever, there isn’t much time to do all that, though scoring goals has not been much of an issue, and that’s where most of the changes and new faces are.
“It’s not always one person who makes the mistake so we have to look at our mistakes and try to solve the problems.
“We only have one or two days, only one training session with all the players together so of course it’s different but every team has to deal with it, not only us. We didn’t have a lot of preparation so now we have to work hard and stay together to do better next time.”
-Kai Havertz; source: Chelsea FC
The chance to do better arrives on Tuesday, with Sevilla coming to town for our first game in the Champions League group stages.