Mason Mount ready to climb the ‘mountain that seems impossible’ against Real Madrid

Thomas Tuchel sounded a bit fatalistic in his post-match interview following our disastrous showing in the first leg of our Champions League quarterfinal agains Real Madrid, though he claimed to be just keeping it real. The first step to overcoming any problem is admitting that we have a problem after all, right?

But this is professional sports and that’s not what happens in professional sports. The messaging on social media from the players has been a lot more positive in the hours and days since, as one would expect, espousing the never-say-die attitude and team unity that’s the bare necessity for trying to either overturn that result — or at least move on from it in a useful way for this weekend’s away test at Southampton.

For Mason Mount, to whom we might look to showcase that classic Chelsea spirit, it’s about finding a way to climb that impossible mountain. Impossible is nothing, as the old adidas marketing slogan used to say.

“It was a very tough loss. It has been two tough losses in a row, and we need to pick ourselves up. The philosophy of Chelsea is that we’re always underdogs and we can climb the mountain that seems impossible at times. That is what we have to do now [...]”

“This is football, anything is possible. We have to give it everything. We know how tough it will be. We need to regroup, attacking every game 100 per cent. Every game is a final now. We have a massive mountain to climb but we are Chelsea and if there is a team that can do it, it is us. We will give it everything as we have that hunger and desire to really accomplish something.”

-Mason Mount; source: Chelsea FC

Of course, first we have to climb the much smaller, but seemingly just as daunting at the moment mountain that is Southampton.