Chelsea gave themselves a mountain to climb after a series of sloppy defensive errors at West Bromwich Albion and although they bounced back to grab a 3-3 draw their frustrated manager Frank Lampard said they have a lot of work to do.
Despite concentrating on tightening up the defence in recent weeks, defender Marcos Alonso made two mistakes that led to goals, while Thiago Silva marked his Premier League debut with an embarrassing error that led to West Brom’s second goal.
“You can do as many meetings as you want — if you’re going to make those mistakes, you’re going to give yourself a mountain to climb,” said Lampard, unable to hide his disappointment at two points dropped to their newly-promoted opponents.
“We created two or three great chances in the first half, I felt we would create more, the only other problem at 3-0 was West Brom were going to protect their lead more,” he added.
“It is a big lesson for us. We will get a lot better. We’re still finding our way with new players and a lack of pre-season. Today is part of the process of getting better.”
The draw leaves Chelsea in sixth place on four points from three games, with three of the five teams above them having a match in hand.
“We have two big games coming up against Tottenham (in the League Cup fourth round) and Crystal Palace. I expect to see an improvement in our performances,” Lampard said, before adding a note of caution about his side’s conditioning.
“In terms of team fitness, it won’t be until after the international break (in October) that I expect to see us up to our real level, especially in terms of on the ball, because we haven’t had time to work on that yet,” he added.
Meanwhile, Southampton’s first points of the new Premier League campaign in Saturday’s 1-0 victory at Burnley can be the ideal launchpad for a steady run of good results, striker Danny Ings said.
The in-form Ings scored in the fifth minute at his former club to continue his prolific scoring for the Saints, having now netted 25 of their 54 goals since the start of last season.
It was the perfect pick-me-up for Southampton, who finished 11th last season but began the 2020-21 league campaign with two defeats — including a 5-2 home thrashing by Tottenham Hotspur last weekend.
“Hopefully it can really kick-start us so we can get back into our rhythm. When we do build momentum, we’re a dangerous team to play,” Ings told Sky Sports on Saturday.
“With a broken pre-season it’s always difficult to get in your rhythm. Especially with the way we play as well - you need a lot of fitness. I feel that’s coming now and hopefully it can be the start of some good momentum.”
Saints boss Ralph Hasenhuettl said Ings, who has been linked by the British media to a switch to Tottenham, was not going anywhere during the transfer window.
“We’ll have Danny for a very long time with us. That’s all I can say,” the Austrian added. “I’ve spoke often about his development ... we must always pay attention that we’re more than only Ings. He scores for us but also we work for him, Che (Adams) made a fantastic assist.
“We worked very hard and it’s important, then we play together we’re a good team. It’s important for him to stay fit and then he’s always there to score.”
