Chelsea manager, Enzo Maresca, has warned football fans to not judge the Blues against their past glory days.
He recently urged supporters of the club to trust him more after taking a significant step towards Champions League qualification on Friday.
Marc Cucurella’s 71st-minute strike gave the Blues a hard-fought 1-0 win over Manchester United at Stamford Bridge, which took them up to fourth place in the Premier League table.
Speaking during an interview with Sky Sports, Maresca said that Chelsea’s critics keep comparing the current team to their successful recent past under former owner Roman Abramovich, and it is simply unfair.
According to him, the aim is to build a team that will do something important in the coming years; therefore, people should stop acting like the plan was always to deliver straight away.
“For me, personally the problem is in general, you, the press. You think it is the same Chelsea from years ago. It is not the same.
I don’t think since I am here, we are expecting more money than other clubs. It is about building something important. People have to trust us — we are going in the right direction.”
Maresca maintained that the Champions League is where the club should be because being able to compete in the best competitions comes with its own advantages for the club.
The Blues boss praised his players for their performance against Manchester United, applauding every single one of them for playing with aggressiveness up until the very end.
He concluded by saying that while some people continually write Chelsea’s young team off, his boys defeated an experienced Manchester United team last night.
“Off the ball I think we played a fantastic game, The team was very aggressive until the end, we tried to press higher, and I think we deserved to win the game.
It is nice to work on some solutions and then you score.
The Champions League is where the club belongs, competing in the best competitions.
“People like to write us off and call us young, but it’s an experienced Manchester United team and we did what we needed to do to get the three points.”
