Jose Mourinho declared that he has turned Chelsea into a thing of beauty after 5-0 thrashing of Schalke that clinched qualification to the knock out stages of the Champions League as Group G winners.
The result equalled Chelsea’s best ever away success in the competition, a 5-0 victory over Galatasaray in Turkey 15 years ago, but it was the performance that really pleased the manager.
Goals from John Terry, William, Didier Drogba, Ramires and a KanKirchoff own goal provide Chelsea with a comfortable passage to the next round of the competition with a game to spare.
“The players are very serious,” said Mourinho. “Everything they do with big focus and ambition, but at the same time with this component, which is something new in Chelsea football –this happiness, this flair, this beauty. The way they are doing things, we are very happy. We are having good results and playing really, really well at this moment.
“I don’t remember Chelsea playing in this way away from home. Obviously, there have been great victories away from home with me, with Roberto, even with other managers. But this was very impressive. Very complete. I know, you are going to say Schalke were not good, they made mistakes, but the reality is that any team that played against us would feel it was very difficult. The players played a fantastic match.
“This was the whole 90 minutes. Sometimes when a team is winning 3-0, 4-0, 5-0, you make a mistake and allow the others to score. But no, we didn’t. the team were so solid. If anything, in the first half, we could have scored more goals. They must be very sad with this result, but my experience tells me that when we lose against a team who is much better than us, you have to accept it. They have to accept we were too strong for them.”
Chelsea remains unbeaten in all competitions and are top of the Premier League, but he is refusing to reassess his aims for the season.
“I don’t set targets,”said Mourinho.
“the target is to play well and, when you play well, you have more chances to get results. In this moment, we are very confident.
“We go match after match, step by step, Champions League we have one game in December but we are qualified and top of the group so that’s a good situation for us. We’ll see what happens at Sunderland and then Tottenham. We go step by step with this mentality.”
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