Chelsea boss Graham Potter on the Palace win and Mykhailo Mudryk signing
As quoted on BBC Live, Chelsea boss Graham Potter thought that his team played well to beat Crystal Palace, but understands the context and shared his view on Mykhailo Mudryk signing.
Chelsea beat Palace 1-0 in a tightly-contested London derby at Stamford Bridge. The win stopped the run of three defeats in all competitions.
While the game was going on, the Blues announced the signing of Mudryk from Shakhtar Donetsk. He was unveiled to the fans at the stadium at half-time as well.
Here’s what Potter said about the victory and the signing of the Ukrainian winger (h/t BBC Live):
“Today we are happy for the three points. Overall we played quite well, they had their moments as well but today was about getting the victory – park it as three valuable points against a team that was pushing as well.
“We try to play well and I thought at times we did, you have to understand the context of the situation we are in so it isn’t going to be sensational football all the time. The boys have worked hard.
“He [Mudryk] is a young player with exciting quality in the final third. He is very fast and direct and I think the crowd will like him.”
From where we were after the deflating defeat to Fulham on Thursday, this performance was a decent show from the team. It was not perfect as Palace had chances to equalise, but at the moment, game management won’t come naturally.
So, as much as the win was not convincing, Potter and his men would not care one bit about it. The key is to build on this though and show the improvement when we face Liverpool at Anfield next weekend.
The hope is that by the Liverpool game, new signing Mudryk will be ready to take the field. As touched upon by Potter, the Ukraine international has a lot of pace and excellent quality in the final third.
Going back to the Palace game, some of the positives were the performances of Thiago Silva and Trevoh Chalobah in defence. While he missed a few chances, Kai Havertz scoring the winner would instil a lot of confidence in him.
More Chelsea News:
- Graham Potter happy with the debut performance of Benoit Badiashile for Chelsea
- Chelsea defender Kalidou Koulibaly linked with shock exit
- Chelsea target Wilfried Zaha could only leave Crystal Palace in the summer
We can hope that this win kickstarts our campaign in the right direction. There is a long way to go before even thinking about a top-four chase, but this season is only halfway through. A lot of football is still to be played.