Graham Potter side will travel to Germany to face Borussia Dortmund in Champions League round of 16
Graham Potter has warned Chelsea players to punch above their weight in their Champions League matchup against Borussia Dortmund.
If Chelsea had defeated West Ham United instead of drawing 1-1, they might have entered the Dortmund match with a more upbeat attitude.
They dominated for the majority of the game, but a careless error allowed the Hammers to equalise, severely hurting their chances of making the Champions League for the next season.
There are still 16 league games left to play, which will determine their Champions League fate. They are currently ranked ninth in the table, 10 points behind fourth-place Newcastle United.
Potter has received criticism for not putting it together He has rotated his squad multiple times in an effort to establish a winning combination, but so far it hasn’t been successful.
And now, in a post-game interview, he has counselled the players to defeat Dortmund rather than qualify for Europe the following year (h/t Football.London).
“In a knockout competition, anything can happen. That’s the thing,” he said. It’s two games. I don’t think it’s valuable for us to look past Dortmund.”
“We have the capability to beat Dortmund, but they are also a strong side with the capability to get a result as well. We have to understand that, go to Dortmund with humility and respect, and try to get the result.”
“Obviously, it’s a tough match against a high-quality opponent. But at the same time, our team has some good players.”
We have a team that is capable of winning, but Potter needs to figure out how to get the most out of them. Felix did his best to generate opportunities while playing in the middle of the attacking line and appeared at ease doing so.
And others could learn from Felix how to make games easier and discover ways to create opportunities, which have been lacking in past instances.
Dortmund is just as excellent as us, but we’ve been lacking one thing—failing to get along with one another—and if we can fix that, we’ll have a strong team.
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We simply hope that our performance against Dortmund will be positive and lead to a winning streak across all competitions.