Maresca responds to claims his team struggled because of Club World Cup fatigue | OneFootball

Chelsea’s summer has been the subject of much debate among fans and pundits ever since the end of last season.

The Blues played at the Club World Cup through June and July, had just a few weeks off and then returned for a friendly double header last weekend before their Premier League campaign kicked off against Crystal Palace yesterday afternoon.

No team has even really had to deal with a summer like that before – and Chelsea did it all on the back of an exceptionally long season.

The assumption was that the players coming back without much of a break and with just 10 days training might struggle – but the evidence from the friendlies was that they still looked good. However things were far more sluggish against Palace yesterday.

Maresca denies preseason fatigue was an issue in draw

Enzo Maresca speaks to Channel 5 at full time.

Enzo Maresca was asked about this in his press conference yesterday, and denied his team had looked fatigued in comparison to their opponents, who had had a more conventional preseason:

“I don’t think so, because until the end we competed. We tried to win the game. I think we had some chances at the end with Estevao, with Andrey Santos. So that showed that probably we compete overall quite good,” the Chelsea boss said.

“For sure, they already played, I think, seven, eight games. And for us, last week we played two games, but we tried to share minutes. So the real game for us was today. But for sure, slowly, slowly we’re going to be better.”

Maresca has plenty of fresh players to mix in with tired stars

So he slightly contradicts himself there, but we know what he means.

It’s true that a lot of our players have had this exceptional summer, but there are also squad players and new additions who haven’t had quite the same punishing schedule, and a squad like ours should be able to compete at a high level despite all this.