Chelsea manager, Frank Lampard has blamed his side 2-1 loss against Wolves on fatigue.
The Molineux outfit returned to winning ways by coming from behind to beat the Blues with an added-time winner from Neto. The win stopped Lampard’s side going top of the Premier League having gone in front through a fierce volley from Olivier Giroud.
Daniel Podence restored parity in the second half when he tiptoed through the Chelsea defence before wrong-footing goalkeeper Edouard Mendy with a shot that deflected in off Reece James.
Having being denied a winner by VAR decision earlier, the 20-year-old broke away in the 95th minute and fired a low strike into the far corner beyond Mendy to earn Wolves their second win in six games, thereby handing Chelsea their second successive defeat after they were beaten at Everton on Saturday.
“There could be some fatigue. I hate to say it after a defeat because it feels like an excuse but even in the first 60 minutes when we were the better team, we didn’t have a zip about us.
“We’ve travelled up to Everton, came back and then travelled to Wolves but everyone is in the same boat.
“We have a couple of injuries in areas which means I can’t make too many changes so I understand that side of it,” he added.
Will Chelsea be able to recover on time for West Ham after Lampard blamed Fatigue for the defeat at Wolves?
Chelsea has already played five games this December. It was a similar story against Wolves as witnessed during the visit of Spurs to the Stamford Bridge.
The Blues couldn’t get clear cut chances in the first half. The notable chance that occured during the half was a shot on target in the opening 45 minutes, Kurt Zouma hitting the crossbar and Giroud heading over from a corner.
But after the interval, the visitors improved and Giroud beat Willy Boly to Chilwell’s low ball to fizz a left-footed volley underneath Patricio. to give Chelsea the lead to score his seventh goal in as many games in all competitions.
However, it was not enough to stop the Blues losing consecutive top-flight matches for the first time since December last year.
Chelsea later found it hard to create further chances after Giroud’s opener, leaving the host to pick them out with pace and trickery in attack.
With the defeat, Chelsea could lose more ground on the top four since all the teams in the Champions League places still to play this week.
After this fixture, Lampard has at least another six days to prepare his team, with the hope of returning to winning ways against an in-form Hammers.
With the congested schedule, fatigue is not going to be a thing of the past very soon. So, Lampard must figure out a way of grinding out results or find his team lower down the top six, which the owner won’t want to see with over 200m pounds of investment during the summer transfer window.
