Blue is the color: Maresca activates his critics after Chelsea protected fourth position

A overjoyed Enzo Maresca stated Chelsea had emphatically responded their critics through qualifying for the Champions League and informed those that doubted his crew to “eff-off”. A 1-0 victory at Nottingham Forest showed Chelsea will play in Europe’s premier festival subsequent marketing campaign and Maresca suggested his squad to cap this season through successful the Conference League last on Wednesday.

Chelsea completed fourth within the Premier League after Levi Colwill scored the one function on the City Ground, leaping forward of Newcastle, who slipped to a final-day defeat at house to Everton. Maresca, this his first season in rate after becoming a member of from Leicester, praised his crew – the youngest in Premier League historical past with a median age of 24 years and 36 days.

“I didn’t have any doubt about the players,” stated the pinnacle trainer. “The doubt was from outside. All the ones that have the answers or the ones that have the truth, they were saying that we are too young, we are not good enough … They were saying that we were not able to win on this pitch because we are too young, because we are not experienced.

“Unfortunately for them, they have all been wrong. All the ones that have the truth and have the answers to everything. So in English, how do you say? Eff-off to all of them, because the players deserve that. The effort they have been doing is fantastic. Most of the time it [the noise] was from the outside was: we are not good enough, we are too young, we don’t have leaders, blah, blah blah, these kinds of things.

“We are in a business where people judge us because of results. Today, if we were not able to win the game, probably all of you [the media] would judge the season as a disaster. But it was not a disaster.”

Nuno Espírito Santo stated his Forest gamers would deservedly relaxation after returning to Europe for the primary time since 1995-96 whilst Chelsea’s center of attention turns to going through Real Betis in Wroclaw on Wednesday. “If we are able to win, I think we can say overall that it has been a very good season,” Maresca stated. “I already said that, for me, it was a good season but it can become very good if we are able to get Champions League and hopefully we can win on Wednesday.”