I was not happy with my team - Mourinho frustrated by Chelsea first-half display The Blues boss says his side were impressive in the final 30 minutes of the 1-1 Champions League draw with Maribor, but paid the price for a disappointing first-half showing By Sam Lee Nov 5, 2014 22:55:00 Jose Mourinho admits he was not happy with Chelseas first-half performance in their 1-1 draw with Maribor. The Blues would have qualified for the Champions League last 16 had they won in Slovenia, but must now wait until match day five at the earliest when they play Schalke in Germany. Eden Hazard missed a late penalty and Diego Costa had a goal wrongly ruled out for offside, but Mourinho says the poor performance in the first half ultimately proved costly. In the first half we didn’t play well, he told Sky Sports. After their goal we played very well and normally we should win the game, but when you don’t play well for 90 minutes you risk, and in the last 30 minutes when we played really well, intense, and creative and with a big desire to win and had many chances to do it their goalkeeper was magnificent. Mourinho brought on Costa and Oscar at half-time and believes his decision to change the make-up of his team was vindicated. I was not happy with the team and I was not happy with the performance, I changed at half-time with the conviction that the team was going to improve and I was proven right. They scored and their belief was high and the pressure on our team…the players start feeling it a little bit but as I say we created a lot of chances and the goalkeeper was really really good. The Portuguese was also delighted with Hazard, who was foiled by keeper Jasmin Handanovic in a one-on- one situation before seeing his spot-kick saved. When a player plays as well as Eden Hazard did, for me he was absolutely fantastic, by far the best player of my team. A player with a performance like this can miss a penalty and can still be the best player on my team. We paid the price for a not good first half, and their goalkeeper was fantastic. Replays showed that Costas disallowed goal should have stood as Cesc Fabregas was level with the last defender, but Mourinho would not be drawn on referee Daniele Orsato, though he did hint at his unhappiness. I think we deserve to win but with this referee I have a long story from my Italian times but I don’t want to go in that direction. It’s also important to praise a team with a different power than we have, they gave everything and played very well for their point.
Posted on: Thu, 06 Nov 2014 06:11:20 +0000
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