Chelsea star Mason Mount has admitted the team needs to improve defensively on set pieces following the 2-1 defeat to Liverpool at the weekend.
The Blues were caught out twice in the first half by some well worked set piece plays by Liverpool, who scored through Trent Alexander-Arnold and Roberto Firmino, giving Chelsea a mountain to climb.
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N’Golo Kante pulled a goal back for Chelsea in the second half, but Mount admits it was hard for the team to come back from two goals down and that concentration needs to be better in set play situations.
“We had chances of our own and we could have scored. We look back at the second-half performance and take a lot of positives from it,” Mount is quoted by the Metro.
“I think Liverpool are a very, very good side and they started the game well from two set-pieces which you can’t do very much from that with their quality. I thought they didn’t create much in open play.
“So, I think we just need to be concentrated when the ball goes out of play so we are switched on and ready for anything to happen. It is set-pieces that are causing some trouble.
“They scored two and, when you go 2-0 down, then it is quite tough to get back into the game.
“I thought we were at the end but, if you switch off at set-pieces at this level, then you get punished. It happened twice so that’s something we will look at and we have been looking at. We need to keep working on it.”
While this could be taken as a bit of a dig at some of his team-mates at the back, Chelsea fans will surely mostly just be pleased to see this level of leadership from a talented young player.
The 20-year-old has made a fine start to the season for Frank Lampard’s side after being promoted to the first-team following a successful loan spell at Derby County.