Chelsea striker Diego Costa has revealed that manager Jose Mourinho has asked them to remain calm ahead of a key period for the club.
Chelsea find themselves six points ahead with a game in hand over their nearest title rivals Manchester City. With fixtures against Manchester United, Arsenal and Liverpool to come in the nine games that Chelsea have, the title race is still not over. However, it would be surprising to see Mourinho’s side let such a huge lead slip away in the matter of nine games as the Portuguese has past experience of winning the league and that too with ease.
Mourinho doesn’t let his side become complacent once they have a good lead at the top, and here is the proof of that:
In the 2004-05 season, Chelsea won the league ahead of Arsenal with a margin of 12 points and in the following season, they beat Manchester United to the title by a margin of eight points. In his two-year spell at Inter, Mourinho won the league with 10-point margin in the first season and managed to retain the title again, be it with a much smaller gap in the 2009-10 season with just two points. In the La Liga, Mourinho won the League in the 2011-12 season by nine points ahead of Barcelona. The stats clearly show that once ahead, Mourinho rarely allows his side to take the foot of the gas.
Costa admitted that Mourinho’s presence will be a huge factor in his side finally breaking a five-year spell without winning the Premier League, a Our manager has won different leagues and knows how to manage a situation like this.
a Like the great manager he is, he has told us what we need to do now, which is just to stay calm.
a Hea s right because everything depends on us now. We know that the Premier League is complicated.
a Ita s not easy so we know we have to improve. We all need to dig in and give something extra because we have this title in our hands and we cana t let it slip away.a
Mourinho’s side had a seven-point lead going into December but blew it away and gave City a sniff around January. However, the current Champions couldn’t build on that and have had a terrible second half of the season which has meant that they will now have to rely on Chelsea to slip up once again.
The blues host Stoke City on Saturday and could find themselves nine points ahead of Manchester City who don’t play until Sunday. However, they could be without Diego Costa who missed the international games due to a hamstring injury.