Thibaut Courtois has voiced his support for under-fire Chelsea manager Antonio Conte after his side were stunned 4-1 by Watford.
Monday’s defeat at Vicarage Road was Chelsea’s second by a three-goal margin in succession – five days after losing 3-0 at home to Bournemouth – and saw them lose ground in their chase for a Champions League place by missing out on a chance to overtake Liverpool in third.
Conte’s Blues are now a point behind Liverpool and just one clear of fifth-placed Tottenham and the pressure has increased on the Italian manager.
‘We believe in him and we believe in our team. We have two bad results and we just try to get back, regroup and just continue,’ Courtois told club’s website.
‘Obviously we are disappointed with the two results we have had in the last week, obviously it is not good, but we have to regroup in training, have heads high and continue the hard work and just continue what we were doing.
‘We have now two bad losses but we are a team with the manager, and everyone is positive about that, and we will try to do our best to win next week.’
Chelsea were reduced to 10 men against Watford when Tiemoue Bakayoko was sent off after 30 minutes before falling behind to Troy Deeney’s penalty 12 minutes later.
Eden Hazard equalised eight minutes from time, but late goals from Daryl Janmaat, Gerard Deulofeu and Roberto Pereyra condemned Chelsea to back-to-back three-goal defeats for the first time since 1995.
‘We showed that we wanted to fight, even with 10 men, and that shows we have character, but when you lose twice like that, it is not good and there are questions raised, but we go back to training with the manager, and training well and turn this situation around,’ Courtois added.
Chelsea started 2018 second in the table with a Carabao Cup semi-final tie to contest but were beaten over two legs by Arsenal. The Blues have won just one of their five Premier League matches so far this year.
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