Sarri Perplexed By Second-Half Showing

Maurizio Sarri was at a loss to describe Chelsea’s performance in the second half of Sunday’s 2-0 defeat at Everton. The Blues, who could have gone level on points with fourth-placed Arsenal if they had won, were the better side in the first 45 minutes at Goodison Park but failed to make their dominance count and went in at the break level at 0-0.

It was a completely different display from Chelsea after half-time and they were undone by goals from Richarlison and Gylfi Sigurdsson, who saw his penalty saved before tucking home the rebound. Sarri struggled to explain just what went wrong in the second period, telling Sky Sports: “I don’t know and the players don’t know what happened in the second half.

I cannot explain it. We played the best first half in the season and we could have scored four or five and then suddenly we stopped playing. It’s very strange and we stopped to defend and counter-attack. “We were in control of the match and we played very well so we needed to continue but we didn’t defend at the start of the second half.

We changed the system but it was the same. “The problem was mental on the pitch, so the system and the tactics are not important. It wasn’t about motivation because we started very well. We have to play eight matches now and we have to fight for our possibilities.”