Antonio Conte says “we played better than Chelsea” after 3-2 home defeat to Blues | OneFootball

Former Chelsea manager Antonio conte claims that his current side played better than his former side in the Champions League last night.

Napoli went 1-0 down early on in the game after a handball saw a penalty awarded to the away side, and midfielder Enzo Fernandez calmly slot home from the spot.

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Napoli then turned it on and went for it, coming out of the blocks knowing that they had to win the game to stay in the competition. They found two goals and were the much better side in that first 45 minutes.

Liam Rosenior didn’t help with his setup, playing a back three and only using one centre back in a big European away game. This was very naïve and he eventually changed it in the second half. It came as no coincidence that Chelsea then started to get on top of the game a bit more and eventually got back into it.

It needed some real individual quality and class finishing from Joao Pedro though, but his first goal was of a world class calibre without a doubt. His second goal wasn’t too shabby either and was a fine finish to put Chelsea 3-2 up and going on to win the game.

In the end, the game ended in equal 50% possession, but Napoli narrowly led the attempts on goal and shots on target numbers with 8 attempts vs Chelsea’s 6, and 5 shots on target vs Chelsea’s 4.

Conte on the game

After the game, in quotes picked up on X, Conte said:

“There is great pride and satisfaction because despite having more than half the team out, we played better than Chelsea, we deserved much more. Chelsea won the Club World Cup and has extraordinary players, but we played on an equal footing.”

He’s not wrong but not right!

I think Napoli were the better team in the first half but Chelsea edged it in the second. He’s right that it was equal footing though!