Injury news? Koulibaly?
Yeah, out for a while still. I think it will be a tight call for the season, he's working away. Been impressed with him actually as a professional, he's doing his job very well. Unfortunately the injury is a bit of a tough one.
Cucurella, probably another two weeks or so. It was a two or three week injury when he first did it a week or so ago. Mason and Reece you know. Kai Havertz is in contention for the game, he’s trained.
A game for Aubameyang?
We’ll see, I’ve got Auba, I've got Kai, I've got David Fofana. I won’t divulge the team right here. He’s fit and ready.
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Would the Arsenal connection come into your thoughts?
Not really, well, possibly, because we all think a player going back to their old club gives a certain motivation. I haven't delved into that too much with Auba himself. I’ll pick that position on my feeling on how they’ve trained and what the team structure looks like.
Good time to play Arsenal or wounded animal?
It could be either way. I think they're very much in the hunt still to win the Premier League. Fantastic team, who have had a great season. If they’re wounded slightly that could give a big reaction, if we can make things difficult for them, it could feel different. That one is a hard one to call.
Do you think they really are still in with a shout of the title?
Of course. There's enough games left for jeopardy to be there at the top end and bottom end of the table I would say. I think they're fully in it. Manchester City are showing incredible form and we all respect that. You also have to respect what Arsenal have done this year and they'll believe they're still in it and rightly so.
Chelsea a club in distress?
Well we’re not in a great moment are we? I've been able to live this now for a few weeks and I also lived maybe 10 years of incredible success here and saw that continue, and was part of it again and then saw it continue.. I think it can be pretty normal, if you look at history of all of the top clubs in the league, of moments of tough periods. Our opponents tomorrow are a good example of that. They want to challenge for Premier Leagues and they are now. It's been a while for them. We have to put perspective on it and understand we have to try and work on all aspects as a club to get back to the feeling and position of where we want to be. That's not a given in this league and there's a lot of work to do.
Still relish getting up and coming to work?
Absolutely. I was eyes open when I came to this job. I'm too experienced in football as a player and now as a coach to understand things don't necessarily change overnight in terms of results. Our job is to work on performance and mentality of the group, to try bring back good feeling, firstly. Good feeling only comes with hard work. So I enjoy that challenge and I was very aware of the challenges coming in. I'm very proud to manage the club, I love being here and I enjoy doing my job.
The reality of football is, your career will not be full of successes. People will always remember successes, but part of the job is the tougher moments whether you’re a manager or player. You can’t always control results, but you can control how you work everyday. I enjoy that aspect of it.
Have you ever seen a dressing room so low?
They are low on confidence and also low on performance, so I think I shouldn’t distinguish that and make it all on confidence. You can only work to get a level of performance to then bring confidence back. I've been here in period when the confidence has been low because nobody likes losing games. I had moments here as a player where we dropped as a collective, and we had to lift it. Fortunately in those period when you look back, we managed to get it back through hard work, level of the squad. We changed manager a lot in some of those periods.
It's certainly not one to try and compare generations or eras. It’s just different now. In terms of the modern player, squad that we have here and what expectations are. The only thing we can do is consider the moment now and future as a club and work hard to get the squad where we want it andalso to get the players performing so that confidence word is a not a big word like I’m using in my press conference every week. At a club like this, you should work hard and the level of player, you shouldn’t be talking about team confidence. It’s clearly an issue at the minute which needs to be addressed. It only gets addressed with self responsibility in the first place throughout the club. to make it better.
Chelsea fans defended you to Brentford fans, even though results haven't been good, are you enjoying the connection again?
I’ve enjoyed that and that's very normal, I expect that from Brentford fans in a moment of good feeling for them. I said before and after the game what a good story they've been in the Premier League, so I certainly won’t moan about that. I think they were probably just reminded by the Chelsea fans that this club has had a lot of success in the last 20 years and they're probably trying to work to their version of success.
The 60 minutes against Real, a framework for Arsenal?
Every game is different, tactically, that will be different. In terms of togetherness of a group that connected on the pitch, the first 60 minutes versus Madrid was very, very good other than the last bit, so we have to find that last bit. We have to be connected and show that same motivation through the team and energy because Arsenal are a fantastic team, with very good players and a great team ethic. That's what makes great teams. We have to match that as a start, like we did against Madrid, to try to get a result.
Memories of working with Jorginho?
I like Jorgi, he’s a very, very good player. Part fo the team that went on to win the Champions League and a central figure in it. A good personality in the dressing room to drive the team. If he plays, he’s another good player in that squad. That’s the options that teams challenging for titles have. Sometimes you can change a player and not drop the level and bring in a different type of player in.
Arsenal made massive leap this season with the youngest team in the league. Having worked with the squad now can the core of group grow together and reach that level as well?
It’s interesting to compare the Arsenal story. We all had a little insight in the Amazon series. When you see what they are producing now and myself as a football person, the interesting thing about watching the series and before that I went up against Mikel at Chelsea in my first year, there is a long process to get to where you want to get to.
I remember playing against Mikel’s teams in the early stages which were sometimes five at the back, sometimes four, sometimes they build with a four and defend with a five. Now they have a very, very clear identity, and they have a clear, through recruitment, change of squad. Other than maybe the players that have come through, and you always need academy players to come through with a high level and they've had that. There has been a lot of work to that, through Mikel, through the team, through alignment, through good recruitment. If we talk about it as just happening this season, it's come overnight. I think you go back to the begining and all those tougher periods.
Do we have the possibility to do that? Yes. Will it take a lot of time and good decisions along the way? Absolutely yes. You can get there. Those things have been a credit to Arsenal because I saw and you remember the times when the manager was being questioned, the owners were being questioned and players were being questioned. That process can take two or three years which it has done. Within that two or three years you have to make a lot of right decisions and keep working in a good way. To be fair, from the coaching side, it’s great to see a club stick with a manager when maybe at another club they may have changed a manager two or three times. They're a great example of that done well and part of the answer to why they are where they are now, alongside very good coaching and good players.
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