Chelsea head coach Frank Lampard has assured that his team will come back stronger in the next season after the heavy defeat of 1-4 against Bayern Munich in the second leg of their Round of 16 tie in UEFA Champions League on Saturday. The result say Bayern moving to the quarterfinals with an aggregate scoreline of 7-1.
“We were caught cold early on with the two goals in the first part of the game, which is disappointing, but I want to focus on the resilience and performance levels of a lot of players in the team,” said Lampard as quoted on the official website of Chelsea.
The Chelsea boss further said that match against an opponent like Bayern Munich will serve good experience to most of the young players who played their first top-flight season.
“It is a good exercise for us, to look at a team like Bayern and the Champions League experience they have in their ranks, hundreds of appearances through their team, and we had young players in their debut seasons. Reece James went toe to toe with top players and put in an incredible individual performance,” Lampard said.
“A game with this high-level opponent is going to stretch you and strain you, and it will be an experience for Reece and Callum and Tammy and Mason. What I saw is young players staying in a game, showing their quality and fighting until the end,” he added.
However, the former Chelsea midfielder admitted that the players failed to capitalise on some of the half chances that they had earned after Tammy Abraham had reduced the gap. He said that it was disappointing to lose as there were moments when Chelsea played on equal terms.
“I could see where I want us to go, for the good and the bad. We competed well in the game, we got to 2-1, and we then didn’t make the most of a couple of half-chances. Then we concede disappointing goals which were individual errors on the pitch. It was an interesting game, there was a lot of good, we are disappointed to lose, but we will be back,” the 43-year-old former England international explained.
Bayern Munich’s star striker Robert Lewandowski kept his scoring form intact with a brace. Such has been his brilliance in this fixture, that Lewandowski has been involved in all of the seven goals that Bavarians have scored in both the fixtures.
Ivan Perisic and Corentin Tolisso were the other scorers of the night for Bayern Munich at the Allianz Arena.
Abraham scored the only goal for Chelsea in a match where the team from west London achieved the undesired landmark of conceding the most number of goals in a knockout fixture in Champions League in the club’s history.