Chelsea boss Frank Lampard says his players performed poorly for their 2-1 defeat at home to Brighton.

It's three defeats from three games for the caretaker manager.

Lampard later said: "It was the most deserved one. I think at the moment, more than defeats, it's performance we've got to talk about. Wins only come with performance. In terms of performance that was the most disappointing one because we were well beaten in the basics of football. It's a really good Brighton team so we must give them a lot of a credit because they're a fantastic team and they can perform like that against pretty much anyone in the league.

"But we were short. A yard short, a tackle short, a fighting duel moment short and when that's not right you're not going to win games. You have to have the capacity to do that as well as the desire and at the minute we're falling short on that and need to turn it around quickly.

"I don't think it's for me to talk about where it's come from, it's for me to try and get to the bottom of it quickly and change it. We haven't got training time, I feel like we need training time but we don't have training time. The response has to be what we see on the pitch, particularly Tuesday coming. Maybe after Tuesday we have a little breather before Brentford.

"Things that are a must in a performance for Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, against Brighton who can play, sprints, recovery runs and getting up to people and recovering. Then when you've get the ball to stick to ideas that you want to stick to. We came away from that today and the capacity wasn't there today. It's one for me to get into because it's my job to, I'm here for this period. It's my job to get as many, or as much improvement as I can. From that performance today, we certainly have work to do."

Asked about the players' mentality, Lampard also said: "A hard one to divide up. Through each individual there will be different elements. I think physical is work and to be a top team there's no doubt you have to be towards the top of the physical numbers in the league. We have to aspire to do that and that's an individual thing and a collective thing.

"The mental side, we have to be there to support the players because I'm in it now with them. It's my responsibility as well. That's one individually to go around the group because a collective strong group only comes from the individuals amongst it. That's been the history of this club for 20 years.

"For whatever reason there can be some mitigating factors at the moment with some of the change. It can't be an excuse. It just has to be a factor you fight against to get where you want to be. From today's performance it's clear. I'm not going to dress today's performance up. I don't think the players would want me to. I'm not hanging the players out to dry because I see there's talent in that room. It's the Premier League so you have to have the extra bits and we were short of those today."