Tribal Football

Maresca proud tactics worked as Chelsea stun PSG in CWC final

Paul Vegas
Maresca proud tactics worked as Chelsea stun PSG in CWC final
Maresca proud tactics worked as Chelsea stun PSG in CWC finalHeuler Andrey / Zuma Press / Profimedia
Chelsea boss Enzo Maresca was proud of his players after their shock Club World Cup final triumph against PSG.

Chelsea thumped PSG 3-0, with the European champions having Joao Neves sent off late on. Cole Palmer struck twice, with Joao Pedro also scoring on the day.

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Maresca was praised afterwards for his tactics and said: "We tried to plan the game thinking that it was going to go well and that things were going to go well. We had the same thought today. The idea was to go man-to-man. I think PSG are so good that if you give them time, they are going to struggle.

"In my personal opinion, you have to press them very intense. I think in the first 10 minutes, we were able to do it. In our ideal world, we have to do that for 90 minutes, 95, but we knew that because of the weather conditions, it was not possible to do it for a long time. But we tried to be very aggressive and not give them time.

"There are three midfielders, two of them were in charge of Reece (James) and Moi (Caicedo) this point, and Vitinha was in charge of Enzo (Fernandez). Analysing them, we saw that was a good opportunity to exploit that space, and we scored a goal on that side. It was just a game plan, as we said many times, we tried to use different game plans, and we tried to help the players to be in a position where they can give everything.

"Today, it worked quite well. But overall, I think, as I just said, it has been the effort from all the team, all the players, and I'm very happy, especially for them, because they deserve this moment."

 

I planned to win

Maresca added, "I want to say again that I have a lot of respect for Paris Saint-Germain, I respect their coach, but I planned the game to win it.

"Now, if it's Paris Saint-Germain or another team, what we try to do is help the players so that we can win the game. If you tell me, 3-0 in the first half, I tell you, I didn't expect 3-0. 

"But I did expect a game where the team would fight, and we are here for that. And I think that the team we have can compete against the team of this world."