Frank Lampard has explained how he wants fluidity in his Chelsea midfield.

Mateo Kovacic has excelled this season and recently credited expanded freedom from Lampard for his performances.

When asked about the Croatian's comments, Lampard said: "You can call it freedom but it is just how I want us to play.

"Particularly in some games we have had to break teams down and we need to be able to move, we can't be too predictable and rigid in our positions. There is freedom to interchange, and the three who played at Watford can do all the roles so I am happy for them to be fluid.

"I also want them to be positive in their play and play forward passes when they are on, and go by people if that is one of their attributes, like Kovacic has to travel with the ball at pace.

"It is hugely important in terms of how I want the team to play to be able to accept the ball in uncomfortable areas.

"We are trying to be fluid in the movement of the ball and that does means moving it through central areas a lot and we need to be able receive the ball and move it in tight areas. It is a huge attribute of a lot of our players.

"In the first game against Ajax with the pace of the game, if you are not ready to accept the ball then it will find you out very quickly. We train on that sort of stuff and the players are talented on that, but we can always get better because the best teams do it even better than the rest."