Enzo Maresca warns Chelsea stars what's 'completely wrong' as he fails to get carried away

Enzo Maresca continues to downplay any talk of a title race despite Chelsea’s thrilling comeback victory over Tottenham, which saw them reduce Liverpool’s lead at the top of the Premier League to just four points.

The Blues found themselves 2-0 down after just 11 minutes in North London, with Spurs capitalising on two slips by Marc Cucurella to score through Dominic Solanke and Dejan Kulusevski.

However, Jadon Sancho quickly pulled one back for Chelsea, who were fortunate not to see Moises Caicedo sent off for a high tackle on Pape Matar Sarr. This proved pivotal as Caicedo was later fouled by Yves Bissouma, earning Chelsea a penalty.

Cole Palmer converted the spot-kick and then brilliantly set up Enzo Fernandez for Chelsea’s third goal. Palmer added another from the penalty spot, his 12th of the season, before Son Heung-min scored a late consolation for Spurs.

Despite the win, Maresca urged his players to remain focused.

He said: “To be focused in the day-by-day, in our session, in the next game on Thursday then Sunday, because if you start to think in two games, three games or in four games where we are? It’s completely wrong.

“The main focus has to be enjoy the day off, with family or friends, but when they come back go again 100 per cent, train well, go for the game and no more than that.

“We are happy that our fans are happy. They can dream, they can think everything because on the outside it is quite clear, also inside, the reality is that I said many times for me we are not ready to be there, but the important thing is we improve day by day.”

While Maresca downplayed Chelsea’s title aspirations, he acknowledged the ingredients of the victory highlighted the mentality of the squad – the youngest in the Premier League. “This for sure is an important win,” he added.

“First of all for the way that it arrives because to come into this stadium, against this team and to concede two goals but to continue with the same plan on the ball, off the ball, it show how the players are in this moment mentally strong. This is important.

“Since we start, we are trying to work the way we want to play on and off the ball, but also we are trying to work in terms of mentality and togetherness.

“To come into this season to think you are going to win or compete without suffer or without some bad moments is impossible. We were ready for that. It is probably too much after 15 minutes to give away two goals but it is the perfect win probably because of this.”

Spurs’ woes under Ange Postecoglou continued as they slumped to another defeat, leaving them languishing 11th in the league. The return of Cristian Romero was cut short by injury just 15 minutes into the game, and both Brennan Johnson and Micky van de Ven were also sidelined later on.

A contentious incident occurred when Caicedo’s challenge on Sarr was deemed only a foul with VAR upholding referee Anthony Taylor’s decision. Postecoglou expressed his frustration, saying: “There’s a couple of decisions I thought today that definitely went against us.

“It almost feels like no-one is in control because everybody is scared to make a decision to overturn somebody else. Referees are scared to make decisions in case they get it wrong, VAR don’t want to intervene and I get that because you don’t want disruptions to the game. You just have to cop out.

“We worked awfully hard, but to give away two goals and you give away two penalties unnecessarily against a quality side anyway, you make things very difficult for yourself.”