Maresca on Chelsea 3-0 Forest win that cost Postecoglou his job

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Maresca on Chelsea 3-0 Forest win that cost Postecoglou his job  18/10/2025  City Ground, Nottingham, UK

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00:00I don't know if you have a chance to speak with Andre Kostakoglu,

00:04because he's been in the director's box, but he's actually something that didn't suggest a real reaction to that.

00:11Yeah, I didn't speak with Angel, I didn't see him, but I just said I feel very sorry for him.

00:20I always say this is a business where if you don't win the game,

00:26the consequence for all of us is exactly the same, so sorry for him.

00:32What was it like for you watching from the director's box and it wouldn't be a Chelsea game?

00:39Very bad, very bad feeling to be there, I prefer to be in the dugout, to be honest.

00:45But yeah, we won the game, I think first half we struggled a little bit,

00:52off the ball I think we were good, on the ball we made some mistakes where we conceded some moment to them.

00:59Second half we were much, much better, for sure we can do better in terms of red card,

01:05that is a mistake, 3-0, you know, already one yellow card, we can avoid that.

01:09In the same time, I have to say that the desire from the players don't concede goal, it's important also.

01:17In the last four or five minutes, they were shouting, you know, each other, don't concede, don't concede.

01:22So the second yellow card from Malo, for sure, he can avoid that,

01:26but also show the desire that they were playing for clean sheet, they don't want to concede nothing.

01:31And it's important also, this.

01:33Dom, Eze, congrats on the win, Chelsea's third in a row, but just more on the red card.

01:39Again, it's something that we can do better, but I'm not concerned.

01:49I know that there are some of you that say, why is it not concerned, but I'm not concerned,

01:53because I like to analyse, it's a moment that we concede a red card, yes, we can avoid that,

01:59yes, for sure we can avoid that, but also for me, the desire of the players is important.

02:03Today with 3-0, 90 minutes, the game is finished. Malo can avoid that, because it's useless to make second foul in yellow card, for sure.

02:11But also the good part is Malo is showing that he doesn't want to concede nothing,

02:15they don't want to concede a goal, they are playing for clean sheet, so it's the balance, we can avoid that for sure.

02:22And in terms of the performance, you mentioned Chelsea maybe struggled a little bit in the first time,

02:27you obviously made those three substitutions and then the second half was much better,

02:30so you'll be pleased that that substitution worked, but does it maybe mean that you got the selection a little bit wrong originally,

02:36or would you not accept that?

02:38I always try to do my best, sometimes I'm wrong, sometimes I'm right,

02:42but in this moment it's more about protect players, we already knew that Romeo was not going to play 90 minutes,

02:49Romeo today's plan was 45 minutes, Moy cannot play 90 minutes,

02:54so the decision was start with Moy or start with Romeo, and Romeo needs confidence, needs boost,

02:59he needs to start the game, so that was the plan.

03:01Then Garner did fantastic games against Liverpool, so it was good to give him again the chance,

03:06Jamie was inside was okay, and I think Margio was good, but also we planned the game expecting them back four,

03:16not back five, I think back four with Joao Pedro as a nine was better,

03:21with back five Joao Pedro as a nine is not...

03:24If you remember West Ham away, back five we played Liam Delap, Joao Pedro.

03:29Fula Matou, we played Liam Delap, Joao Pedro against back five.

03:34So we expect them back four, but they were back five and then half-time we changed.

03:39Simon?

03:40You said before that you love Josh Actionpong, do you love him even more after that performance?

03:47And secondly, just on Guillaume, is that the kind of impact you wanted to make with the bench before you can start perhaps signing games?

03:55Yeah, exactly. I think he was inside 15 minutes against Liverpool, fighting with Van Dijk, Konate, Gravenberg, and he was very good.

04:03Today, after one minute of the second half, he won a corner against Morato, so we need that from Mark.

04:14And Josh, as you said, I already said many times that I really like Josh, we showed him confidence last season,

04:20and he's doing well, and it's important also that when you have Levi out or Tosin out that the other one, they are ready.

04:29Is there a balance with Josh, because he's obviously 19 and still developing, but he needs minutes to develop even more?

04:37Yeah.

04:38How do you manage that situation?

04:41Yeah, he needs to improve for sure.

04:44I think it's our duty as a coaching staff, it's my duty as a manager to try to help the players to improve,

04:52because we said many times, if we improve the players, we improve the team.

04:55So we are doing exactly the same with Josh, we work every day to try to improve him and to improve the team.

05:01I think the last couple will go down and finish with Peter.

05:04The team improved a lot after half-time, but the goals came so quickly after the break.

05:09Do you think what you said to them at half-time had more of an impact than the actual changes,

05:15particularly for the way the goals happened? Were you angry at half-time?

05:19No, my message at half-time was, guys, off the ball, the way we were pressing, we are good,

05:25on the ball we are not good enough, because in the first half we made three or four mistakes in the build-up,

05:30where we concede, like you say, lazy, no, lazy, silly, no, how do you say it in English?

05:35Lazy?

05:36Lazy.

05:37Yeah, I think the word is lazy.

05:40Yeah, anyway, lazy mistake, that we can avoid that, and second half I think also we adjust something tactically,

05:49and we were a little bit better.

05:52What's Italian word you want to translate to lazy? We'll look at that.

05:55Yeah, I don't think it's lazy, it's sloppy.

05:59Sloppy.

06:00Sloppy, sorry.

06:01I said silly, no, sloppy.

06:03Sloppy, yeah.

06:04Sloppy, no, we look sloppy on the build-up.

06:07We made some mistakes that were not good enough.

06:10Okay, we'll finish with Peter.

06:11Can I just check, firstly, on Enzo Fernandes, who wasn't involved in his time,

06:17and then also Wesley Barna, he had a concussion as well.

06:21No, yeah, Enzo had a small problem that at the moment we are not able to say if he can be available for Ajax or not.

06:31And Wes is just a way to try to protect a little bit him.

06:36For me, Wes is the same than Josh.

06:39I said many times that I really like Wes and he's going to play games, but it was just to protect.

06:44He's available for, he will be available for Ajax.

06:48Can you say protect?

06:49Yeah, in general.

06:51I think with Wes, what do we need to do with Wes, with Romeo, with Riz, is we need to do what we have done with Riz.

07:02Now Riz is playing three games a week, he's playing almost every game, he's fit, he's good.

07:07And we need to try to do exactly the same with Wes and with Romeo.

07:11I would love to have inside the pitch every game Romeo, Wes, Romeo, Wes, Riz, but it's not possible.

07:17It's not possible, we need to manage them.

07:19And the main target this season is try to rotate and keep all of them fit.

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