Chelsea appointed Maurizio Sarri last summer as their new manager and the club’s first goal was to get back into Champions League after missing out this season.
But for the longest time, it looked like the Blues would fail to achieve this target given how the other contenders were performing and also how the Blues themselves had been dropping points.
During the course of the season, Sarri had received a lot of stick especially with his rigid team selection and his stubbornness at not giving more game time to a number of bench warmers.
Now though, the manager has come out to claim that three players(Loftus-Cheek, Hudson Odoi and Ross Barkley) have shown good improvement this season.
“I think that in my job the first target is not to win a trophy, the first target is to improve players,” Sarri said.
“We are trying to do it and in my opinion, some players improved, especially the young players; Callum, Loftus.
“Not only the young players, because in my opinion, Barkley improved.
“I think we had a lot of problems but the work is going in the right direction, I think.
“I think that we reached the target of the club (by qualifying for the Champions League), so we are really happy with this,” Sarri said.
“Now we have to play in another competition. The target is to reach the final and the final target is to win the competition.
“Our feeling is that we deserve to win a trophy. So it’s a very important match.”
Barkley has been used in tandem with Mateo Kovacic in central midfield but now that Chelsea’s appeal against the transfer ban has been upheld it looks like Barkley is set to get a more consistent role next season.
As for Hudson Odoi, a number of top European clubs have shown interest in signing him but Chelsea are hopeful that they can hold onto him by making him sign a new contract.
