Chelsea star makes surprise Club World Cup claim after falling to defeat

Chelsea winger Pedro Neto says he is “thankful” to be playing at the Club World Cup instead of enjoying a post-season break, with the Blues having now played two games at the tournament

Pedro Neto insists he would far rather be at the Club World Cup than sunning himself on the beach. The 32 team tournament in the United States has taken a lot of criticism largely because it means Premier League and other European stars will not get much of a summer break.

Chelsea have had a mixed start to their campaign after beating Los Angeles FC but then losing their second game to Flamengo when they also had Nicolas Jackson sent off. They must now face Club Tunis in their final Group match to guarantee their path into the knock-out stages but Chelsea winger Neto says he would not swap the Club World Cup for a holiday.

“We have to be thankful. We are here playing this tournament,” said Neto who was then asked whether he would rather be in the US rather than the beach. “I’m 100 percent sure.

“We have to enjoy it. There would be a lot of players that would love to be in my place, We are always confident. We are Chelsea, we play to win and we have an unbelievable team.”

Chelsea defender Marc Cucurella was brutally honest about their mistakes against Flamengo – and admitted they have been making them all season. Cucurella said: “We need to have more passing, control better the situations and not concede another easy goal similar to the first one.

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“It’s true that these things happened a lot of times last season in the Premier League but we are here to learn, to see the clips to see where we can improve and then do better in the next game.

“But we can still go through and maybe we can learn from this and that’s it. I think if I remember in the last ten games we played, we had a lot of clean sheets so we are doing better in this aspect.

“But Flamengo also have a good team and they are in the middle of the season and physically did better than us in this moment. They also played in the heat and maybe these things we can control better in this moment and we can learn but it’s better it happens now in these stages rather than in the later rounds.”

Flamengo have now beaten Chelsea and Botafogo also upset pre-tournament favourites Paris Saint Germain. It would be a surprise if a Brazilian team won it but Cucurella insists they have the advantage of just starting their season and the Spain defender insisted that the Premier League is still the best in the world.

He added: “I think the Premier League is the best league in the world but it’s true that it can be very different from one team to another and it’s not only this game, you can see the other results and the momentum they have is different to European teams.

“The conditions are not the same as well for European teams and it’s not an excuse, it’s a reality and it’s one of the reasons. Flamengo have a lot of talent but if we play in another moment then we can maybe beat them.

“Maybe now is the moment to lose and if you are going to lose then it’s now and if we go through that is the moment to show our qualities.”

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