Chelsea midfielder Nemanja Matic has stressed that the ability to grind out results while not playing well is the hallmark of a championship-winning team.
Jose Mourinho’s men are at the top of the Premier League table, seven points of second placed Arsenal, with a game in hand.
Chelsea need another eleven points to guarantee the league title this season and many believe there is very little chance of the Blues slipping up in the final stretch.
However, the west London side have not been putting up the best of performances of late and only a late winner from Cesc Fabregas last weekend helped them to garner all three points against relegation threatened Queens Park Rangers.
But Matic feels that the ability to grind out results has always been the hallmark of champions and he saluted the resilience the Chelsea team have shown to keep their title charge on track over the last few weeks.
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“This is very important because whoever wants a title has to do things like this”, Matic told the club’s official website.
“Especially the last three games were very difficult and we showed we have good character and we showed lots of qualities.”
He admits that Chelsea would ideally like to score early goals and put the game to bed sooner rather than later but he also stressed that it is not always possible to play at a certain level all the time.
“Of course we always try to score early but it is not always possible, although especially early in the season we scored a lot of times in the first 10 minutes.
“We still have seven games and maybe we start again to score in the beginning of the game, but every game is a different story.”
Chelsea would surely like to score an early goal against an in-form Manchester United side later today at Stamford Bridge.
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