Antonio Conte has blamed fatigue for Chelsea’s lacklustre performance against Leicester City in their 0-0 draw at Stamford Bridge.

While Chelsea threatened in the first few minutes, Leicester were the more dominant team in the first half as they raided the Chelsea defence in the opening 45 minutes at an alarmingly regular rate for Conte and his coaching staff.




In the first ten minutes Leicester wasted three good opportunities to score and fluffed their lines when it came to finishing off the chances. Chelsea looked ragged in defence and the Foxes continued to remain wasteful in front of goal.

Chelsea also created a few chances of their own, but they failed to punish the away side's profligacy. Claude Puel’s men continued to play the early ball to Jamie Vardy, who kept the home side’s defence on the edge throughout the first half.
 


Puel’s men had 12 attempts on Chelsea’s goal in the first half, the most for an opposition team in opening 45 minutes of football in the Premier League for 15 years.  

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The away side continued to remain the brighter team in the opening exchanges after the break and had a penalty claim rejected when Andreas Christensen brought down Riyad Mahrez inside the box.

However, an under pressure Chelsea side were handed a lifeline when Ben Chilwell received two yellow cards within a space of five minutes to be sent off the pitch in the 68th minute.

With an advantage of an extra man, Chelsea sensed an opportunity to win a game they were second best until the final 20 minutes, but they failed to create the clear cut chances to open the ten men of Leicester up.

The home side had one last chance in stoppage time when they had a free kick from 25 yards out, but Marcos Alonso sent the ball over the bar and the game ended in a 0-0 stalemate.

Conte feels most of his top players were tired after the grueling first leg of the EFL Cup semi-final against Arsenal and it showed in their performance.

The Chelsea manager believes Leicester with their energetic style of football were the worst kind of team for his team to face after a tiresome week.

Conte told the BBC’s Match of the Day programme: "I think we played with a lot of top players against Arsenal, and then again today against a very good team. I think a lot of our players were tired.

"In the first half Leicester ran more than us, they played better than us.

"But we knew we were playing against a good opponent, maybe the worst opponent we could have played in this moment.

“We suffered a lot in the first half."

Chelsea have now been involved in three consecutive 0-0 draws in all competitions for the first time in the club’s history.

However, the Blues became the second team in the Premier League to keep 400 clean sheets after Manchester United, who have 430.