Chelsea boss Mauricio Pochettino says he understands fans booing his players after their 0-0 draw at Bournemouth.
Ben Chilwell went to thank the away support at the final whistle and was met with a chorus of jeers, boos and abuse.
Asked about the reaction, Pochettino later said: “Because of expectation. No? I think the fans know if you invest the type of money people create in the media.
“Okay it is true, but this is an expectation. If you don’t win it is normal that the fans are not happy. But what I can tell the fans is the circumstance, that we cannot change, the reality we cannot change.
“We have too many players (out). Of course, we are a team that will be strong if we are all together. Even Manchester City, Arsenal, all the teams, with normal circumstances with all the squad fit of course can compete for everything.
“Why is it different for us? Why? It is because of what? We don’t have all the squad available from the beginning of the season. What can we do? For me, I have nothing to say. The fans can do whatever they want. We know what we need to do, we are strong in our belief.
“We have had bad luck. We had 12 injured (out) today. Plus Noni [Madueke], [Marc] Cucurella and [Moises] Caicedo. Then we have three, four young guys and two keepers on the bench. Okay, am I going to cry, am I going to complain? I need to accept this.
“The challenge and keep being positive. Of course, Bournemouth is a good team and is going to compete. Every team is going to compete and be difficult. Fair or not fair, that is the circumstance we need to accept and we need to be positive, and patient.
“We are not going to change in the way we are doing things and then we have our opinion, our reality. We assess the team and in our opinion, our reality, in our circumstance, we are doing very, very good things, more than people can expect. But Chelsea’s expectation is to win.
“I told you before the season, Chelsea is about winning. We are creating something and we need to believe, young guys need to feel what it means to be a Chelsea player and of course what it means to play in the Premier League.
“I can understand the emotion, football is about emotion. If the emotion was of course to complain because we did not win. nothing more. The fans, for sure they are going to help the team on Sunday to help the team against Aston Villa, to get behind the team.”
