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Lampard blasts Mourinho’s claim he copied Conte

Frank Lampard has shot down Jose Mourinho’s suggestion he used Antonio Conte’s tactics to beat Tottenham on Sunday.

Chelsea ran out 2-0 winners in an impressive performance which saw Lampard outsmart his former coach, Mourinho.

Lampard was not impressed with Mourinho’s suggestion.
Lampard was not impressed with Mourinho’s suggestion.

Lampard was unimpressed with Mourinho’s swipe at him and insisted his system is different to the one Conte played when he won the Premier League with Chelsea.

‘No, it didn’t factor in at all,’ Lampard said in response to Mourinho’s accusation he copied Conte’s tactics.

‘I don’t know if I want to go through all the players, but I’m sure half of them weren’t here [in Conte’s time].

‘I know [Fikayo] Tomori wasn’t, [Mason] Mount wasn’t, [Tammy] Abraham wasn’t, and I’m not trying to clone anyone’s system.

‘I think Conte’s system was an incredible one that won the league at Chelsea, but the way I play it and the message I give is different.

‘It’s not as simple as if you play 3-4-3 you’re cloning somebody else, otherwise you’d all be cloning each other.

‘It was more a question of “Can this system help us defensively and offensively against Tottenham and the way they play?”

‘It was my choice to play it, not to do with whether players understand it. Having said that, the players took the plan on incredibly well as we all saw.’

Tottenham had Son Heung-min sent off and struggled to break a compact Chelsea down, as well as contain a brilliant Willian.

While Mourinho conceded Chelsea were the better side, he suggested the Blues were still using the same tactics they did under Conte.

‘They were better than us in the first half. It is not difficult for me to admit it,’ Mourinho said.

‘They played in a system they are very comfortable with. A system they played for two years with Antonio Conte. Lots of their players are very comfortable with it.

Read Also: Mourinho aims dig at Rudiger after Chelsea beat Tottenham

‘It’s easy for me to admit they were superior. But you look to the goals and they are not a consequence of any superiority.

‘The first goal is a short corner with a big mistake. We know how to defend short corners, we train how to deal with short corners. The players involved were not focused.’

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