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Five from training: Recover and reset

Chelsea were straight back to work at Cobham today, refreshing following yesterday's win over Aston Villa and beginning preparations to go again at Southampton.

It is a quick turnaround for the Blues between the first two of our three Premier League fixtures in eight days, with the first order of business at Cobham to shake off any fatigue for those who played on Sunday afternoon and recover in time to do it all again.

We put in an excellent performance last time out to stroll to a 3-0 victory over Aston Villa, with Nicolas Jackson, Enzo Fernandez and Cole Palmer all finding the net and earning praise from head coach Enzo Maresca, ahead of recovering today with the rest of the players who started against Villa.

Our head coach will no doubt be hoping for more of the same when we return to Premier League action in a couple of days, having been impressed with how we played at Stamford Bridge yesterday.

'It was a very good performance, on the ball and off the ball,' said Maresca. 'I think we competed quite well.

'We have been doing that since we started, sometimes better sometimes worse, but as I have said many times I think we are going in the right direction.

'On the ball we played the way we prepared the game, because Villa is a very difficult team. They are top defensively, it is very difficult to find space.

'They don’t press, they just wait, so you have to be patient, if you force it you lose the ball and you concede. Off the ball we were very aggressive, we were pressing.'

However, the squad's attention has quickly moved on, as focus today turned to the upcoming away trip to Southampton on Wednesday evening.

Those not in yesterday's starting XI were out on the training pitch on Monday as preparations for the next game got under way at Cobham and the Blues get ready to go again in the Premier League.

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