Pochettino expects Chelsea to bounce back against Wolves

Chelsea manager Mauricio Pochettino expects a strong response from his team on the heels of their 4-1 rout by Liverpool on Wednesday when they host Wolverhampton Wanderers in the Premier League on Sunday.

Pochettino was candid in saying his side were not good against Juergen Klopp’s league-leading Liverpool, but added Chelsea were on the receiving end of what he thought were two poor and potentially game-changing refereeing decisions.

“I think the performance wasn’t good enough. It’s important to be realistic that we were not good enough,” Pochettino told reporters on Friday. “But what I can say, after two days, some decisions happened in the game that maybe today we can talk about in a different way.

“At five minutes, we had one (penalty). It was so clear. Liverpool were better after 90 minutes. But if different things happen, maybe it provides us the confidence and the trust, maybe the direction of the game will be different.”

Chelsea had two penalty appeals turned down, with both checked by VAR, the first when Virgil van Dijk brought down Conor Gallagher and the second when the Dutch defender appeared to kick Christopher Nkunku.

Chelsea are 10th in the table on 31 points after 22 games, while Wolves are two points behind them in 11th.