Frank Lampard insists he still loves being at Chelsea and is relishing the challenge of turning the club’s fortunes around.
Lampard has lost all five of his games in charge since returning to the club earlier this month for a second spell as manager, this time as caretaker, after Graham Potter was sacked.
Chelsea were booed off at half-time during last week’s 2-0 home defeat to Brentford, which extended their winless run in all competitions to eight matches, and sit six points adrift of the Premier League’s top 10.
They play at title-chasing London rivals Arsenal on Tuesday and when asked if he still relished coming into work, Lampard said: “Absolutely. My eyes were open when I came into this job.
“I’m too experienced in football as a player and now as a coach to understand that things don’t necessarily change over night in terms of results and we’ve seen that.
“Our job is to work on performances and mentality of the group in training to try and bring back a good feeling. That only comes with hard work.
“I enjoy that challenge and I was very aware of it coming in. I’m very proud to manage the club. I love being here and I enjoy doing my job.
“The reality in football is your career will not always be full of success. People will always remember the success, but part of the job is the tougher moments, whether you’re a manager or a player.
“You can’t always control the results, but you can control how you work every day, so I enjoy that aspect of it.”
Chelsea’s Champions League hopes have also been dashed under Lampard after a 4-0 aggregate defeat to Real Madrid and the former Blues midfielder faces another huge test of his managerial credentials against the Gunners.
“We’re not in a great moment are we?” Lampard said. “But I’ve been able to live this now for a few weeks. I also lived maybe 10 years of incredible success here and saw it continue, and was part of it again, and saw it continue.
🆙 @afcbournemouth pull further clear of the bottom three pic.twitter.com/tmXThT89qb
— Premier League (@premierleague) April 30, 2023
“It can be pretty normal, if you look at the history of all of the top clubs in the league, (there are) moments of tough periods.
“Our opponents (on Tuesday) are good example of that. They want to be challenging for Premier Leagues and they are again now and it’s been a while for them.
“I think we have to put perspective on it and understand that we’ve got to work on all aspects of the club to get back the feeling and position of where we want to be.
“It’s not a given in this league and there’s a lot of work to do.”
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang could feature again after stepping off the bench against Brentford and Kai Havertz is back in contention after injury.
But Kalidou Koulibaly (calf) is still out and could miss the rest of the season.
Mason Mount (pelvis) and Reece James (hamstring) are also unlikely to appear in Chelsea’s last six matches and Marc Cucurella faces two more weeks on the sidelines.
