Maresca: Chelsea still not ready to challenge big guns

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Enzo Maresca insisted Chelsea are still not yet ready to challenge Manchester City, Liverpool and Arsenal despite a hugely impressive victory over Aston Villa.

The Blues won 3-0 at Stamford Bridge and are level on points with Arsenal.

First-half goals from Nicolas Jackson and Enzo Fernandez put them in control before Cole Palmer added a late third.

But head coach Maresca said: “We are not ready to compete with Liverpool, Arsenal and City for many reasons.

“Just because we won today I’m not going to change my idea. We’re not ready for that. But the good thing is that we are improving and hopefully very soon we can be there.”

“Arsenal, Liverpool, (Manchester) City players have all lived finals and competed for titles. We’re going to be there soon but it’s the reason we are still far and not yet ready to compete.”

Meanwhile, Maresca expects Chelsea to be without Wesley Fofana for a number of weeks.

The injury-plagued defender limped off with a hamstring problem and faces another spell on the sidelines.

Maresca said: “Unfortunately it is bad news.

“It is a hamstring problem and these kind of things usually require at least three, four or five weeks, but in this moment that means we lose him for 10 or 12 games.

“The way he was playing, it’s a big loss for us, but we have more players and we will try to find a solution.

“It’s a big loss because he’s doing fantastic, but it’s normal when you play this amount of games unfortunately.”