Thiago Silva has blamed all of Chelsea’s team for the club’s defensive crisis, saying Kepa Arrizabalaga cannot be solely responsible for a leaking defence.
The Blues goalkeeper has been under even more scrutiny after his huge mistake led to Liverpool scoring their second at Stamford Bridge on Sunday.
However, Chelsea struggled throughout the 2019/20 campaign, conceding 54 Premier League goals.
The defence came under huge criticism over the season and Frank Lampard often chopped and changed his back line, without finding the perfect combination.
However, Thiago Silva, who is set to make his debut for the Blues in the Carabao Cup tonight against Barnsley, believes the whole team must take responsibility for the issues.
“It is always difficult when you are a big club because there are a lot of demands and all the players need to be aware of their responsibility in a Chelsea shirt. That is the way football is,” Silva said.
“But in my opinion that is not always the fault of the defence.
“People single out the goalkeeper or the centre-backs, but the main responsibilities come from across the team, starting up front.
“People will point out these errors but I am not here single errors or this and that. What I am here to do is to help the team on the pitch and meet the expectations.
“I am the type of player who communicates a lot on the pitch and also is encouraging and motivating to those around me so that we can achieve great things at Chelsea.
“In my vision, a team needs a solid defence, but people confuse things and think that defending is just the centre-backs, but the defence is the entire team, which starts with the player at the very front.
“If we have a solid defence and given the individual quality we have across the team we will be successful. But there needs to be an understanding that it’s not just the case for the defenders.
“We will be playing the attackers in with a good attacking ball but similarly, they need to help out in defence with marking. We have a very intelligent coach in Frank Lampard and he has been working on situations, namely where we have been below par.
“Little by little, we will do great things for Chelsea.”
Timo Werner admits Bayern Munich’s crushing victory over Chelsea in the Champions League “hadn’t exactly spoken in favour” of a move to Stamford Bridge but believes the club have since gone some way to addressing the problems made evident in the one-sided last-16 tie.
A quickfire double from Serge Gnabry and Robert Lewandowski’s 76th-minute strike put Bayern in total control of the clash and Chelsea’s hopes appeared to have been extinguished before the second leg had even kicked off.
Asked whether it was shocking watching Bayern’s comprehensive win over Chelsea, Werner told cfbayern.com, via the Metro: “I would be lying if I said it wasn’t like that.
“The 3-0 home defeat of Chelsea in the first leg against Bayern hadn’t exactly spoken in favour of going to London.
“I have to say that openly because with Leipzig we always played very good and close games against Bayern.”
Werner is confident Chelsea have learned their lessons from the loss and made up ground on Bayern in the short time that has passed.
“With Bayern showing Chelsea their weak points, the club was able to work on the pieces of the puzzle in order to catch up with the future Champions League winners Bayern,’ the attacker added. ‘That’s what Chelsea did.”
Chelsea defender Thiago Silva admits it will be “difficult” not being able to speak English but insists he is studying all week to ensure he is able to communicate with his team-mates.
The Brazilian, who turned 36 on Tuesday, arrived on a one-year deal from PSG with the option of a further year included.
After being included in the squad for tonight’s Carabao Cup tie against Barnsley, the veteran centre-back says he is committed to learning the language as quickly as possible.
“It’s going to be difficult, it always is with a new language,” said Silva.
“But you are speaking to someone who speaks Italian, French and Spanish and Portuguese. The tendency when you learn some languages, others come easier.
“I am going to learn English as quickly as possible. It’s quite uncomfortable for me, being here, giving this interview with someone else interpreting for me so I would like to give interviews in English soon. I’m studying Monday to Friday to speak English.”