Graham Potter 'owed' by players for sticking up for them, Chelsea star admits

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Graham Potter 'owed' by players for sticking up for them, Chelsea star admits

Ruben Loftus-Cheek has said that Chelsea's players "owe" Graham Potter for the manager's continued defence of their performances.

The Blues have endured a torrid 2022/23 season despite spending the guts of £600m over the last two transfer windows on new players.

Chelsea currently sit mid-table in the Premier League and on the brink of elimination from the UEFA Champions League having lost their first leg clash with Borussia Dortmund 1-0, though their spirits were lifted on Saturday with a vitally important win over Leeds United.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Chelsea's poor run of form has seen Potter face up to a barrage of criticism in recent weeks, with some tipping the former Brighton boss to lose his job if results do not turnaround fast despite publicly receiving the backing of Todd Boehly.

Now, ahead of the reverse fixture with Dortmund at Stamford Bridge, Loftus-Cheek has admitted that the players themselves owe Potter a debt of gratitude for fronting up and taking the brunt of criticism, and suggested that the squad remain behind the 47-year-old.

“We definitely owe it to the manager. He is obviously a fantastic manager, no can argue against that after what he has done with Brighton and other things," Loftus-Cheek said, via the Evening Standard.

“It is up to us as well. We have massive respect for the manager, the way he has been sitting in front of the media with us in this poor form. And he has stuck up for us players.

“So we owe it to the manager to perform as best we can on the pitch and turn things around.”

Loftus-Cheek's comments come days after teammate Kalidou Koulibaly described Potter as a 'great manager' who was handling the pressure of such a big dressing room well, and the England midfielder added that "mediocrity" is simply not acceptable at the club.

“A team like Chelsea, we can’t accept mediocrity. We understand we have been mediocre in this recent run, and we are not just accepting it.

“It might look like that from the outside, but that is not the case. We are hurting from the losses and the draws, because it is not in us as Chelsea players and we are fighting our hardest to turn it around."