Lampard vows Chelsea will come back stronger after heavy Bayern loss

Frank Lampard vowed Chelsea will gain experience from their heavy Champions League last-16 defeat to Bayern Munich and come back stronger next season.

Chelsea went down 4-1 to Bayern in Saturday’s second leg at the Allianz Arena to seal a 7-1 aggregate loss – the second-heaviest inflicted on an English team in the competition.

Robert Lewandowski scored twice, either side of assisting goals for Ivan Perisic and Corentin Tolisso, with Tammy Abraham registering what proved a consolation for the depleted visitors.

And after a disappointing conclusion to his debut campaign as Chelsea boss, Lampard conceded the Bayern rout has to be used as a learning curve for him and his players.

Our run in the Champions League comes to an end.#BAYCHE pic.twitter.com/EDnOZWtEBj

— Chelsea FC (@ChelseaFC) August 8, 2020

“It was a good exercise for us to go up against Bayern and their Champions League experience, with a lot of our players having debut seasons,” he told BT Sport.

“I can see where I want us to go and I know we’ll be back.

“They performed alright. It is difficult to say after a 4-1 defeat, and I’m not happy, but when you concede two early we did get back into the game after that…

“When you match our Champions League appearances to theirs, I saw lots of good things in the team and also some of the bad we have seen this season.

“We had individual errors that gave them goals and at this level that will finish you off.”

79 – Chelsea conceded 79 goals in all competitions in the 2019/20 season, an average of 1.44 per game – their worst ratio in a season since the 1990/91 campaign (1.64 goals per game conceded). Problematic. pic.twitter.com/rKF3NF0C2G

— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) August 8, 2020

Chelsea conceded seven times in a two-legged European tie for the first time, taking their tally of goals conceded this season to 79 in all competitions.

It is their worst record since 1990-91 and Lampard hinted he could strengthen at the back, having already brought in attackers Hakim Ziyech and Timo Werner.

“It is a work in progress. It is not the norm for Chelsea. We lost the best player in the league pretty much in Eden Hazard,” he said.

“People would not normally commend coming fourth for Chelsea. We want more but the feeling is we have achieved something with the group we have. Now is the time to think where we can improve.

“It is something we will look at. We have worked at it already. You feel we missed where other clubs spent and improved. 

“Recruitment is a huge part of football. Now is the time to see if we can improve and where we can improve. I feel like in a football sense I know where we can improve.”