YULE BE SORRY

Sarri fires warning to his stars: No more festive failures

MAURIZIO SARRI has revealed he will be talking to “four or five” of his players to try to solve Chelsea’s Christmas wobble.

They lost 1-0 at Stamford Bridge to Leicester on Saturday, their first home defeat of the season but a third in the last month.

They have a tricky Boxing Day trip tonight to Vicarage Road – where they were thumped 4-1 in February – to take on a Watford side buoyant after winning at West Ham and unbeaten in their last three games.

Once again against Leicester, Chelsea’s lack of a reliable striker came back to haunt them.

They have had talks with Juventus about taking over Gonzalo Higuain’s loan spell at AC Milan, and the Argentinian is keen on the move.

It is a deal that could see the unhappy Alvaro Morata go the other way on loan to replace Higuain. Chelsea are also interested in Lyon’s Nabil Fekir.

Sarri (above) though insisted it was a problem of not having the right mentality that was hurting his team. The angry Italian said: “Right now, we have to think about us. Only about our team.

“The most important thing is our reaction to this result. In the match, the reaction was not right.

“I have an idea about what happened. I want confirmation – so I have to speak with my players.

“I want to speak with the group, first of all. Then with three, four or five players.

“We have to do everything to avoid the same problem in the future. It’s not easy. We’ll prepare a video, as we do for every match. And an individual video, with individual mistakes.”

After each of their previous two league defeats, Sarri was critical of the way his team reacted after conceding. It happened again against Leicester, Chelsea losing their shape and discipline after Jamie Vardy’s 51st-minute goal.

Sarri said: “It’s clear we didn’t lose because of the way we were playing. We were a bit unlucky. But the reaction after the goal was in the wrong direction. We had only to continue. We were in full control of the match.”