Conte: I will not fall prey to curse of the champion

Antonio Conte will make a fresh plea for signings next week after admitting he fears becoming the third Premier League champion to be sacked.

Conte has spent £130 million this summer but is growing increasingly concerned that his squad are not strong enough, two weeks before the start of Chelsea’s title defence.

The Italian arrives back in England today and will step up his bid to sign players, with Juventus left-back Alex Sandro, Arsenal’s Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Bayern Munich midfielder Renato Sanches all in his sights.

And Conte has revealed he is desperate to avoid following in the footsteps of former Chelsea managers Jose Mourinho and Claudio Ranieri, who were both dismissed months after winning the league, the latter at Leicester.

“We know the next season will be tough and we want to avoid what happened in the previous season for Chelsea, two years ago, when the team finished in 10th place in the Premier League,” he said. “We want to try to avoid this. I want to try to avoid what happened two seasons ago.

“Two coaches have been sacked from Chelsea and Leicester after winning the league and I want to avoid this and the players want to avoid the bad season they had with Mourinho.

“We are working very well and we hope to find the best solution in the future. We have a lot of young players and if necessary we will have to try to play these players.”

Conte’s squad will also be weakened by the likely sales of Diego Costa and Nemanja Matic, while former captain John Terry, Nathan Ake and Nathaniel Chalobah have already left.