Antonio Conte: Michy Batshuayi has 'great potential' after Chelsea debut

1/12
Tom Doyle20 July 2016

Antonio Conte has praised new Chelsea signing Michy Batshuayi after the striker impressed on his Blues debut against RZ Pellets.

Chelsea looked strong from the start during Wednesday evening's 3-0 win in Austria, with the Italian coach's side dominating the pitch and impressing the Worthersee Stadion crowd.

The Blues kept up the tempo in the second half, and the fans were rewarded with the surprise appearance of Batshauyi, given that the striker was not initially named among Conte's substitutes.

The summer signing had two chances to open his Blues account - first seeing a shot deflected over just after coming on, before having the angle closed after rounded Kofler - but showed his pace and desire to lead the line for the Blues.

Chelsea capped a fine performance as substitute Ruben Loftus-Cheek rose to head home completely unmarked six minutes from time, while Batshuayi had a goal correctly ruled out for offside soon afterwards before Nathaniel Chalobah added a fine third with the final kick of the game.

Conte was pleased with his side's display - and that of Batshuayi - saying: "Batshuayi is a young player. He has great potential. I am happy for him."

Conte lost his first game in charge of Chelsea 2-0 to Rapid Vienna, and was relieved to see his players turn in a much-improved performance on Wednesday.

"Today I wanted to see the improvement on our idea of football," he said. "I received a good answer.

"I saw a lot of good things today and also situations we can improve.

Bertrand Traore and Diego Costa celebrate
Getty Images

"It was nice to win, it’s important to have this habit for everyone’s mentality."

Conte was also impressed by goalscorers Loftus-Cheek and Chalobah, as well as defender Ola Aina - the latter receiving applause from the coach for a fine first-half block.

"Aina is showing the academy is a good school and it is very important for the club," he added. "It’s a new source.

"'In the future I want to see other young players like [Tammy] Abraham and [Dominic] Solanke.

"I am very happy to have young players to work with and that I can improve and permit to become Chelsea first team players, not young players."

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in