Aston Villa 2-1 Chelsea: 'Toughest defeat of the season' explained as Enzo Maresca issues demand | OneFootball

It was another defeat for Chelsea on the road in the Premier League as Aston Villa completed a comeback to claim a 2-1 win at Villa Park on Saturday night.

A Marco Asensio brace cancelled out Enzo Fernandez's tap-in from close range after nine minutes to hand Chelsea a third straight defeat in all competitions.

Chelsea were punished for their lack of quality in both boxes, with Asensio taking advantage of individual errors to win the game for the hosts.

Filip Jorgensen, who has replaced under-fire Robert Sanchez in recent weeks, made a huge error to compound Chelsea's goalkeeping problems after allowing a fairly tame Asensio shot to go through him in the 90th minute to ensure the Blues left the Midlands point-less.

It left head coach Enzo Maresca rueing Chelsea's missed opportunities, including Cole Palmer's one-on-one chance with Emiliano Martinez in the 76th minute, with the Italian admitting it was the 'toughest defeat of the season'.

"This is, for me, probably the toughest defeat of the season," Maresca told reporters post-match. "The reason why is because the reaction from Brighton was brilliant, the performance was very good and unfortunately, in this moment, it is not enough. That's why it is a tough one.

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"I don't think we deserved to lose the game, to be honest. In this league, you have to be clinical. The difference most of the time is inside of the box. Unfortunately at 1-0 up we had some chances and didn't score, at 1-1, we had some chances and didn't score. In the end, anything can happen and unfortunately we lost the game."

Fortunately for Chelsea, who are now in seventh place in the Premier League, their bid for Champions League qualification has only been dealt a minor blow after Nottingham Forest and Bournemouth suffered defeats

Chelsea have two extremely favourable games awaiting them next in the league, playing both Southampton and Leicester City, who are likely to be relegated as things stand, to get their season back on track. There will be nowhere to hide if maximum points aren't claimed. It's non-negotiable.

Maresca took the positives and will accept nothing other than his side going again to try to get back to winning ways to quieten the frustrations.

"We have 12 games to go - and again, my feeling is that winning one, we go again," concluded Maresca.