Champions League: Jose Mourinho takes blame for Basel loss

Jose Mourinho has taken the blame for Chelsea’s shock 2-1 loss at home to Basel last night and admitted it was “one step back” in their bid for Champions League progress.

Chelsea had looked on course for victory when Oscar opened the scoring at the end of a tight first half, but the Blues squandered a number of chances to extend their lead and were stunned by late goals from Mohamed Salah and Marco Streller.

It was Mourinho’s first European game in charge of the club since his return this summer, but despite the loss at the weekend and again last night, Mourinho insisted there was no need to panic.

“I am the manager, I am responsible for everything,” he said.

“Especially after a bad result. In the good moments I want everyone to shine, in the bad moments I want everyone to keep calm.

“Tomorrow I will not wake up with a smile on my face but at seven o’clock I will work hard to get three points against Fulham.

“In the next match, we go to Bucharest (in the Champions League), we have to get the points to put us in the Champions League. We don’t want to play in the Europa League.”

Asked where it had gone wrong, Mourinho added: “I think they played well. I think in the first half they defended well because we had a lot of the ball but could not create many chances.

“Oscar scored at a good time for us and then I think they scored their equaliser at our best moment of the game, after we had a couple of good opportunities, and after that we were punished defensively.”