Reece James not making excuses after Chelsea throw away lead at Brentford

Chelsea captain Reece James said there was “no excuse” after his side threw away victory in the dying stages of their draw with Brentford on Saturday.

The Blues were leading 2-1 at the Gtech Community Stadium through Moises Caicedo’s 85th-minute thunderbolt when a long throw by Kevin Schade caused chaos in their penalty area, allowing substitute Fabio Carvalho to prod home the equaliser three minutes into stoppage time.

The lapse denied Enzo Maresca’s side the chance to finish the day on top of the Premier League and undid the good work done to turn the match around in the second half.

“It’s disappointing not to win,” James told Chelsea’s club website. “We came here to win and we found ourselves a goal down, and we adapted the way we played and got ourselves back into the game.

“We’re not happy with drawing but we’ll keep fighting. We’ll have to accept the result.”

Chelsea turned in a poor first half against their west London rivals and fell behind to Schade’s goal 10 minutes before half-time, the forward finishing well after beating Tosin Adarabioyo to a wonderful ball over the top from Jordan Henderson.

The second-half introduction of Cole Palmer, deemed not fit to start having not played since the opening weekend, was transformational. Within minutes he had levelled the match, finishing neatly after Joao Pedro had knocked down Enzo Fernandez’s lovely cross.

Caicedo then hammered Chelsea in front late on and at that point the visitors looked to have got away with their languid first 45 minutes to steal all three points.

Then came Schade’s long throw and Carvalho – himself sent on as a late change by Keith Andrews – arriving at the far post to scramble home.

“There are many factors as to why the first half wasn’t good enough,” said James. “It’s a difficult place to come and we’re coming into games after an international break and that’s always tough.

“It’s no excuse. We have super high standards here.

“They caught us on the counter (in the first half) and we were prepared for that, but we didn’t deal with it. The second one is a set-piece where they are super strong and we didn’t deal with it.

“We came to win, and we dropped points today. We are disappointed but the game is done now. It’s time to focus on the next game.”

Andrews defended his team’s use of the long throw to unsettle Chelsea.

“It’s been here for numerous years, it’s not new to us,” he said. “That was probably the last eight to 10 games of last season, big Champions League games it was quite prominent and I felt it would probably trickle down the game.”