Cech: "We need to clean up the mess"

[BlueLion. 21,491]

Petr Cech's face said it all as Chelsea were yesterday dumped out of the FA Cup by League One side Bradford City.

The Bantams, famous for another recent "cupset" when they surprised Arsenal en route to the 2013 League Cup final, were truly magnificent as they came from 2-0 down to end up 4-2 victors at Stamford Bridge.

Chelsea were cruising through first-half strikes by Gary Cahill and Ramires, but when Cech was surprised at his near post by a powerful drive from Jon Stead, Bradford were reinvigorated and ended up worthy victors.

"It’s one of the biggest ever surprises in the FA Cup", Cech said in an interview with chelseafc.com. "It’s one of those where it can always happen. Obviously we are not proud of the result but I wouldn’t want to take anything away from the Bradford team because they came here, they fought hard for their luck, they got chances and they scored four goals. Credit to them.

"I’ve been here for more than 10 years and every year you can see these kinds of results in the FA Cup. That’s why I have always said it’s special. This can always happen and unfortunately for the first time I was on the wrong side of that. That’s the way it goes".

Cech has identified Tuesday's second leg of the Capital One Cup semi-final at Stamford Bridge as being the perfect opportunity to make amends.

"We need to take it on the chin and pick ourselves up. It’s up to us. We have put ourselves in this position and we only have ourselves to blame for what happened. We play at home on Tuesday [against Liverpool] and we would like to use that as an advantage. We need to clean the mess up".

Cech made a number of excellent saves throughout yesterday's fixture, not least a stunning reaction stop from a well-worked corner routine from the visitors, but he was left over-exposed by a leaderless Blues defence and could do little to prevent the League One side from exploiting gaps in Chelsea's rearguard - stretched in search of a leveller - late on.

The Czech international stresses that Chelsea were not complacent and that José Mourinho warned that an upset was on the cards at the break, but was thoroughly magnanimous in accepting the better team went through - as was Blues boss Mourinho, who entered the jubilant visiting dressing room after full-time to congratulate each of the Bradford players individually.

"Sometimes it’s hard to explain why things happen. We came out for the second half perfectly aware the game was far from over and it was going to be difficult. They came out, had a number of set-plays and corners and gained some confidence.

"We let them feel they might have some chances. When we conceded the second goal we lost control of our game. We forced everything and it was not working for us".

[Laylabelle 9,293]

Home less of a advantage after yesterday.agree though.clean it up and n it be a one off. not a sign of things to come