Enzo Maresca lauded Chelsea attacker Jadon Sancho after he contributed with an assist for Christopher Nkunku’s winner at Bournemouth on his debut.
Sancho was brought on at half-time for his first Premier League appearance in 12 months after his widely reported spat with Manchester United head coach Erik ten Hag last season.
The Chelsea newbie squashed his beef with Ten Hag this summer, but he joined the Blues on loan on transfer deadline day and set up the winning goal with a precise threaded pass into Nkunku, who turned inside the area before his shot found the bottom corner in the 86th minute for the only goal on the south coast.
“Very happy, very happy for him. He was very good,” Maresca said of Sancho.
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“I have a feeling that Jadon is a guy that needs love. This is what I thought when I spoke with him before he joined us.
“Also I know he has the desire to show the player he is, but for me, it is just to enjoy football. This is the reason why they play.
“Jadon helped us a lot but what he did tonight is exactly what we expected from him. As I said, I know Jadon very good because I watched him many, many times in the past and I know what he can give us.
“Then also Christopher was very good and not just because he scored but because he fought without the ball and Jadon was exactly the same.
“The performance second half changed completely but we need to learn these kind of things if we want to build something important and we want to win games, first of all we need the desire to win games, win duels and to fight together.”
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Bournemouth enjoyed the better of the chances in the first half, with Marcus Tavernier firing an effort against the crossbar from 25 yards in the fourth minute before Evanilson set up Justin Kluivert, but Robert Sanchez produced a smart save.
Not long after Nicolas Jackson had been denied by Mark Travers, Bournemouth won a penalty when Evanilson raced on to Wesley Fofana’s poor back pass and was brought down by Sanchez.
However, the blushes of Fofana were spared when Evanilson saw his low shot pushed wide by Sanchez to continue his goal drought since a £40million move from Porto.
Maresca had seen enough and at half-time sent on Sancho, who immediately helped Marc Cucurella go close to teeing up Noni Madueke.
Sancho was in the thick of the action, setting up Jackson for another chance which the forward curled wide before he was booked for dissent, but his key moment arrived with four minutes left.
The Manchester United exile worked a yard of space on the left and passed into Nkunku, who got in between Marcos Senesi and Illia Zabarnyi too easily and slotted into the bottom corner to earn Maresca a narrow second Premier League win.
Andoni Iraola refused to criticise Evanilson for his penalty miss and was eager not to speak about referee Anthony Taylor after he handed out 14 yellow cards, which is a new Premier League record.
“Within 14, first yellows? Quite easy first yellows and then second yellows? Not easy but I will not focus on the referee. It hasn’t worked before so I will try not to focus on that,” Iraola insisted.
“I think we were the better team and deserve probably to win, but when you are against this kind of opposition and miss a penalty, hit the crossbar, hit the post, miss more chances, their keeper is good, you can think that at one moment in the game they will hurt us and it happened at the end.”
