Reece James has admitted even Chelsea’s players can hardly believe the way their season has turned out.
Chelsea are in the semi finals of the Champions League, face Manchester City in the FA Cup semi final at Wembley on Saturday and are still in the hunt for a place in the top four.
It has been a turbulent season which saw Frank Lampard axed in January and replaced with Thomas Tuchel and their form in the past three months has rejuvenated their campaign.
Chelsea defender James has played a key role this season and they have also kept 13 clean sheets under Tuchel as they have become a tough side to beat who should fear no-one in the Champions League.
James said: “The season started off a bit strange and if you’d said we would have been here at the start of the season, then we probably wouldn’t have believed you.
“But it just shows with hard work, if everyone gets their head down and we work as a team and come together, then it shows what’s possible.
“As we’ve progressed in the Champions League, obviously the games have got harder and it’s higher stakes. I’ve never been in this position before, like a lot of the other young lads, and we’re learning a lot on the way.
“You can’t go into games with any fear. You can acknowledge a good team, but you can’t go in worrying.
“We’re a very good team as well and we have many strengths and we play to our strengths as well, and I think that’s shown over recent weeks. I just hope we can continue our good form and keep improving as a team.
“Going into every game, we need to have our heads up and go into the games positively and we can’t fear anyone – whoever we get, we just have to take it and prepare well for that game.
“We feel very confident going into games. We work hard defensively as a team and do a lot of work in training on how we defend as a unit. We make sure we take that into games.
“Of course, when you come to the later stages of competitions, you know you are going to come up against top-class teams so we need to be ready and at our best right from the start. They are all very good teams so we will need to prepare well and be ready for both games.”
James also said that Chelsea’s youngsters are also having to learn to be more street wise to get free kicks and decisions against experienced European teams.
Porto kicked and fouled Christian Pulisic through the second leg but James said sometimes players just have to give a bit back.
James added: “That’s part of playing in Europe and in the Champions League. When you play against foreign teams, they know what to do to get through games so you sometimes have to give some back to them as well.”
