Mauricio Pochettino has revealed that he held a meeting with his Chelsea stars prior to their FA Cup fourth-round replay with Aston Villa.

The Blues went into the game off the back of consecutive losses against Liverpool and Wolves, but somehow, managed to put on what many now say is their best display of the season to beat Unai Emery’s side 3-1, and progress to the fifth round of the tournament.

Speaking of the pre-match meeting, Pochettino said: “Really important. The mental is the most important thing. What I can see today, I don’t know if it’s because of the last few days we were talking or the noise around the team, I saw the team really free, enjoying playing football. That is the most important [thing] because football is about enjoying.

“We were talking yesterday about this is not my job, it’s our passion. Players need to go there and be free, to enjoy, and not be thinking nothing and express their talent. After the game, we had another meeting here now and I told them, ‘Look, it’s about to trust, it’s about the energy, it’s about how you approach the game’.

“A real team need to behave different, they need to approach the game different. And today you can see in the middle before the start, we were ready to fight. After you can win or lose, but the right attitude, the right approach. We were united, we were ready to fight for each other, fight for our fans, fight for the badge, fight for the coaching staff.

“That is the connection we need to build. And now the challenge is to be consistent. We need to perform and after now to analyse, to show them, for them to process and be able to perform in this way. Because that is mental energy to be able to work in this.”