Napoli 2-3 Chelsea: Liam Rosenior waxes lyrical over star after Champions League thriller in Naples

Chelsea head coach Liam Rosenior has described Cole Palmer's performance during the 3-2 victory over Napoli in the Champions League as "scary good".

The Blues travelled to Naples knowing that maximum points were required to keep the club in with a chance of earning a spot in the top eight of the League Phase table.

When trailing 2-1 to the Serie A champions at half time, Chelsea were on course to settle for a playoff tie, but the introduction of Palmer from the substitutes' bench and a switch in formation changed the game.

As well as helping dictate play when Chelsea had the ball, Palmer supplied two assists for Joao Pedro, whose brilliant finishes secured a rare win for the West Londoners in Italy.

Rosenior praises Palmer, namechecks Chelsea teammates

Palmer's name has not left the headlines of late, the England international suffering with lingering injury issues as well as being linked with a transfer away from Stamford Bridge.

However, speaking to the media after Wednesday's match, Rosenior talked up the qualities of the 23-year-old, while also explaining while the shackles were kept on for the first half.

Rosenior told reporters: "There was no way that Cole could have started this game and played through to 60, 70, 80 minutes, so I knew Napoli had had a difficult time with injuries.

"I felt that later in the game we would be stronger and I felt Cole's performance was magnificent. Not just his quality, his pressing, his running for the team.

"We need to look after him. He's had so many games over a long period of time. We need to look after him and I think the way that he's managed himself in the last two weeks has been magnificent and hopefully we can now see the best of him now that he's fully fit. We need to see him absolutely relish nights like this on a big occasion."

He added: "Scary good. I don't like to talk about individuals. I felt [it wasn't] just Cole [who played well] when he came on. I thought Jamie Gittens came on and I asked him to play a left wing-back role which he was magnificent. Ale Garnacho came on to help the team.

"Obviously, Joao Pedro is top. Actually, the tactical change, I thought Andrey Santos actually had a very good game but we needed to go for the win. When Enzo [Fernandez] moved back into the No.6 role, he started to really dominate and control the game with Moi [Caicedo].

"Again, so many pleasing individual performances but I think the most pleasing aspect was the collective mentality of the group to have a positive reaction to a difficult first half."