Lampard fires back at Mourinho over attack on Chelsea

Frank Lampard was “not surprised” by Jose Mourinho’s accusation that Chelsea players have attempted to win cheap penalties.

Mourinho alleged that Chelsea, Manchester United, Manchester City and Liverpool have attempted to con officials into awarding a spot-kick in his defence of skipper Harry Kane.

The Portuguese was unhappy with the insinuation that Kane had deliberately backed into Adam Lallana to win a penalty in Tottenham’s 2-1 win over Brighton and Hove Albion last weekend.

Speaking earlier this week, Mourinho said: “Kane? I think you are confused.

“You could be speaking about some Manchester United players, some Man City players, some Liverpool players, some Chelsea players.”

Chelsea have already had eight penalties this season but Lampard insists none of those were awarded for a player diving inside the box.

“I wasn’t surprised by those comments,” he said. “There have been no incidents of diving at Chelsea this season that I’ve seen.

“But I wasn’t surprised by it, no. I think it’s very normal that managers in and around the clubs challenging sometimes mention others with those statements. It didn’t affect me.”

He added: “I’m not going to tell Jose or any other manager how to do a press conference.

“I think we all know when we watch these penalty decisions, we know what ones are penalties, what ones are dives, ones that are cleverly bought. I don’t want to dwell on it.”