Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea ended a turbulent few days with this draw against Southampton yesterday. In doing so, they extended their lead over their Premier League rivals at the top of the table.

Chelsea have a six-point margin over Manchester City, and still have a game in hand, following a hard-fought draw against Ronald Koeman’s side.

“I am not happy with the result but happy with the situation,” said Mourinho, whose side were a goal up early on through Diego Costa before conceding a penalty which was put away by Dusan Tadic.

“We started well but the penalty kick changed the rest of the first half. We stopped playing. In the second half, we killed their counter-attack and were also able to create a lot of chances.”

Coming days after being knocked out of the Champions League by Paris St-Germain, Chelsea supporters would have wanted a strong performance from their team. 

However, they struggled to impose themselves against Southampton.

Mourinho’s men looked to be on their way on 11 minutes when Costa put his side ahead with a header after being picked out by full-back Branislav Ivanovic with a fine cross.

However, the visitors were back in the game seven minutes later when Nemanja Matic conceded a spot-kick after bringing down Saints’ striker Sadio Mane. 

Replays suggested that it was a harsh decision by referee Mike Dean. Tadic put away the penalty to even things up.

Mourinho chose not to comment on the penalty award but was clearly upset as to what he felt was another decision going against his players.

Southampton had chances to add to their goal. Morgan Schneiderlin came close with a firm volley minutes before the interval.

Chelsea’s efforts were better after half-time but despite creating a series of goal-scoring opportunities, they could do not enough to break Southampton’s back-line. 

The visitors had goalkeeper Fraser Forster to thank for keeping them in the match.