Gary Cahill insists that there were positives to take for Crystal Palace, despite losing 2-0 against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge.
The Eagles lost out in west London, with goals from Tammy Abraham and Christian Pulisic on target for the Blues as Frank Lampard's men recorded a sixth win in a row in the Premier League to move up to third.
In contrast, it was a third defeat in four games for Palace, who slipped to 12th in the Premier League, ahead of a home game against Liverpool after the international break.
And Cahill said he cannot remember a run of fixtures like this in his career, with Palace in the middle of a tough run against five of the current top six in the Premier League.
"Our fixtures at the moment are incredible; Manchester City, Arsenal, Leicester, Chelsea, Liverpool all together, I have never had that in my career," he said as he reflected on a busy afternoon for the Palace defence on his return to Stamford Bridge.
“It is tough and you come to places like this and hope that they have an off day, they go out and perform below their levels, but they didn’t, I thought they performed very well. But we have a lot of positives to take from it and we did well.
“If you have wave after wave of attacks to defend, eventually they are going to score, but I thought that we defended great as a team in the first half, and it was marginal for offside for the first goal, obviously it wasn’t, it was well timed and that was a blow for us.
Cahill was involved in one of the better moments from a Palace perspective, with the former Chelsea defender producing a superb block just before half time to deny his old team-mate Willian.
“That was the story of the first half, we had a lot to soak up, a lot of attacks to defend in the first half, and we defended well," he said.
“But we couldn’t break their back line, we couldn’t get a goal to give us something to hold onto.
“But coming to Stamford Bridge, I have been on the other side, they are on the front foot, and they are expected to be on the front foot. They have a lot of possession and you are hoping that they don’t perform as they did today.
“But there is a lot of character in this team and we will be fine this season. We need to get through these tough fixtures and roll our sleeves up and go again."
