Chelsea's 'great character' key to Wembley win - David Luiz

Chelsea's 2-1 win against Tottenham at Wembley owed much to its title-winning character, according to defender David Luiz.

Published : Aug 21, 2017 22:10 IST

David Luiz believes it was important that Chelsea showed its "great character" in a 2-1 win over Tottenham at Wembley after losing to Burnley on the opening weekend of its Premier League title defence.

The champion was 3-0 down against Burnley at Stamford Bridge, with a second-half fightback not enough to recover a point for Antonio Conte's nine men.

But David Luiz saw a spirit in the closing stages of that defeat that Chelsea took into the clash with rival Spurs to earn a huge win through Marcos Alonso's double.

"The victory started in the second half of the first game against Burnley, because we did great then," he told Sky Sports .

"It's important to show character after a defeat. We had a great mentality and great character, especially as we didn't start the league very well last week.

"Playing against a fantastic team, fantastic players, we deserved to win."

And David Luiz was particularly pleased with Chelsea's game plan against Tottenham, acknowledging that it could not hope to dominate a side that had finished as runner-up last season.

"It was a clever game," he added. "You need to understand, when you play against a very good team, sometimes you can keep more of the ball, but sometimes you need to try to surprise them on the counter-attack with one touch.

"I think we did great in a clever way."