Maurizio Sarri has again questioned whether he is the right man to motivate the current crop of Chelsea players after Wednesday’s 4-0 thumping at the hands of Bournemouth.

Sarri handed a Premier League debut to loan signing Gonzalo Higuain for the clash at the Vitality Stadium, while Spaniard Pedro was also preferred as part of the attacking trio to Brazilian Willian.

Despite dominating the first half, Chelsea were unable to find the breakthrough and there were clear frustrations from the travelling fans, who have started to question the manager’s tactics in recent weeks.

In a complete capitulation, the Blues conceded four goals after the break, with Joshua King grabbing a brace while David Brooks and Charlie Daniels also got on the scoresheet for a famous Bournemouth victory.

Chelsea have now slipped down to fifth – still level on points with Arsenal in fourth – and Sarri was again perplexed as to why he is unable to motivate his players.

“Maybe it’s my fault because maybe I’m not able to motivate this group and these players. I don’t know why. But I need to understand and we need to understand very soon because we have to play in three days,” he said in his post-match interview.

“We are doing something wrong with our mentality, of course. We need to understand why and we need to react to the difficulty. For me it’s really difficult to understand why. I’m trying to do it, and I will try to do it tomorrow but it’s not easy.”

Chelsea return to action on Saturday when they welcome rock-bottom Huddersfield Town to Stamford Bridge and the hosts are 1.18 favourites to pick up the win, a draw is priced at 7.00 and the Terriers are massive 19.00 outsiders.