Marc Cucurella exclusive: Chelsea defender on lessons from first season, beating Spurs and learning from Pep

By Marc Cucurella's own admission, his first season at Chelsea did not go to plan. Amid a torrent of managerial changes at the club, the left-back found that the form which secured moves from Barcelona, Getafe and Brighton in successive summers did not quite follow.

But the 25-year-old is applying the lessons learnt over a difficult year to the current campaign, and points to mentality as being key.

"I'm not happy with my first season, but I can learn a lot, especially in the bad moments," he said ahead of Chelsea's match against Manchester City on Super Sunday, live on Sky Sports.

"I can learn when I need to manage the head because that is so important in football. Before I came here, I always played and played well and never had problems like this.

"But here when I came, I didn't play at my level, I'm a little bit frustrated and I can learn to manage this. Now I can show them that I'm very happy here and all the things I learnt last season, I can put here in this season.

"I think this season is better. I'm very good mentally and I think this is one of the important things because if you are good mentally and in your life, I think you can you can play better, you can help the team and you can enjoy this."

Cucurella has had to wait for his opportunities under Mauricio Pochettino. He had largely been restricted to Carabao Cup appearances until recently, starting four of the last five Premier League matches.

The defender has topped a number of defensive categories among his team-mates in those games too, including tackles and headed clearances.

While predominantly a left-back, Cucurella has started on the right this season, sometimes to fill positions left vacant by injury. The same can be said for his appearances at centre-back