Antonio Conte has a message for Sir Alex Ferguson – Do not write Chelsea out of the title race.

Having read that Sir Alex Ferguson had named five teams capable of winning the Premier League this season and Chelsea not being one of them, Antonio Conte has warned Sir Alex to not disregard our potential to do so just yet.

Speaking after Chelsea had thumped Manchester United last weekend, Sir Alex Ferguson had stated who he believes would challenge for the Premier League title.

He stated that Manchester City were the favourites closely followed by Liverpool, Tottenham, Manchester United and Arsenal with Chelsea not considered as realistic challenges despite heading into this weekends fixtures just a single point behind the leaders.

Insisting that he respects the opinion of the greatest manager of all time, Conte was keen to point out that it’s far too early to write Chelsea out of the race.

He said:

"I respect a lot what he said, but I know that we are working very well.

I think now we are now in a good way to improve a lot and to become a team that can stay (in contention) until the end to get something.

Our ambition must be always to play to win every game. Always. It's important. I try to transfer this to my players in every moment, in every day, every week, in every game.

We must be ambitious. But to be ambitious you must work a lot."

I'm very happy for the work that we are doing. And I'm sure that if we continue in this way, we can have good satisfaction for our work.

It's important now to be focused on the work during the training session, on the game, game by game and to try to improve in every game.

And to be ambitious, to work for the maximum always. You can reach this (aim) or not, but it's important to work a lot with this target." – Source SkySports.

It’s far too early to write Chelsea off at this stage. If Chelsea had stuck with the same formation and struggled to pick themselves up after the two defeats to Liverpool followed by Arsenal, then it could have been a very different situation looking at the Premier League table right now.

We have only played nine games with our next game this afternoon against Southampton. There are still twenty-eight games to fight for and with Conte in charge, demanding work from his players every single day, I cannot understand why anyone would discount us at this stage?

OK, the Livepool and Arsenal performances were woeful, we all understand that but just look at what has happened since the tactical change was made. Three wins from three, three clean sheets and nine goals scored including a thumping victory over Jose Mourinho’s United.

I agree with Antonio Conte. Do you?