Chelsea believe they have equipped Antonio Conte with a squad capable of combining a Premier League title defence with the Champions League, despite missing out on a string of summer targets.

The Blues took their summer tally up to six new signings with the late arrivals of midfielder Danny Drinkwater and right-back Davide Zappacosta to try to ease Conte’s fears that he does not have the quality or numbers to compete in Europe.

Conte is happy with the signings of Drinkwater and Zappacosta, but wanted eight new players over the summer and identified Southampton’s Virgil van Dijk and Juventus left-back Alex Sandro as two of his top targets, along with Romelu Lukaku.

Sources close to the Italian have claimed that of last season’s Premier League title-winning team, Conte wanted to build a new squad around Thibaut Courtois, N’Golo Kante and Eden Hazard that he felt would be capable of winning the Champions League.