Chelsea may already be six points clear at the Premier League summit, but manager Jose Mourinho warned on Friday that there is even more to come from his in-form side.
The west London club have made an unbeaten start to the 2014-15 campaign and visit Sunderland in this weekend's round of matches having taken 32 points from a possible 36.
They have also transferred their outstanding domestic form to Europe, with a crushing 5-0 mid-week victory away to Schalke securing a place in the knockout stages of the Champions League as group winners.
Mourinho's side are being tipped to go through the entire Premier League season unbeaten, while a major British bookmaker has already paid out on them being crowned champions.
But the manager believes his side are still at the development stage and are not yet the finished article.
"I'm sure, yes, there is much more to come," Mourinho told his weekly media conference.
"This is a young team with lots of young players. I have two more years of contract to work with them. They want to stay in the club, I want to stay in the club. We have a lot ahead of us.
"This team has all the conditions to be better. But, all the other factors that can affect us negatively -- except complacency -- are part of the game.
"I am so experienced in this life that I'm not over the moon when I win, and I'm not in Hell when I lose. Balance. The players follow me in this.
"We are not jumping every day, or crying every day when things go wrong. We are very stable."
Mourinho is convinced his players will not allow complacency to creep into the changing room despite their dominant start to the campaign.
And he highlighted the efforts of Eden Hazard -- criticised by the manager towards the end of last season for failing to put the team's interests before his own -- in the Schalke game to illustrate the team's resolve.
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"We were winning 5-0 against Schalke in the 88th minute and Eden Hazard made a sprint to defend. Winning 5-0 at minute 88," said the Portuguese.
"They have changed. There was an evolution in these young people, a clear evolution. I don't think the group, as a group, can be complacent.
"That's the only risk we don't have. We have all the other risks, the risks that belong to football. The risk of a bad period. The risk of injuries. The risk of unlucky matches.
"The risk of other teams growing up, a great evolution, and becoming stronger during the season. Complacency is not a risk we have because it's not the profile of this group at this moment."
Mourinho's side now enter a gruelling period of 11 games in 35 days, including a League Cup quarter-final clash with Derby County and an FA Cup third-round tie.
But Mourinho has vowed that he will not prioritise one competition ahead of another.
"In football, things can change very quickly. We are not free to have problems like the others," he said.
"We are not in conditions to say we don't care about a certain competition, or this match is not so important as the next one or the previous one.
"For us, every competition is important. Every match is important. So we don't rest people. We try to play with our best team. We need a bit of luck, also."
Meanwhile, Mourinho dismissed outlandish media reports that Chelsea are poised to make a sensational move for Barcelona megastar Lionel Messi.
"Obviously it's not true," he said. "Obviously it's not true."
Source: AFP
