Dyche ready to bring on Chelsea after pre-season

Goals from Matt Taylor, Lukas Jutkiewicz’s sixth in six games, and a late free kick from Ross Wallace cancelled out an opener from Lazaros Christodoulopoulos, expertly crafted by World Cup winner Luca Toni.

And, ahead of the big kick-off at home to Chelsea a week on Monday, Dyche said: “The main thing was to come through with as many people fit as possible. There were changes today again - it’s not necessarily the side, it was important we get minutes into people and we did that again.

“We’re pleased with that, and that the minor injuries we’ve had in pre-season have cleared up.

“I think the mentality is good, it was another good performance.

“Italian football tends to more more tactical, shape-oriented, so it was a real good challenge because that can happen in the Premier League, we all watch it and there can be a slowness to the game, method, then rapid end-to-end games, and different spells during games.

“We’ve had a good feel of that, certainly in the last two games.”

He added: “I thought first half we were ok, the tempo was a little bit slow, but after a crazy first couple of minutes in the second half, we got a grip of things and played much more like what we’re about, and there were three very good goals, and a great reaction, which we have a name for.

“They were no mugs and we gave a really good account of ourselves, and were going ever so strong physically at the end.”