Chelsea produced a wonderful second half display to vanquish Leeds in the quarterfinals of the Capital One Cup.
Luciano Becchio had given the home side a shock lead at Elland Road in the 37th minute, but once Juan Mata equalized early on in the second half, it was all Chelsea as further goals from Branislav Ivanovic, Victor Moses, Eden Hazard and Fernando Torres consigned their bitter rivals to a rather harsh 5-1 loss.
"We upped it," Lampard told Sky Sports. "In the first half, we weren't at our best, a bit slow with the tempo of the game and we gave away a silly goal that allowed them to score.
"Once we upped it with a bit of pace in our game, you could see a big difference.
"We had a word with ourselves at halftime."
The Blues were reeling from a loss in the Club World Cup final to Corinthians Sunday, and needed a convincing win to boost their confidence ahead of the Christmas and New Year run-in of English Premier League games.
Chelsea did much of the running in the first period, but despite some good efforts, and thanks to a couple of good saves from goalkeeper Jamie Ashdown the scoreline remained 0-0 until the 37th minute.
A quick counter-attack from Leeds caught Chelsea off guard and before anybody could take a deep breath it was 1-0. David Luiz gave the ball away in the Leeds half, with Tom Lees heading the ball towards Michael Tonge, who in turn found Jerome Thomas on the left flank. The winger then produced a brilliant cross for Becchio to slot in past Petr Cech.
The Blues needed to come out and produce an outstanding second half and they did.
Juan Mata equalized two minutes into the second period, with Ashdown culpable in allowing the Chelsea playmaker's low drive from outside the box to get past him.
Ivanovic then made it 2-1 four minutes past the hour powering home a header from a corner, before Moses made the game safe with a strike from 25 yards in the 66th minute.
As Leeds desperately went in search of a goal, the game opened up for Chelsea and they took advantage in the final ten minutes with substitute Hazard and Torres adding to the scoreline.
"We didn't make the greatest preparation but there's no excuse, we had to up it.
"The early goal gave us the impetus, we believed from then on and we didn't think we could lose the game.
"Some of the football we played, we opened them up and showed what we could do."
Chelsea will now play Swansea City in the semi-finals, with the Blues hosting their fellow Premier League side in the first leg, while the other last-four match will see Aston Villa and Arsenal's conquerors Bradford face off.
