aston villa 7-1

Sunday Times
Frank Lampard to the fore as Chelsea net seven
Chelsea 7 Aston Villa 1

WHO would have thought it? Chelsea putting five past doomed Portsmouth is one thing. Trumping that against an Aston Villa side whose rise has been based on a defence that, before yesterday’s black comedy, was the joint-meanest in the division, is another thing entirely. However the dice come to rest in May, Chelsea’s second-half showing was a performance of champions.
Of course Villa — who had not conceded seven since they went to Old Trafford in 1964 — were abject, but if they could take any consolation, their worst Premier League defeat could have been worse still had their hosts turned up for the first half. Although the symmetry would hardly concern Villa, this was also Chelsea’s biggest win in the Premier League, surpassing their 6-0 drubbing of Manchester City in 2007.
Once the teams changed ends the hosts were unplayable. Frank Lampard, who last scored four against Derby County in 2008, did it again, but this was no one-man show. Florent Malouda, Joe Cole, Nicolas Anelka and Yury Zhirkov asked more questions than Jeremy Paxman at his grumpiest. Sorry Villa had fewer answers than a politician at his most pilloried.
“We were first-class,” purred Chelsea assistant manager Ray Wilkins, whose team travel to Old Trafford on Saturday in buoyant mood. “We go there with the utmost confidence. We’re defending well and we’re attacking with pace and power. This was good for our goal difference, but this title race will go down to the wire.”
Aston Villa had headed for the bright lights undefeated in the Premier League in 2010, but rather than the six points they might have expected from last week’s visits of Wolverhampton Wanderers and Sunderland, they arrived with fourth place slipping through their fingers, Emile Heskey on the treatment table and, somewhat prophetically, the away ticket allocation far from sold out.
“Fourth place?” asked dejected visiting manager Martin ONeill afterwards. “On the basis of that performance we wouldn’t finish 44th. That’s as devastating an afternoon as I’ve ever had in the game. We were well beaten — hammered even — by a fine side, but we capitulated and we didn’t compete: that’s not good enough.”
It had seemed as though Chelsea had troubles of their own. Didier Drogba was on the bench after bruising his knee at Portsmouth; Paulo Ferreira’s ankle-induced absence hardly suggested that Chelsea’s rickety defence would be less porous and an ignominious Champions League exit was far from well-received at Roman Abramovich’s dacha.
Even so, and even though Chelsea looked as wary as Villa looked fatigued, the hosts swept ahead in the 15th minute with the sort of goal from which titles are hewn. Anelka, thriving on the responsibility Drogba’s absence gave him, strayed from his central role to feed Malouda. Chelsea’s revelation of the season crossed low beyond a series of outstretched toes until, lurking with intent behind Stephen Warnock, Lampard stretched longer than the rest and turned the ball past Brad Friedel.
For a moment, Villa found reserves of strength from within. Ashley Young crossed low, the otherwise excellent Zhirkov unaccountably let it go beyond him and, at the back post, that shark-eyed assassin John Carew walloped it past Petr Cech from five yards.
Like tortoises chary of sudden sunlight, Villa were sent scurrying back to their shell by the shock of parity. Chelsea prodded and probed until Malouda jinked on the edge of the penalty area and sent Zhirkov through. James Collins’ challenge took a combination of man and ball, but there were little in the way of Villa protests when referee Peter Walton awarded a penalty which Lampard smashed beyond Friedel.
O’Neill argued, not unreasonably, that his team were still in the game at half-time. After the break, Villa juggled their formation and hunted for goals. Alas for them, the hunters became the hunted and as the effervescent Cole began to suggest his summer may yet be spent closer to Soweto than Surrey, Chelsea turned the screw. The first of three goals in 10 minutes came when Deco picked out Zhirkov with the ball of the match. Zhirkov’s cross was adequate but Villa’s bedraggled defence left Malouda unmarked inside the penalty area and nature took its course.
Having kicked off level on strikes with Manchester United and seven ahead of Arsenal, Chelsea sniffed the prey of boosted goal difference and, yet again, Zhirkov found his way into the Villa penalty area. Richard Dunne’s challenge was as lazy as it was crude and Lampard’s penalty gave him his 150th Chelsea career goal.
Before Villa could pause for thought or breath, they had conceded five. For once, it stemmed from Chelsea’s right when Ferreira’s cross was deftly helped on by Lampard and Malouda gleefully polished off Chelsea’s 10th goal in two games. The eager Nathan Delfouneso added some vim for Villa but as the rain fell, Salomon Kalou scored a simple sixth after fine foraging from Anelka. Added time meant only time to add both insult and injury and when Lampard gleefully steered home his fourth Chelsea had scored seven for the second time this season.
“World class,” noted Wilkins of the midfielder who is now Chelsea‘s third highest scorer of all-time. “Take away his goals and this was still some performance. His work ethic is astonishing, he gets back as well as he gets forward and he trains as hard as he plays.”
“Boring, boring Chelsea,” chanted the Shed mischievously, and chanted louder still when the news of Kevin Phillips’ equaliser at St Andrew’s filtered through.

Chelsea: Cech 6, Ferreira 6, Alex 6, Terry 6, Zhirkov 7 (van Aanholt 76min), Deco 6 (Ballack 73min), Mikel 6, J Cole 7 (Kalou 76min), Lampard 9, Malouda 8, Anelka 7 Aston Villa: Friedel 6, L Young 5, Collins 5, Dunne 5, Warnock 5, Agbonlahor 5 (Beye 73min), Sidwell 5, Milner 5, Petrov 5 (Downing 62min), A Young 6, Carew (Delfouneso 62min)
Star man: Frank Lampard (Chelsea)
Yellow cards: Chelsea: Ferreira, Zhirkov, Deco Villa: Dunne, Petrov
Referee: P Walton Attendance: 41,825
BIGGEST PREMIER LEAGUE WINS
4 Mar 1995 Manchester United 9 Ipswich Town 0 22 Nov 2009 Tottenham Hotspur 9 Wigan Athletic 1 19 Sept 1999 Newcastle United 8 Sheffield Wednesday 0 11 May 2008 Middlesbrough 8 Manchester City 1 6 Feb 1999 Nottingham Forest 1 Manchester United 8 14 Jan 2006 Arsenal 7 Middlesbrough 0 11 May 2005 Arsenal 7 Everton 0 25 Oct 1997 Manchester United 7 Barnsley 0 18 Nov 1995 Blackburn Rovers 7 Nottingham Forest 0 27 Mar 2010 Chelsea 7 Aston Villa 1* *10 other Premier League fixtures have finished 7-1

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Observer:
Frank Lampard plunders four as Chelsea humiliate Aston Villa
Chelsea 7 Lampard 15, Lampard (pen) 44, Malouda 57, Lampard (pen) 62, Malouda 68, Kalou 83, Lampard 90 Aston Villa 1 Carew 29
Amy Lawrence at Stamford Bridge

So rapidly do football's fortunes deal their cards, Carlo Ancelotti cannot afford to be over-confident. But the more football they have played since the crushing week in which Chelsea slipped out of the Champions League and dropped points at Blackburn, the more that looks like an aberration they are well and truly over. Twelve goals in their last two games puts paid to the notion that a European exit might dent their appetite for the domestic challenge.
Given Carlo Ancelotti's belief that a powerful finish can make for a "fantastic season", it could have been a blow to Chelsea that Didier Drogba, so influential he had contributed 10 league goals in eight games since returning from the Africa Cup of Nations, was omitted from the starting line up to rest his knee. Not so. In this goalfest Frank Lampard plundered four and Florent Malouda was a constant source of torment. The Frenchman conjured two artistic finishes. He has never before scored so often in a single season during his entire career. Confidence is glowing.
It was a momentous afternoon for Lampard, who ended up with a stack of milestones to go with the match ball. In a single game he managed to mark his 100th Premier League goal for Chelsea and 150th in all competitions since crossing London for Stamford Bridge. Perhaps the most staggering of all is the statistic that confirms he has reached 20 goals for the sixth consecutive season from midfield. "Frank is world class and he is invaluable to us," said assistant manager Ray Wilkins.
Chelsea were able to rely on him to open the scoring early. When the effervescent Malouda drove in a cross-shot from the left which evaded a clutch of players, Steven Warnock was deceived by the pace of the ball. It was easy pickings for a man with Lampard's instinct for goal. Just before the half hour, Chelsea invited Villa to equalise with a move that echoed their opener. Ashley Young was given ample time and space to eliminate three opponents from the scene. His curled cross confused Yuri Zhirkov, who appeared to barely notice as John Carew stole in behind him to finish from close range. It was the Norwegian's ninth strike in eight games. Unfortunately for Villa, that was the high point of another troublesome afternoon regarding their fading Champions League ambitions.
Not only did Brad Friedel have to pick the ball out of the net seven times, his distribution was also appalling, constantly putting Villa on the back foot as he booted it long to cede possession. Martin O'Neill was brutal afterwards about the dwindling possibility of finishing fourth, remarking, "On that performance we wouldn't finish 44th." He was visibly shocked by what he witnessed.
Two minutes before half-time Malouda made another teasing impact, with a beautifully crafted back heel to send Zhirkov into the penalty area. James Collins was a fraction late with his challenge and appeared to catch the Russian's toe. Referee Peter Walton pointed to the spot. Although Friedel stretched a hand to it, Lampard's effort was too firmly struck to be denied.
Trailing by a slender enough margin at half time, there was no reason for Villa to assume they would be so horribly overrun after the break. O'Neill did reorganise at half-time, pushing Agbonlahor up to partner Carew and switching Milner into the heart of midfield. It didn't make a big difference as Chelsea looked increasingly comfortable and eased further in front courtesy of a fine team goal in the 55th minute. Joe Cole and Deco combined to work the ball to Zhirkov, whose cross was dispatched brilliantly via Malouda's volley.
Chelsea turned the screw on the hour when the galavanting Zhirkov was upended en route to another dash into the penalty area. Same scenario, same outcome. Lampard hovered over the spot kick and nervelessly collected his hat-trick.
O'Neill was distraught with the way his team caved in. "We didn't compete," he lamented. "I didn't see it coming at half time. At 3-1 we capitulated and that isn't like us. We were well and truly hammered. It's as devastating as I've known in the game. I have been a player and manager some considerable time but that was as tough a lesson as any."
The Chelsea goals came thick and fast. Lampard was unselfish when, with target practice surely tempting, he rolled a pass for Malouda, whose finish bent deliciously over Friedel. Substitute Salomon Kalou angled in the sixth after an assist from Nicolas Anelka. The seventh fell to Lampard's boot, a late arrival and crisp finish. Should it boil down to it, goal difference is looking radiantly healthy. While Wilkins did not disagree, he did predict there would be "many more twists and turns to come".
Chelsea travel to Old Trafford next weekend for a match which might just be subject to a mild dose of hype over the next few days. The following week they rendezvous once more with O'Neill's men in the FA Cup semi-final. Bet Villa can hardly wait.

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Independent:
Lampard to the four as Blues run Villa ragged
Chelsea 7 Aston Villa 1
By Mark Fleming at Stamford Bridge

It had been a relatively quiet season for Frank Lampard, until yesterday. With Chelsea needing a win to maintain the pressure at the top of the Premier League, he hammered in four goals as Carlo Ancelotti's side simply destroyed poor Villa.
Ancelotti, pilloried over Chelsea's meek Champions' League exit to Internazionale, took a gamble by leaving out top scorer Didier Drogba but now will head to Saturday's showdown with Manchester United at Old Trafford with his team riding the crest of a wave.
Drogba had limped off against Portsmouth in midweek with a knee injury and Ancelotti decided to keep his 30-goal man on the bench, only to be used in case of emergencies. The Ivorian was never needed and will be fresh for Old Trafford, but United must travel to Bayern Munich on Tuesday. Suddenly Chelsea look the team to beat once again.
In Drogba's absence, Lampard stepped up to fill the void. His four goals took his Chelsea tally to 151 and moved him above Roy Bentley and Peter Osgood to third place in the club's all-time scoring charts. His contribution in the past six seasons has been immense, and when they needed him again after the trials of recent weeks, he delivered once more.
Chelsea's assistant manager, Ray Wilkins, said: "He is a world-class player who is invaluable to us. We will go there [to Old Trafford] with utmost confidence." The mauling left Aston Villa's manager, Martin O'Neill, despondent and fearing the worst when the two sides meet again in the FA Cup semi-final in two weeks' time. "I feel as devastated as I have ever felt in the game," O'Neill said. "I have been in the game as a player and manager for some considerable time and you get taught a few lessons along the way, but that was as tough as any."
Asked how he considered Villa's chances of finishing fourth now, O'Neill quipped: "Fourth? On that performance we wouldn't finish 44th."
Chelsea took the lead after a quarter of an hour. Florent Malouda's attempted shot deflected off Richard Dunne and Lampard tapped in from close range. However, they have been vulnerable after going ahead and conceded an equal-iser 14 minutes later. Ashley Young cut in from the left wing and his misplaced shot was allowed to bounce all the way to John Carew, who scored at the far post.
Chelsea never found a real rhythm to their passing, only showing what they are capable of in flashes. One such moment led to their second goal, as Malouda and Yuri Zhirkov combined superbly before the Russian fell over a challenge from James Collins and the referee, Peter Walton, blew for a pen-alty. Lampard hit the resulting spot-kick with such venom that even though goalkeeper Brad Friedel dived the correct way, he had no chance of saving it.
The best move of the game earned Chelsea their third goal. Deco sliced apart the Villa defence with a stunning pass to Zhirkov on the overlap and he looked up and found Malouda, who scored on the volley.
Chelsea soon added a fourth, when the excellent Zhirkov was upended by Richard Dunne and Lampard scored his second penalty of the game. The Blues were flying now, and shortly after Paulo Ferreira had dashed down the right Lampard passed to Malouda, whose explosive shot almost ripped the net from its moorings.
The sixth came when Lampard's ball found Nicolas Anelka and the Frenchman, who has gone 11 games without a goal, opted not to have a go, passing to the substitute Salomon Kalou, who did.
The Premier League's top scorers, who notched five at Portsmouth on Wednesday night, made it 12 goals in three days when Malouda's cross ricocheted off Luke Young and Lampard scored the seventh, his 20th goal of the season.
Attendance: 41,825
Referee: Peter Walton
Man of the match: Lampard
Match rating: 9/10

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NOTW:
LAMPS AND TERRY NO CHELSEA PENSIONERS Chelsea 7 Aston Villa 1 By Andy Dunn

WHEN Frank Lampard rolled in his second penalty of a riotous afternoon, John Terry was 50 yards away.
Within seconds, he had Lampard in a stranglehold of joy and defiance.
The two men most synonymous with Chelsea's 21st Century success were brothers in arms again, linked for the combat ahead.
These were supposed to be fading disciples of the Jose Mourinho era, veterans of too many attritional campaigns.
Lampard's influence waning after years of uninterrupted excellence; Terry's leadership a busted flush amidst off-the-field wreckage.
This was to be a defining end of the season. Still will be.
Not just for the club's policies, for the patience of its owner, for the longevity of its manager.
But for the two playing pillars of Stamford Bridge, stalwarts whose lavish, long-term contracts were symptoms of a malaise threatening the pre-eminence of the house Roman built.
Make no mistake, this is a season's finale that will answer many a question about two of England's most indefatigable characters.
Questions that filled the dank night air after the last game here.
Yesterday, they began to answer with roaring indignity.
The manner in which Lampard smashed in his first penalty was not just emphatic, it was an angry riposte.
Every jarring tackle on John Carew, every sinew-straining celebration was a token of Terry's refusal to buckle, a gesture of resistance amidst the mental pressure.
Lampard and Terry have taken up the cudgels. They know there will be stellar contributions from others along the way.
From Florent Malouda, who continues to pepper a belated breakthrough season with goals that are easier on the eye than a Mrs Abramovich.
From Salomon Kalou even, who looked peckish when he came on for a goalscoring cameo.
From Didier Drogba when he returns after an afternoon on the bench.
(I'm not one for stats, by the way, but check out this one - 25 goals scored in the six games Drogba has missed).
But Lampard and Terry know that success will be brought through the type of belligerent example-setting that has been their speciality for so long.
This was their finest hour and a half in harness this season.
This wasn't kicking lumps out of a puppy such as Portsmouth.
This was against a team that clings to results with the lockjaw determination of a pitbull. A team that had not been beaten in 10 league games.
And that team left humiliated, their morale shattered by the remorseless quality of Lampard, the muscular ebullience of Terry and the elusive confidence of Malouda.
Apologies to Villa fans right now. There is little to say about your team's performance. Little to encourage you ahead of the FA Cup semi-final against the same opposition. Even John Carew's tap-in - which cancelled out Lampard's first - was the product of defensive drowsiness.
Collectively, they folded. Physically and up top. Individually, they had no-one to match Lampard.
He never switches off. Not even for Earth Hour, you suspect.
Great players never do. Amongst his myriad talents, unerring accuracy of shot might be the eye-catcher but his sense of awareness is underplayed.
He anticipates - passes, ricochets, knockdowns, mistakes - and never flags if nothing comes of his physical and mental exertions. When Malouda shaped to shoot, few could have envisaged a badly hooked strike, a deflection and an unlikely journey through a copse of limbs.
So little point, it seemed, in a central midfielder dashing to the far post. But that's what Lampard did, arriving with customary punctuality to fire the romp's starting pistol.
He had to stand through a blip before resuming a profitable afternoon that took him to third on the all-time Chelsea scoring list and gave him his sixth successive season with 20 goals.
Yuri Zhirkov was culpable for Carew's equalizer, somehow failing to notice the Villa striker was ghosting in behind him as Ashley Young's curling cross approached. That's if a 6ft 4in forward, built like a mature Norwegian pine, can ghost in.
But Zhirkov was to made amends with some spectacular interventions and some spectacular stylized falls.
Malouda's back-heel opened up an avenue for the Russian to scamper down - an avenue lined by the lamp-post presence of James Collins.
Straw-like Zhirkov would tumble under heavy breathing so when Collins rather mechanically extended his boot, there was only one option for the Chelsea full-back.
Peter Walton bought it but this was one of those occasions where the referee was in an invidious position. Was it a dive? Yes, I thought so. Was it a penalty? Yes. I thought so. Whatever, Lampard was angrily decisive from the spot, hitting it with unfamiliar venom and vicious lift.
The clichés about scoring just before half-time proved to be thumpingly apt.
From the moment Malouda capped a sublime, sinewy move with a bullish finish, the second half was a procession fuelled by an overwhelming rush of confidence.
That move was almost as beautifully piercing as the one that again sent Zhirkov careering joyously Brad Friedel-wards.
Richard Dunne gave away the penalty - with an almost resigned exhaustion - and Lampard's despatch this time looked less symbolic than the first.
This from a man who knew himself and his team were back on top of their game. And who knew the contest had become an exercise in goal-difference enhancement.
It was a sign of Malouda's swaggering self-belief that he collected the fifth with a right-footed flourish that unfurled the roof of the net.
With no need to extend Drogba's bruised legs - he took a couple of knocks so Carlo Ancelotti decided not to risk him - Kalou was sent on.
And the delirious crowd were, for the first time according to those who come here game in, game out, already singing Ancelotti's Christian name before Kalou drilled in the sixth.
Lampard's fourth was another example of his awareness, another illustration of being in the right time at the right place, of reading the game like few others do.
By now, they were bellowing his name and Ray Wilkins had to nudge Ancelotti when the masses demanded an Italian wave. He obliged and, after the game, settled down with a nice red.
But the real vintage came from Lampard and Terry, the skipper captaining Chelsea for the 325th time - a new record.
For that achievement, we will even forgive him the customary post-match ritual.
Shirt off, tossed gently to a deserving punter, biceps flexed, armband lifted to maximum prominence.
And as usual, he was the last person into the tunnel, only just beating Lampard.
How fitting. Just those two out on the pitch, the acclaim still ringing out.
They declared themselves ready for the most fascinating title fight in years.
They are ready for Old Trafford on Easter Saturday.
Bring it on.
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Chelsea 7 Aston Villa 1: Frank Lampard hits four as rampant Blues annihilate Villans
By Daniel King

‘Have you won the European Cup?’ was the early, hideously premature taunt from Aston Villa fans.No, Chelsea have failed again to win the competition that obsesses owner Roman Abramovich, but they do look a decent bet to pick up the consolation prize of the Premier League title.
And Villa’s dreams of playing in Europe’s premier competition for the first time in almost 30 years are in tatters after this morale-crushing mauling.
Defeat by Inter Milan and a draw against Blackburn had many critics writing obituaries for this ageing Chelsea team and their latest manager, Carlo Ancelotti.But 12 goals in two emphatic victories, including seven yesterday without top scorer Didier Drogba being required to leave the bench, mean Chelsea can go into Saturday’s pivotal game against Manchester United with belief that the title is still theirs for the taking.Frank Lampard’s four goals took his Chelsea tally to 151, ahead of Roy Bentley and Peter Osgood, while John Terry’s 325th appearance as captain beat the record set by Ron ‘Chopper’ Harris. Osgood and Harris were part of the entertaining but underachieving Chelsea team of the Seventies and, given the huge investment Abramovich has made, he will not be prepared to wait the 50 years it took to win another title after Bentley’s side were crowned champions in 1955.If they succeed, great credit will also be due to Florent Malouda, their player of the year so far and denied the man-of-the-match billing his two goals and performance might otherwise have deserved only because of Lampard’s spree.In fact, there was good news for Chelsea all over the pitch. Deco was imperious as a slightly withdrawn playmaker, Yury Zhirkov rampaged down the left in a way which suggested Ashley Cole need not hurry his recovery, Petr Cech had a gentle reintroduction to the first team and even Terry looked back to something approaching his best. Not that he needed to be against a desperately disappointing Villa side whose only meaningful shot on target was John Carew’s first-half equaliser.
Villa have again run out of steam when it matters most. This may have been their first defeat of 2010, but only three wins in those 11 games is the more significant statistic.Before yesterday, only Manchester United had as mean a defence as Villa’s, but the shattering of that record, combined with the lack of creativity, brutally exposed their dreams of playing in the Champions League as fanciful. ‘We were well beaten by a fine side,’ said manager Martin O’Neill of the club’s worst defeat in nearly half a century.
‘But at 3-1 we capitulated.’ were slightly unfortunate to be behind after a poor first half.Lampard had opened the scoring in the 15th minute when Malouda’s fine cross eluded everyone else, but when Carew converted a similar delivery by Ashley Young 14 minutes later, Ancelotti was soon indulging in typically-Italian hand gestures and facial expressions which suggested he is not as undemonstrative as some may claim.Just before half time, Lampard restored the home team’s lead with the first of his two penalties. James Collins seemed to make contact with the ball first as Zhirkov ran on to Malouda’s pass, but he also appeared to step on the foot of the Russian, who made the most of the contact, and referee Peter Walton pointed to the spot. Lampard’s conversion was typically efficient.
So far, so unconvincing. But Villa had never looked like scoring until Carew’s goal and they never looked as though they would again.
Their delivery from set-pieces continued to be poor and Stephen Warnock’s horribly-high effort early in the second half said everything about their lack of cutting edge in attack.And although the more attractive style which Ancelotti claims to have brought to Chelsea had been little in evidence during the first half, a three-goal salvo with which they hit Villa in 11-second half minutes was great to watch.

Deco eased through the Villa half before stroking a beautiful pass into Zhirkov’s path and the Russian’s cross found Malouda unmarked and he finished with ease.Another good move ended with Nicolas Anelka helping the ball into the path of the onrushing Zhirkov, Richard Dunne bringing him down and Lampard completing his hat-trick from the penalty spot.Then Paulo Ferreira’s cross was left by Joe Cole but helped on to Malouda by Lampard, and the Frenchman caressed the ball into the net with his weaker right foot.

Further goals by substitute Salomon Kalou and Lampard, yet again, completed a riotous afternoon which Ancelotti enjoyed sufficiently to grant the crowd’s request for a wave not once, but three times. But the biggest cheer was reserved for news of Birmingham’s late equaliser against title rivals Arsenal.Now for Manchester United.

portsmouth 5-0

Independent:

James' error opens the way for Chelsea to fire
Portsmouth 0 Chelsea 5
By Mark Fleming

Chelsea took no prisoners as they moved to within a point of Manchester United at the top of the Premier League with a bruising victory. They left two Portsmouth players nursing nasty facial injuries and Daniel Sturridge was fortunate not to be sent off as their mean streak came to the fore.
Yet Carlo Ancelotti's faltering side needed a disastrous mistake by David James to set them on their way. The goalkeeper missed an attempted clearance in the 32nd minute that allowed Didier Drogba to open the scoring and ease Chelsea's nerves. Another goal from Drogba, two from Florent Malouda and a late header from Frank Lampard put Chelsea on the same goal difference as United, one point behind the champions with a trip to Old Trafford to come on Easter Saturday.
Chelsea's commitment has been questioned as they dropped points in recent weeks, and against a determined Portsmouth side they went to the other extreme. Two Pompey players – Ricardo Rocha and Tommy Smith – had to leave the pitch with serious facial injuries, with their team-mates claiming they had been elbowed by their opponents just before halftime. Rocha suffered a suspected fractured cheekbone after he was caught by Malouda, who was booked by referee Lee Mason. The Portuguese defender hit his head on the turf, and had to be taken off on a stretcher, with an oxygen mask strapped to his face before going to hospital.
Smith soon joined Rocha on the receiving end when he left the pitch looking groggy and nursing a broken nose from a challenge by Sturridge, who should have been sent off but went unpunished. There could well be further punishment for the young striker as the off-the-ball incident was not seen by the referee. Chelsea attempted to play down both incidents. Ancelotti said: "I was very close. I saw what the referee saw. It was a challenge with two heads. Malouda did not mean to hurt him. I didn't see the other challenge."
Ancelotti said he would not agree that his team was over their slump until he has seen them beat Aston Villa at Stamford Bridge on Saturday: "We have to wait until Saturday, because that's a very important test for us."
Portsmouth, who before kick-off were granted permission to sell players outside the transfer windows, had held their own for the first 30 minutes until James committed one of the howlers that have littered his career. He totally missed the ball with his attempt at clearing a Deco header, and presented Drogba with the simplest goal he will score. In mitigation, the ball took a bad bounce at the crucial moment, which was a sad way for groundsman Bob Jones to bow out after 20 years at the club.
Portsmouth reorganised when Angelos Basinas and Quincy Owusu-Abeyie came on to replace Rocha and Smith respectively, but Chelsea quickly made the most of Portsmouth's difficulties by putting the victory beyond doubt with two goals in 11 minutes. Malouda, who has been probably Chelsea's best player during their wobbles of recent weeks, scored from a tight angle and then added a second after James parried Lampard's shot.
Drogba got a fourth with 13 minutes left, when he latched onto a ball from John Obi Mikel and beat James inside the near post for a trademark goal, his 30th of what is becoming his finest season.
Lampard scored a fifth when Drogba's mis-timed header bounced back off the ground and the England midfielder applied the finishing touch with his forehead.
Portsmouth (4-5-1): James; Mullins, Rocha (Basinas, 45), Hreidarsson, Finnan; Smith( Owusu-Abeyie, h-t), Mokoena (Kanu, 71), Wilson, Hughes, O'Hara; Piquionne. Substitutes not used: Ashdown (gk), Brown, Vanden Borre, Webber.
Chelsea (4-2-3-1): Cech; Ferreira, Terry, Carvalho (Alex, 36), Zhirkov (Van Aanholt, 71); Mikel, Lampard; Sturridge (J Cole, 55), Deco, Malouda; Drogba. Substitutes not used: Turnbull (gk), J Kalou, Anelka, Bruma.
Referee: L Mason (Lancashire).
Bookings: Portsmouth: Hughes. Chelsea: Malouda, Mikel.
Man of the match: Drogba.
Attendance: 18,753.

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Mail:
Portsmouth 0 Chelsea 5:Blues storm past sorry Pompey to close gap on Manchester United
By Matt Lawton
To begin with, Chelsea owed much to David James and the one member of the groundstaff he might now be glad to see the back of.
It was a calamitous error from James that enabled Didier Drogba to open the scoring on Wednesday night, but a nasty bobble on a patchy Fratton Park pitch that sent the ball looping over the Portsmouth goalkeeper’s foot as he attempted to make the simplest of clearances.
After the break, however, Portsmouth had to accept they were second best against a Chelsea side who will feel they are right back in the title race. They are only one point adrift of Manchester United and level with the champions on goal difference.
For Carlo Ancelotti, it was a timely result. He might have said he had nothing to fear from Roman Abramovich but defeat to Avram Grant after the humiliation he suffered at the hands of Jose Mourinho in the Champions League might have proved too much for Chelsea’s owner.
To lose to one predecessor may have been regarded as a misfortune by Abramovich; to lose to two in little over a week would have looked like carelessness.
Ancelotti avoided such an accusation thanks to Drogba and Florent Malouda, who rattled up four goals between them before Frank Lampard added a fifth in stoppage time.
It marked the end of a shocking run of results that has seen them go out of the Champions League, and drop eight of the last 15 Barclays Premier League points. Changing history still looks like quite a challenge, because this was not Chelsea at their best.
They were up against a Portsmouth side lacking any real incentive after their nine-point deduction and a side that suffered the further distraction of nasty injuries to Ricardo Rocha and Tommy Smith and the news that they may lose players after the Premier League allowed them to sell outside the transfer window.
Rocha suffered a suspected fractured cheekbone after an arial clash with Malouda, and Grant was sufficiently worried to go straight to the hospital after the match. Smith had a broken nose from what appeared to be an elbow from Daniel Sturridge that is sure to attract the attention of the FA.
For Portsmouth there was also the embarrassment of that opening 32nd-minute goal. While James might have seen to it that four members of the training ground staff keep their jobs during these difficult times at the club, he will be glad to bid farewell to the Fratton Park groundsman after this
Bob Jones will not be alone if he blames James for the manner in which Drogba was allowed to steal a lead. For any goalkeeper it was the stuff of nightmares. But the replays will prove just how significant a role Jones also played on his last night as groundsman after 20 years, because the playing surface has to take some of the blame.
Jones is not among the dozens who have been made redundant in recent weeks. He instead had the opportunity to retire. But he will wince when he sees how James’ attempt to clear a simple header forward from Deco was seriously undermined by a wretched bobble.
‘He was unlucky,’ said Ancelotti. ‘The bounce was not good.’
Comparisons with Paul Robinson’s howler against Croatia will inevitably follow but had it not been for James the score could have been considerably higher.
There was, however, nothing he could do to stop Malouda increasing the lead five minutes after the break. The Frenchman accelerated on to a neat pass from Lampard, much better here after his recent dip in form, and smashed the ball into the roof of the net.
James then did well to deny Joe Cole, on for a nervous-looking Sturridge, and saved the initial effort from Lampard before Malouda seized on the rebound to make it 3-0 in the 61st minute.
But, again, he was helpless when it came to the fourth and fifth — a close-range shot from Drogba, who took his season’s tally to 30 after chesting down a ball from John Mikel Obi and then holding off the challenge of Steve Finnan, and a simple header from Lampard.
Ancelotti said: ‘I hope the bad moment is finished. But we have to wait because Saturday against Aston Villa is a very important test. We played well tonight. We were lucky for the first goal but after that we did well.
'This performance will improve our confidence. We are involved in the Premier League and the FA Cup and we have to remember that.’
He insisted Malouda’s foul on Rocha was an accident. The Sturridge incident? He said he did not see. But for Chelsea’s manager there were other issues to consider. Not least the state of the team and their ability to finish the season with a flourish.
On Saturday we will have a much better idea.
MATCH FACTS
PORTSMOUTH (4-4-1-1): James 5; Finnan 6, Rocha 6 (Basinas 45, 5), hreidarsson 6, Mullins 5; Smith 6 (Owusu-Abeyie 46, 5), Wilson 6, Mokoena 6 (Kanu 71), Hughes 6; O’Hara 7; Piquionne 5.
Booked: O’Hara, Hughes, James.CHELSEA (4-3-3): Cech 6; Paulo Ferreira6, Carvalho 6 (Alex 37, 6), Terry 7, Zhirkov6 (Van Aanholt 71); Lampard 6, Mikel 6,Deco 6; Sturridge 5 (J Cole 55, 6),Drogba 7, Malouda 8.Booked: Malouda, Mikel.
Man of the match: Florent Malouda.
Referee: Lee Mason.


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Guardian:

Drogba leads Chelsea charge back into form at Portsmouth
Portsmouth 0 Chelsea 5 Drogba 32, Malouda 50, Malouda 60, Drogba 77, Lampard 90
Dominic Fifield at Fratton Park

Chelsea felt the fates had conspired against them in recent weeks but they should have known it is Portsmouth who have monopolised the hard luck story this term. While the visitors hoisted themselves out of their untimely lull in form and back to within a point of the summit here, the locals were left to survey the wreckage of a drubbing. The ignominy is merely prolonged in these parts.
They now have broken bones, together with bruised egos, to show for a miserable campaign. Ricardo Rocha ended last night in hospital with a suspected fractured cheekbone after an aerial challenge from Florent Malouda, who had led with his arm but with eyes fixed on the ball. The Portuguese was carried off on a stretcher with an oxygen mask pressed to his face. Tommy Smith then left dazed and bloodied at the interval with a broken nose after Daniel Sturridge appeared to catch him with an elbow.
The Portsmouth assistant manager, Paul Groves, suggested "nothing untoward" had occurred in the second collision, though the possibility remains that the off-the-ball incident could yet prompt retrospective sanction – potentially a three-game ban – from the Football Association once video evidence has been scrutinised. Hermann Hreidarsson had been more animated in his protest at Malouda's escape with nothing more than a caution, with Pompey's sense of injustice merely exacerbated by the reality that it was the Frenchman's two goals in the second half that prised the floodgates open. Fortune has long since deserted this stretch of the south coast.
Chelsea will care little. They could have scored at will in the second period, and virtually did, as confidence flowed back into their game, though it should not be forgotten that the thrashing could not have come to pass without an element of farce. David James, otherwise outstanding, provided the unwanted comic moment with a first-half air-kick at Deco's headed pass, the ball skipping up from the quagmire on the edge of the area with Didier Drogba trotting in to tap home.
It was a piece of theatre to rival Paul Robinson's infamously fluffed clearance from Gary Neville's back-pass with England in Zagreb in 2006 and James could be thankful Fabio Capello was at White Hart Lane last night rather than here. Prospective England players will wince at errors such as that in the build-up to the World Cup. This club's head groundsman of 21 years, Bob Jones, retired after this game. He deserved to go out on a better note.
The visiting players departed in better spirits, their conviction that the league title can still be claimed pepped by a conclusive victory. Their goal difference now sits level with Manchester United's, at 47, and victory in their remaining seven games – including at Old Trafford on Saturday week – will secure the title.
The irony was that theirs had been far from the slick and stylish performance that had graced Ewood Park in the first half on Sunday, a display that had gone on to degenerate after the interval and ended in talk of crisis and impending doom. This was the opposite: a sloppy start was exorcised by the opening goal and, thereafter, they roused themselves and steadily gathered steam.
Buoyed by James's error, and mustering bite on the break at last, they ran riot after the interval. Malouda, inevitably inflicting more pain, gathered Frank Lampard's pass and was allowed to veer into the area before thumping his finish emphatically beyond James. The home support were still querying why the Frenchman was on the pitch in bellowed chorus when he rammed in his second after James parried Lampard's strike. "We stayed focused and this will have improved our confidence," said Ancelotti.
Drogba's rasping near-post goal – his 30th of the season – and Lampard's header deep into stoppage time completed this side's biggest away win of the season so far, all memories of their disjointed first half long forgotten. The last time Ancelotti visited this stadium his Milan side salvaged a late 2-2 draw in a Uefa Cup tie 18 months ago. His new team were never in danger of being hauled in.
The Italian conceded that he would be in a better position to judge whether this team's blip is over after Saturday's visit of Aston Villa. For Avram Grant focus has long since been fixed on the FA Cup semi-final against Harry Redknapp's Tottenham Hotspur. The manager skipped his post-match duties to visit Rocha in hospital, presumably to console a player who has played six times for Pompey and, in that time has lost his debut 5-0, been sent off twice and carried off once. His return to English football has been traumatic.
Portsmouth do not anticipate the centre-half playing again this season. "He hasn't had much luck," conceded Groves. This team will struggle to sell any of its players in the weeks ahead, regardless of the green light granted them by the Premier League yesterday, given that their squad appears more threadbare with every match. This troubled league season cannot end soon enough.

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Telegraph:
Portsmouth 0 Chelsea 5
By Jason Burt at Fratton Park
Chelsea feel fortune has deserted them of late but, on Wednesday night, it ridiculed David James instead. The Portsmouth and England goalkeeper committed the sort of error that was not only freakish but will be replayed time and again, completely missing the ball as he attempted to clear, gifting the crucial opening goal. A Paul Robinson moment.
It meant Chelsea reduced Manchester United’s lead to just one point but Portsmouth will feel that they should have been reduced to 10 men after Florent Malouda caught Ricardo Rocha with his arm. The Portuguese was one of two Portsmouth players to suffer facial injuries; broken bones to add to broken hearts. And Malouda went on to score twice as did Didier Drogba.
Spare a thought this morning for Bob Jones, though. Before kick-off he was presented to the crowd — this being his last match as head groundsman at Fratton Park, a role he has held for the past 20 years, before he retires — and now he will wonder if a divot did it for James. He had said he couldn’t bear to watch the players cutting up his turf. He surely couldn’t watch on Wednesday night. Certainly Chelsea manager Carlo Ancelotti had looked warily at the pitch beforehand.
The table would suggest that this was the right kind of fixture, although maybe not the right venue, what with Portsmouth’s own sense of injustice over this season’s travails, for Chelsea to use up that game in hand and try to re-align their stumbling season.
They could do so with Petr Cech back in goal, returning from a five-match injury-induced absence as Ancelotti made changes from the dispiriting, ragged draw away to Blackburn Rovers at the weekend after which one of his own players, John Obi Mikel, questioned the “fight” they had shown.
Still the young midfielder survived in a re-configured formation, with Frank Lampard dropping deeper to accommodate Deco who, in the opening minutes combined with Drogba only for the latter to drag a shot wide. Moments later and Drogba slipped, after easily turning Rocha, to spurn another opportunity.
Quickly, James was brought into action, tipping away Lampard’s crisp strike from distance and, as would be expected, the pattern was set. Portsmouth’s game was containment and occasional forays spearheaded by Frederic Piquionne whose partnership with Aruna Dindane has been shelved, permanently, by the club’s inability to pay the £4 million transfer fee another appearance this season would have triggered.
That easy Chelsea dominance continued and it turned into a gifted advantage.
But what a terrible goal for a previously resolute Portsmouth to concede with Hermann Hreidarsson and Rocha getting in each other’s way as they attempted to clear Deco’s header. Still, the ball ran through to James who went to punt it back up-field from just outside his penalty area. But, with an air shot, the ball bobbled past him — was it the turf, was it his technique? — for Drogba to run on and tap into the net. It was his 14th goal in his last 14 league matches. None will have been simpler while James will have to re-live his mistake time and again.
To add to Portsmouth sense that things were conspiring against them, the goal came soon after Yuri Zhirkov had appeared to foul Jamie O’Hara as he was set to run onto Hreidarsson’s pass. Portsmouth were rocked and soon after Lampard burst through, only to slice his shot under Rocha’s challenge.
Their frustration grew and when Malouda jumped with Rocha he caught the defender with his arm. Hreidarsson howled for a red card and John Terry reacted angrily. Malouda was cautioned but there was also concern for Rocha who appeared to have been rendered unconscious by the challenge and was eventually stretchered off and immediately taken to hospital with a suspected fractured cheekbone.
It has been some return to English football for the former Tottenham defender whose record now reads — six games, sent off twice, carried off once..and made is debut in a 5-0 defeat. Welcome back to the Premier League.
It meant referee Lee Mason quickly become the focus of local anger while, at half-time, Tommy Smith was led from the pitch, blood streaming from his face and looking concussed after being caught by Daniel Sturridge with a flailing arm. It was later claimed he had broken his nose. Carnage. It had been some series of setbacks for Portsmouth.
And their anger rose when it was Malouda, who the home supporters felt should have been dismissed, who scored soon after the interval, latching on to Lampard’s simple, chipped ball forward to lash his angled shot from the corner of the six-yard area across James who was easily beaten. Soon after his arrival, Joe Cole was sent through down the right, only for James to parry his first-time shot.
But Chelsea were now rampant. James blocked Lampard’s powerful shot, only for the rebound to fall to Malouda who hammered it left-footed into the net.
It continued. Mikel’s cross-field pass was chested down by Drogba who was far too strong for Steve Finnan, shrugging him aside and driving past James.
Richard Hughes should have pulled one goal back but somehow headed wide. The rout was completed when Lampard nodded home from close-range in injury-time as Portsmouth crumbled.


------------------------------------------------------

Times
Chelsea close the gap after James provides charity for richPortsmouth 0 Chelsea 5
Matt Hughes Deputy Football Correspondent
In the desperately sad event of the football club going under, Portsmouth should rebrand itself as a spa town because a visit to this port in a storm provides a guaranteed pick-me-up.
Chelsea arrived in a crisis and departed a point behind Manchester United at the top of the Barclays Premier League and level on goal difference. With a visit to Old Trafford to come on Saturday week, their health is fully restored after taking out recent frustrations on their sorry hosts.
The West London club are not playing like champions at the moment despite the one-sided scoreline, but no one among them will remember or even care about that if blue ribbons are attached to the Premier League trophy in May. It will take more than a convincing win over financially and physically crippled opponents to erase the doubts that have surfaced recently, but Carlo Ancelotti’s side appear determined to take the title fight to the finish.
Chelsea laboured until Didier Drogba, Florent Malouda and, finally, Frank Lampard turned a decent contest into a turkey shoot in the second half. If it had been a boxing bout, the referee would have stopped it long before the final whistle, although to judge from the liberal manner in which Malouda and Daniel Sturridge threw their elbows around, it was more like Ultimate Fighting.
If Chelsea do use this thrashing as a springboard for regaining the Premier League title, they may look back on their 32nd-minute opening goal as the turning point of their season, because before then David James had been untroubled. Portsmouth have enough problems without making life more difficult for themselves, but that is exactly what they did, with James guilty of one of the aberrations that have characterised his career. Paul Robinson, his former England team-mate, would no doubt sympathise.
Avram Grant’s players were still complaining that Yuri Zhirkov should have been penalised for a foul on Jamie O’Hara, who was the home side’s best player, when Deco’s header over the top gave them something else to worry about. Ricardo Rocha and Hermann Hreidarsson began the slapstick by colliding with each other in a manner reminiscent of the Chuckle Brothers in their prime, but James upstaged the lot of them, missing the ball after charging out of his goal to present Drogba with a tap-in. The only good news for the England goalkeeper was that Fabio Capello was otherwise engaged at White Hart Lane.
James’s air-shot looked horrific, but he was not helped by a dreadful pitch with more divots than a cabbage patch, all the more unfortunate given that it was the last one prepared by Bob Jones, the club’s long-serving groundsman, before he retired yesterday. James organised a whip-round among the players to keep the groundsman at Portsmouth’s training ground in a job after he was made redundant this month, but he will probably be glad to see the back of Jones.
Portsmouth’s problems — and sense of injustice — increased just before half-time, when they lost two more players to injury and effectively the match. Malouda was booked for raising his arm in a challenge with Rocha that left the Portuguese centre back with a suspected fractured cheekbone, while Sturridge went unpunished despite appearing to elbow Tommy Smith, leaving him with a broken nose.
Ancelotti was adamant that Malouda’s challenge was accidental, although he refrained from commenting on Sturridge, perhaps wisely. The 20-year-old is unlikely to escape for a second time when the match video is passed on to the FA’s disciplinary unit, because the television pictures of contact with Smith’s nose were conclusive.
Portsmouth could have no complaints about Chelsea’s second goal five minutes into the second half, however, after which they threw in the towel. Lampard’s ball down the left found Malouda, who beat Steve Finnan for pace before powering the ball past James from a tight angle for his ninth goal of the season. The France winger has been Chelsea’s most improved player this season and is the only rival to Drogba for the club’s Player of the Year award.
The same combination extended the lead in the 61st minute, with Malouda tapping in the rebound for his second goal after James had saved Lampard’s initial shot, before the visiting team set about erasing United’s advantage in terms of goal difference, which they achieved in some style.
Drogba scored his 30th goal of a remarkable season at the near post after a through-ball from John Obi Mikel in the 77th minute and Lampard grabbed his sixteenth with a close-range header in injury time.
Ancelotti is experienced enough to know that this bullying exercise could count for little in the long run, but seven more wins of any sort will secure Chelsea the title.
Portsmouth (4-5-1): D James — S Finnan, R Rocha (sub: A Basinas, 45min), H Hreidarsson, H Mullins — T Smith (sub: Q Owusu-Abeyie, 46), M Wilson, A Mokoena (sub: Kanu, 71), R Hughes, J O’Hara — F Piquionne. Substitutes not used: J Ashdown, M Brown, A vanden Borre, D Webber. Booked: O’Hara, Hughes, James.
Chelsea (4-3-3): P Cech — P Ferreira, R Carvalho (sub: Alex, 36), J Terry, Y Zhirkov (sub: P van Aanholt, 71) — F Lampard, J O Mikel, Deco — D Sturridge (sub: J Cole, 55), D Drogba, F Malouda. Substitutes not used: R Turnbull, S Kalou, N Anelka, J Bruma. Booked: Malouda, Mikel.
Referee: L Mason.


--------------------------------------------

Sun:

Portsmouth 0 Chelsea 5
IAN McGARRY at Fratton Park
DON'T be fooled by the hype - this was more classy Chelsea than Calamity James.
True, the Portsmouth keeper came up with another clanger to make sure his nickname will stick a lot longer.
But without the England stopper this might have been 10-0 as Chelsea made sure their title challenge is alive and kicking again.
They arrived at Fratton Park with their credibility, courage and hunger to win the League in question.
But after 94 rain-soaked minutes, Carlo Ancelotti's men left no one in doubt they are not prepared to throw the towel in just yet.
As a response to the disappointment of the games against Inter Milan and Blackburn, this could not have been more positive.
Arsenal are back in third again this morning while Manchester United lead Blues by a solitary point and they are now level on goal difference as well.
Ancelotti had called on his players to show courage, desire and commitment in this game - and they didn't let him down.
From the very off they chased down every ball, went into every tackle and never turned their back on the task.
Pompey will argue Chelsea's aggression went too far at times - especially when Ricardo Rocha was taken off on a stretcher with a suspected broken jaw.
Florent Malouda appeared to lead with his arm in the incident just before half time.
The French winger got off with yellow card and added further injury by scoring two goals.
For Pompey boss Avram Grant, though, the pain started a lot earlier when John Terry headed a clearance from James back towards the home goal. Rocha and Hermann Hreidarsson looked like a pair of circus clowns as they clashed mid-air attempting to clear.
That was nothing though compared to James' wild slash at fresh air which allowed Didier Drogba to walk the ball into an empty net.
He looked almost embarrassed and even waited until his team-mates found him before he dared to celebrate.
Pompey soon suffered another casualty when striker Tommy Smith was taken off with blood pouring from a cut on the bridge of his nose after clashing with Daniel Sturridge and was replaced by Quincy Owusu-Abeyie.
When the teams reappeared it was to the soundtrack of The Great Escape - but it was hard to see Pompey digging themselves out of this one.
It then got a lot worse in the 49th minute when the home defence was caught ball watching.Frank Lampard threaded an excellent ball for Malouda who timed his run in behind the defence before smashing an unstoppable shot past James.
There was nothing he could do about that one!
Still, after the way Portsmouth rallied against Hull Chelsea probably knew they could not take anything for granted.
The casualty list continued to grow when Sturridge was forced off and Joe Cole finally got some game time.
Sporting a new shaven-headed look, he almost got on the scoresheet as well when Lampard put him in but James pulled off another great save to his right.
The veteran keeper's skill was not enough to keep them at bay for long. On the hour he did well to turn away a rasping Lampard drive only to see Malouda react the quickest to bury the rebound.
By now Pompey looked like a team who are already down and most definitely out. However, after having received permission to sell players outside of the transfer window to pay off debts you wouldn't think they would get too much for this lot on this performance.
The re-jigged defence was then caught out with a long ball in behind which saw Drogba bear down and smash home the fourth.
It was the striker's 30th of the season and he is creeping up on his best tally of 33 despite spending a month at the African Nations Cup.
Worryingly for Chelsea, the Ivory Coast ace limped off at the end, though his ankle knock is not thought to be serious. He had still managed to leap to head back a Cole cross for Lamps to complete the rout in the final minute.
After the final whistle, the Blues players applauded their fans and threw their shirts into the crowd.
They knew this was an important win and with seven games left - including a visit to Old Trafford - seven more wins will see them crowned champions. Who'd have thought it three days ago?
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blackburn 1-1

Independent:

Chelsea's northern strife puts dent in title prospects
Blackburn Rovers 1 Chelsea 1
By Phil Shaw

Should Chelsea fail to win the Premier League title for a fourth consecutive year, they are sure to look back ruefully on their performances in the north-west. Carlo Ancelotti's first trips to Wigan, Everton and Manchester City all ended in defeat, and yesterday Blackburn shrugged off the setback of Didier Drogba's early goal to restrict them to a single point in the Ewood Park drizzle.
El-Hadji Diouf headed Blackburn's second-half equaliser, and for all that Chelsea piled forward in pursuit of a winner in the final minutes, they struggled to recapture the fluidity of their football during a first half in which a three-goal advantage would not have flattered them.
Chelsea now visit Portsmouth on Wednesday – even an anticipated victory over Avram Grant's doomed team would leave them a point adrift of United – before a visit to Old Trafford on 3 April and the penultimate fixture at Liverpool.
Ironically, Blackburn's strength at home, where they have lost only twice this season, could yet help Chelsea to finish ahead of United and Arsenal, who are both due at Ewood during the final weeks. Sam Allardyce's side also eliminated Chelsea from the Carling Cup on penalties before Christmas and there is a doggedness about them which means the title contenders will underestimate them at their peril.
Chelsea were possibly guilty of doing so here; in the second half, however, Ancellotti admitted Chelsea's composure went AWOL.
"We started well but it was more difficult on this pitch for us to play on the floor," the Chelsea manager said. "In the second half we lost a bit of composure and conceded a goal. After that we had another strong spell but it was too late and we have lost two important points."
Asked whether the second-half display was a hangover from the Champions League exit at the hands of Jose Mourinho's Internazionale, or if the pressure of the John Terry affair affected Chelsea's equilibrium, Ancelotti played a straight bat. "We tried to win this game and for an hour we did well. It will be more difficult now to win the title, but not impossible.
"We have to leave this moment as soon as possible. We have to look forward and to win [on Wednesday] is the only solution to do that. We have less probability to win the title, but we need to stay compact and work together at this moment."
Allardyce, who was disinclined to revise his prediction that Chelsea may win the League and FA Cup double, felt the performance of his 18-year-old, debutant central defender Phil Jones epitomised Blackburn's effort. "We think he has the look of John Terry about him," he said without any apparent irony. "He had one hell of a debut and we think he's got a bright future."
The Blackburn manager is, of course, a friend of Sir Alex Ferguson's, yet he played down the suggestion that he would be pleased to have done United a favour. "This was for us, not for Sir Alex. The most important thing is that it's another point towards safety."
In the opening stages, however, Chelsea looked anything but a team in crisis, oozing confidence and scoring early. Frank Lampard's pass down the right-hand side picked out a run by Nicolas Anelka, who ghosted through two challenges before showing impressive composure by cutting the ball back to a yard beyond the penalty mark. Drogba took it with his left foot, side-footing home his 28th goal of the season as if taking a spot-kick.
Chelsea had several opportunities to kill off Blackburn. Salomon Kalou headed narrowly over, an Alex volley thudded into Martin Olsson's midriff, flooring him and Florent Malouda, taking a pass by the lively Kalou and gliding past two challenges, fired straight at Brown.
Chelsea's lack of ruthlessness encouraged Blackburn to raise their tempo after half-time, although Allardyce may have been unduly conservative in sticking to a single striker throughout. Even when he sent on Jason Roberts, it was to replace lone striker Nikola Kalinic.
A hint of the kind of vulnerability Chelsea might demonstrate under pressure emerged moments after half-time when Yury Zhirkov, who had replaced the injured Branislav Ivanovic in first-half stoppage time, headed off the line from a header by Christopher Samba.
There was no such reprieve after Michel Salgado swung in a deep cross from the right. When it reached the far post, Paulo Ferreira was beaten in the air by the conspicuously peroxide-topped head of Diouf. At the final whistle, Allardyce punched the air, while Ancelotti's grey, grizzled countenance was furrowed with anxiety.

Blackburn Rovers (4-4-1-1): Brown; Salgado, Samba, Jones, Olsson; Pedersen, Andrews, Nzonzi (Hoillet, 90), Diouf; Dunn (Emerton, 56); Kalinic (Roberts, 63). Substitutes not used: Bunn (gk), Jacobsen, Linganzi, Chimbonda.

Chelsea (4-3-3): Turnbull; Ivanovic (Zhirkov, 45), Alex, Terry, Ferreira; Lampard, Mikel, Malouda; Anelka (Sturridge, 90), Drogba, Kalou (Deco, 73). Substitutes not used: Sebek (gk), Cole, Matic, Bruma.

Referee: S Bennett (Kent).
Booked: Chelsea Zhirkov.
Man of the match: Jones.
Attendance: 25,554.

-------------------------------------------------

Guardian:

Chelsea's confidence dims after Blackburn are let off the hook
Blackburn Rovers 1 Diouf 70 Chelsea 1 Drogba 6
Joe Lovejoy at Ewood Park

Do Chelsea have the best players in the country, or merely the best paid? The question with which Roman Abramovich is said to have confronted his team after their elimination from the Champions League is manna from heaven for media studies classes and pub knowalls everywhere and their verdicts will be even more damning after this latest disappointment.
Arsenal won on Saturday to take over pole position in the title race and Manchester United displaced them at lunchtime today, and it was up to Chelsea to respond. But for the second time in six days they were found wanting.
Before this, they took comfort in the fact that if they won all their remaining games they would be champions, regardless of what the others could accomplish. That no longer applies, and Carlo Ancelotti's expression was more hangdog than ever tonight when, pointedly, the Italian did not gainsay the suggestion that United were now favourites to retain their Premier League crown.
If the result against Internazionale was job-threatening, this one will not have improved the Chelsea manager's standing with Abramovich and company. The statistics are beginning to look ominous. Of their last 11 matches in all competitions, starting with an unimpressive 1-1 draw at Hull City, Chelsea have won five and lost four, and of their last eight away games in the Premier League they have won just two. By Ancelotti's own admission, they have lost their confidence. "It's not an easy moment for us and we have to maintain our confidence and our composure," he said.
The Italian eschewed wholesale changes after Internazionale, dropping only his left-back, Yury Zhirkov, in favour of Paolo Ferreira. If the Russian suspected he had been made a scapegoat, he did not have long to let the feeling fester. Branislav Ivanovic, injured in a collision with El-Hadji Diouf, had to go off just before half-time and Zhirkov came on, with Ferreira switching to the right.
The other absentee from last Tuesday, Michael Ballack, was said to be "not 100% fit" and gave way to Salomon Kalou. Neither Petr Cech nor Hilario were deemed ready to return, so Ross Turnbull, the third-choice keeper, was in goal for his third game in succession.
Blackburn were well below optimum strength, injuries depriving them of their England goalkeeper, Paul Robinson, the captain, Ryan Nelsen, and another centre-back, Gaël Givet, among others. There was a Premier League debut in central defence for the 18-year-old Phil Jones, who could be well satisfied with a steady, no-frills introduction to the big time which brought him the man of the match award and ridiculously premature comparisons with John Terry.
Chelsea were glad to see the back of Robinson, whose shoot-out heroics put them out of the Carling Cup in the quarter-finals in December. His understudy, Jason Brown, was picking the ball out of the back of his net after only six minutes.
Nicolas Anelka motored down the right before delivering a left-footed cutback which Didier Drogba coolly passed low inside the near post, also with his left foot, from 13 yards for his 28th goal of the season.
Slicing through Rovers almost at will, Chelsea should have had the issue settled by half-time, but Kalou met Frank Lampard's right-wing cross with a feeble header and Florent Malouda shot straight at Brown when a yard to either side would surely have produced a goal.
The possibility that Chelsea might rue such opportunities spurned was underlined at the start of the second half, when it took a goal-line clearance by Zhirkov to prevent Christopher Samba from equalising with a close-range header. It proved to be the case after 70 minutes, with another header. The finish was applied from six yards by Diouf, who climbed above Ferreira at the far post to nod home Michel Salgado's inviting cross from the right for only his third goal of the season.
So comfortable and assured before the interval, Chelsea had lost their shape and composure. Drogba, attacking a Deco corner, brought a noteworthy save from Brown near the end, but Rovers had the better of the second half and deserved a result which keeps them ahead of the relegation pack.

----------------------------------------------------

Telegraph:

Blackburn Rovers 1 Chelsea 1

By Jason Burt

El-Hadji Diouf’s powerful second-half header piled the pressure on Carlo Ancelotti with Chelsea dropping vital points in the Premier League title race.
After taking an early lead, through Didier Drogba, with his 28th goal of the season, Chelsea appeared set to reduce Manchester United’s lead at the top of the table but fell away dramatically.
With John Terry and Frank Lampard struggling to impose themselves this is a worrying time for Ancelotti who spoke before this match of his desire to win a league and FA Cup double after crashing out of the Champions League in midweek.
Blackburn were bolstered by an outstanding Premier League debut by 18-year-old central defender Phil Jones who was, in the driving rain, the man-of-the-match against stellar opponents.
Nevertheless Chelsea drew ahead with Drogba side-footing home after just five minutes, after superb build-up play by Nicolas Anelka, and appeared to be cruising to victory.
Salomon Kalou headed over a corner and Anelka was wayward with a volley as Chelsea comfortably controlled the match while another by Alex struck Martin Ollson and goalkeeper Jason Brown beat out Florent Malouda’s drive. For Blackburn, Morten Gamst Pedersen’s free-kick was easily stopped by Ross Turnbull but they threatened little until after the break.
The home side’s best chance of scoring appeared to be Pedersen’s long-throws and substitute Yuri Zhirkov had to scramble off the line as Chris Samba headed on with Turnbull stranded. It encouraged Blackburn who raised the tempo and started to press.
Pedersen collected an angled cross from Steven Nzonzi and, with Paulo Ferreira distracted, he rounded the full-back only to lift his shot across goal. Chelsea didn’t heed the warning and so when substitute Brett Emerton crossed deep, Diouf rose brilliantly, with Ferreira rooted, to head firmly into the net.
There was a frantic finish. Chelsea pushed forward, desperate for the winning goal, with a series of half-chances cleared, by Samba in particular.
The Blackburn captain flung himself to deflect Drogba’s goal-bound half-volley while Pedersen brilliantly tackled Lampard and Jones, appropriately, denied Terry. What a debut.


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The Times

Chelsea's weakness exposed by El-Hadji Diouf and Blackburn

Blackburn 1 Chelsea 1

Matt Hughes, Deputy Football Correspondent

It scarcely needs saying that this was a match José Mourinho would have won.Carlo Ancelotti’s side were one up and cruising towards a much-needed victory at Ewood Park yesterday, but they lost their way after half-time and never looked like recovering.
Chelsea’s hopes of regaining the Barclays Premier League crown had suffered a shattering blow on the ground where they gained the self-belief to win a first title in50 years five years ago.
All is not yet lost — they can move to within a point of Manchester United by winning their game in hand away to Portsmouth on Wednesday — but a calamitous few days has left them playing catch-up in every sense.
After being knocked out of the Champions League, they find themselves outside the Premier League’s top two for the first time since the middle of August.
After the recriminations that resulted from defeat by Inter Milan, what Chelsea need now is a demonstration of unity. Roman Abramovich, the owner, would be advised to resist the temptation to launch another investigation, Ancelotti, the manager, should be given a public show of support and the players must stop bickering among themselves and begin fighting for a common cause.
The early signs were not encouraging, however, because after El-Hadji Diouf’s 70th-minute equaliser, the visiting team accepted their fate meekly.
Chelsea have been a dysfunctional club since Abramovich paid £140 million for a new plaything in the summer of 2003, but in recent years the malaise has spread to an unusually powerful dressing room. Of Mourinho’s successors, only Guus Hiddink gained the true loyalty and respect of his players and the short length of his tenure meant that the Dutchman was never confronted with a period of reckoning such as that facing Ancelotti.
The Italian’s ability to raise his side from their gloom will reveal a great deal about his character, and that of his players.
Ancelotti believes the rot that has led to a run of two wins from six matches set in with the remarkable 4-2 home defeat by Manchester City last month, but in many ways this game can be seen as a microcosm of their season. Chelsea began brightly and took the lead as the result of an attractive goal from Didier Drogba, but ran out of steam before being undone by familiar defensive shortcomings.
Such vulnerability at the back has been a recurring problem all season, but even more worrying is the dip in form suffered by many of their leading players. John Terry’s mobility appears more restricted with every passing week, Frank Lampard is lacking his usual energy and only Drogba and Florent Malouda are performing anywhere near their best.
Abramovich had attempted to rouse his employees from their lethargy with a reminder of the demands that accompany their huge pay packets last week, and initially the message seemed to have got through as they took a sixth-minute lead. Nicolas Anelka’s pace took him away from Martin Olsson and Phil Jones down the right and he had the presence of mind to delay his cross, with Drogba taking full advantage to score with a first-time left-foot finish.
Chelsea have relied on Drogba and Lampard for goals for several seasons, leading to an occasionally one-dimensional attacking style that Blackburn coped with comfortably as their opponents lost their way. Ancelotti blamed a pitch that has taken sustained punishment during this harsh winter, but as well as the poor quality of Chelsea’s passing, the home side’s resilience was deserving of considerable praise, particularly that of Jones, an 18-year-old centre back making his Premier League debut.
Blackburn were so comfortable that they began to push for an equaliser after half-time and it was no surprise when it arrived. Yuri Zhirkov had already cleared a header by Christopher Samba off the line when Michel Salgado slung another deep cross into the penalty area. Diouf took full advantage, rising above Paulo Ferreira to head in his third goal of the season.
Ferreira was only stationed at the far post because Branislav Ivanovic had limped off before half-time with a knee injury that further illustrates Chelsea’s mounting woes, but they do not have the time to waste in feeling sorry for themselves.

Blackburn (4-4-1-1): J Brown 6 M Salgado 6 C Samba 6 P Jones 6 M Olsson 5 M G Pedersen 6 K Andrews 6 S N’Zonzi5 E-H Diouf 6 D Dunn 5 N Kalinic 6. Substitutes: B Emerton 5 (for Dunn, 55min), J Roberts 5 (for Kalinic, 62), D Hoilett (for N’Zonzi, 90).Not used: M Bunn, L Jacobsen, A Linganzi, P Chimbonda. Next: Birmingham City (h).

Chelsea (4-3-3): R Turnbull 6 B Ivanovic 5 Alex 6 J Terry 5 P Ferreira 5 F Lampard 6 J O Mikel 5 F Malouda 6 N Anelka 6 D Drogba 6 S Kalou 5 Substitutes: Y Zhirkov 5 (for Ivanovic, 44min), Deco (for Kalou, 74), D Sturridge (for Anelka, 90). Not used: J Sebek, J Cole, N Matic, J Bruma.

Next: Portsmouth (a).
Referee: S Bennett. Attendance: 25,554

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Mail:

Blackburn 1 Chelsea 1: Big Sam swings it to keep Carlo Ancelotti on the slide
By Ian Ladyman

Chelsea's season is in danger of becoming characterised by missed opportunities. Sunday’s draw at Ewood Park was symptomatic.
Competing for the Barclays Premier League title against a Manchester United side weakened by the departure of Cristiano Ronaldo and an Arsenal team who have played most of the season without a dependable forward, Chelsea will ask themselves why they are outside the top two for the first time since August.
Here, during 94 frenetic minutes in Lancashire, were some of the answers. Deprived of key players such as Petr Cech — expected back for Wednesday’s game against Birmingham — Ashley Cole, Michael Ballack and Ricardo Carvalho, Chelsea are sliding.
Carlo Ancelotti’s team really needed to win here to reintroduce momentum in the wake of Wednesday’s numbing Champions League defeat at home to Inter Milan. That they didn’t was telling.
Chelsea were so superior to Blackburn in the first half it was almost embarrassing. They should have been three or four goals to the good by the break.
But their failure to convert these chances cost them by the time Sam Allardyce’s team found a little belief and tempo in the second period. When the intensity of Blackburn’s play was turned up, Chelsea could not cope.
Perhaps it is down to confidence. It can come and go very quickly, even at this level. But equally worrying for Chelsea is that they look a tired team. Frank Lampard — for the second game on the trot — looked to be running in sand.
Given the state of Blackburn’s pitch — Allardyce’s team have had to train on it this winter — Lampard and his team-mates were indeed playing on a peculiar surface.
Their opening goal was superb, though. Only five minutes had passed when Nicolas Anelka romped down the right, turned inside Keith Andrews and laid the ball into the path of Didier Drogba who scored from 12 yards with his left instep.
After United’s win over Liverpool earlier in the day, this was the start Chelsea would have wished for. Unfortunately for them, they could not capitalise on it.
With Salomon Kalou so effective at the point of their midfield diamond, Ancelotti’s team were vibrant early on.
But Anelka volleyed carelessly over in the 21st minute, Alex struck a chance into the midriff of Martin Olsson and Florent Malouda drew a save from Jason Brown with a shot so well struck that it would have brought the second goal had it not been directed straight at the Rovers goalkeeper.
Blackburn were toothless, with striker Nikola Kalinic too often left isolated at the top of Allardyce’s 4-2-3-1 formation.
But Chelsea lost right back Branislav Ivanovic with a knee injury just before half-time and Allardyce rejigged his team during the interval. From then on, it was a different game.
Blackburn improved vastly after the break as their wide players, Brett Emerton and El Hadji Diouf, pushed hard on to Chelsea’s full backs. Nevertheless, the manner in which Chelsea allowed themselves to concede ground was surprising.
Substitute Yury Zhirkov had already headed a Chris Samba flick off the goal-line and Pedersen had ballooned an effort over when Blackburn hauled themselves level in the 69th minute. It was a simple goal but brilliantly executed.
Michel Salgado — who had endured a difficult game at full back — hit a deep cross from right to left and Diouf rose above defender Paulo Ferreira to head down and in past Ross Turnbull at his right-hand post.
Diouf would certainly not have got above the taller Ivanovic and news that the Serb has a ‘traumatic’ knee injury will worry Ancelotti ahead of the scan the defender has on Monday.
For the final 20 minutes everything turned rather hectic. Rain began to fall and tempers flared.
Predictably, Chelsea threw everything they had at Blackburn and Drogba almost scored the winner, only for Brown to turn his shot aside from close range with three minutes to go.
As Chelsea poured forward, Blackburn stood firm. Holding midfielder David Nzonzi was impressive but young central defender Phil Jones stood above everybody else.
Making his debut at 18, Jones is a product of Blackburn’s youth system and looks a terrific prospect.
‘We have high hopes for him,’ said Allardyce. ‘He is from down the road in Chorley and he will be very proud of himself in the morning. He could be the next John Terry.’
This morning, Jones will be feeling a damn sight happier than the Chelsea skipper.
Terry is believed to be under investigation by UEFA following comments he made in the wake of the 1-0 defeat by Inter at Stamford Bridge.
For Chelsea, it has not been a great week.

inter 0-1

Times:
Mourinho makes triumphant return to Stamford Bridge as Chelsea crash out
Chelsea 0 Inter Milan 1 (Inter win 3-1 on agg)
Oliver Kay, Football Correspondent
Of all the many traits that José Mourinho instilled in his Chelsea teams, the only one to rear its head last night was the persecution complex.
Once again John Terry et al found themselves venting anger at the match officials as they departed the Champions League stage, but this time any talk of a Uefa refereeing conspiracy should give way to some serious self-examination.
There will be recriminations over the red card shown to Didier Drogba, for an apparent stamp on Thiago Motta with three minutes remaining, and over a strong Chelsea penalty appeal that was rejected in either leg, but do not let Terry or anyone else say that they were robbed over two fast and furious legs. Quite simply, they were beaten by a better team.
A better team or simply a better organised, better drilled team? Either way, it reflects well on Mourinho and rather less so on Carlo Ancelotti, his latest successor in the Chelsea dugout. As Chelsea’s players looked to the touchline for inspiration in the second half, they saw Mourinho gesticulating wildly and Ancelotti looking, well, a little forlorn. We must get away from this unhealthy idea that touchline demeanour is an indicator of managerial ability, but for as long as Terry, Drogba, Frank Lampard and the rest remain in thrall to Mourinho, comparisons, while odorous, are inevitable.
Ancelotti could well lead Chelsea to the Barclays Premier League title and the FA Cup this season, but this was not a good night for him. Even if Inter’s supporters were almost certainly guilty of wishful thinking as they serenaded the AC Milan legend with lusty chants of “Bye bye Carletto” towards the end of the game — and repeated that message when Roman Abramovich made the long, lonely walk across the pitch towards the dressing-room area afterwards — Ancelotti will reflect on this as the most chastening night of his first season at Stamford Bridge.
It was also a night when Inter gave a reminder that there is still life in Serie A. Italian clubs have fared miserably against their Premier League counterparts in the Champions League over the past couple of seasons — most recently AC Milan’s wretched capitulation at Old Trafford a week ago — but Inter performed here with silk as well as steel, the former provided almost exclusively by Wesley Sneijder and the latter supplied by redoubtable figures such as Lúcio, Walter Samuel, Thiago Motta and Esteban Cambiasso, four players who conform to Mourinho’s requirement for his teams to have a strong, unyielding spine.
It was Sneijder, inevitably, who set up the only goal of the night with 11 minutes left as he produced the third in a series of defence-splitting passes, to send Samuel Eto’o clear for an opportunity that, after his earlier profligacy, he did not dare to miss. Chelsea’s players looked to the assistant referee for an offside flag, but Alex, who had a difficult evening alongside Terry in central defence, had clearly played Eto’o onside.
Sneijder is a wonderful talent but he could hardly have imagined that he would find as much space as this in the cramped confines of Stamford Bridge. If Chelsea still had a player in the Claude Makelele mould to patrol the area in front of their back four, it would have been a different story, but John Obi Mikel has nothing of the great Frenchman’s discipline or tactical nous.
Mourinho made the rather gratuitous point afterwards that Branislav Ivanovic and Yuri Zhirkov — two of the four players in the Chelsea starting line-up whom he had not bought — had been weak links, but Ancelotti’s team were poor in every department. With the exception of Florent Malouda, they simply did not perform.
There was a five-minute spell either side of half-time when Chelsea banged on the door repeatedly but, with Inter defending resolutely, it was not enough. When Malouda danced inside two challenges in the penalty area just before half-time, Samuel appeared from nowhere to take the ball off his toe. When Drogba sent Nicolas Anelka through moments later, Samuel repeated the trick. When Drogba finally escaped the attentions of Samuel with a twisting run early in the second half, Lúcio was there to snuff out the danger. And when Malouda fizzed a low shot through a crowd, Júlio César, Inter’s excellent but largely untested goalkeeper, pushed the ball around a post.
Ancelotti, his desperation growing, sent on Joe Cole and Salomon Kalou as he looked for something different, but neither player made the slightest impact. If anything, the changes played into Mourinho’s hands as Sneijder found even more space in midfield.
The momentum was firmly with Inter and, after Sneijder set up Eto’o and Diego Milito in quick succession, with the unfairly maligned Zhirkov making the recovery tackle on each occasion, Milito struck another opportunity wide, Mourinho’s blood pressure seemed to soar on the touchline.
He need not have worried. Sneijder split the home defence again and Eto’o ran clear, this time finally beating Ross Turnbull, Chelsea’s third-choice goalkeeper.
Mourinho reacted by pumping his fist very discreetly, the Tim Henman of celebrations, and, being the shrinking violet that he is, proceeded to watch the final minutes of the game from the privacy of the players’ tunnel, away from the television cameras.
And let us end at the start of the evening, when Mourinho appeared on the touchline pre-match to a soundtrack of the Rainbow classic Since You’ve Been Gone. The next line goes “I’m outta my head, can’t take it”, swiftly followed by “You cast the spell, so break it”. The concern for everyone at Stamford Bridge is that Mourinho’s spell, far from being broken, has been reinforced. And if you think that Terry and his team-mates will not be pining for Mourinho this morning, it is to underestimate the extent to which he remains, in their eyes, the Special One.

Chelsea (4-3-3): R Turnbull — B Ivanovic, Alex, J Terry, Y Zhirkov (sub: S Kalou, 73min) — M Ballack (sub: J Cole, 63), J O Mikel, F Lampard — N Anelka, D Drogba, F Malouda. Substitutes not used: R Taylor, R Carvalho, J Belletti, J Bruma, D Sturridge. Booked: Malouda, Drogba, Alex, Terry. Sent off: Drogba.
Inter Milan (4-2-1-3): Júlio César — Maicon, Lúcio, W Samuel, J Zanetti — E Cambiasso, T Motta (sub: M Materazzi, 90) — W Sneijder (sub: M Mariga, 85) — S Eto’o, D Milito, G Pandev (sub: D Stankovic, 74). Substitutes not used: F Toldo, I Córdoba, D Santon, R Quaresma. Booked: Eto’o, Motta, Lúcio, Júlio César.
Referee: W Stark (Germany).

Slaps in face of respect
Didier Drogba departed the Champions League in ignominy for the third successive season last night 2008 Final, Manchester United 1 Chelsea 1 (United win 6-5 on pens): Drogba is sent off in extra time for slapping Nemanja Vidic.
2009 Semi-final, Chelsea 1 Barcelona 1 (1-1 on agg; Barcelona win on away goals rule): Refereeing decisions prompt striker to shout at a TV camera: “It’s a f***ing disgrace.”


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Telegraph:

Chelsea 0 Inter Milan 1 By Henry Winter at Stamford Bridge
Still the Special One. Still the king of Stamford Bridge. Still the tactical grand master. Jose Mourinho, Inter’s inspiration, orchestrated Chelsea’s first home defeat in the Champions League in 22 games, sending his old club crashing out of the competition that Carlo Ancelotti was so expensively brought in to win.
So the mistake Roman Abramovich made in falling out with Mourinho in 2007 came back to haunt him. The Portuguese had hinted beforehand that he would not celebrate any Inter goal out of respect for his former employers but he couldn’t resist it.
Mourinho marked Samuel Eto’o’s fine late strike with a few steps down the touchline before remembering his promise, heading back to the dug-out, still scarcely able to conceal his delight. He knew that Inter were superior in all departments: their defence was mobile defiance personified, their midfield a winning mix of passing and tackling while their four-man attack never gave Chelsea’s back-line a moment’s peace.
Sadly, shamefully, the game ended in even greater humiliation for Chelsea. Didier Drogba, having tangled with Thiago Motta, who went down as if shot, was dismissed, echoing his embarrassing exit last season. Suddenly it was England-Argentina as John Terry and Javier Zanetti exchanged unpleasantries.
As tempers flared all over the place, as Dejan Stankovic could have followed Drogba for a challenge on Alex, some of the Chelsea supporters around the away dug-out suggested exactly where they felt Mourinho should go. He headed for the tunnel, taking a famous, familiar scalp with him.
Mourinho had sprung a surprise, sending out his strong, athletic Inter side in 4-2-3-1 formation. His intentions had been clear: going for the jugular, going for the away goal with Samuel Eto’o, Wesley Sneijder and the left-sided Goran Pandev supporting the frontrunning Diego Milito.
In a tense match crammed with compelling duels, Inter started at top speed, looking to test Ross Turnbull, Chelsea’s inexperienced but promising keeper. Maicon, showing his ambitions with an early shot, enjoyed a buccaneering opening half down the right, Chelsea never found their stride in the first half.
Florent Malouda wriggled into the box only to be thwarted. Michael Ballack, needing a big game but not delivering and removed on the hour, fired wide. Nerves jangled like alarm bells. Chelsea, needing to score, knew they were in a real scrap, both physical and tactical.
With the stakes so high, tempers rose high as well. Lucio’s foot was certainly high on Malouda. Eto’o then pushed Ballack. Eto’o was enraging Chelsea fans, partly with his angry hornet impression and partly with his play-acting. Such was the tumbling Cameroonian’s eagerness to inspect the Bridge lawn closely that an invitation to the Chelsea Flower Show surely awaits.
Eto’o was eventually booked for dissent and could have walked when, waving an imaginary card, attempted to get Alex cautioned. Inter’s appliance of the dark arts and sciences was rampant at times, particularly at defending corners. Thiago Motta hauled down Branislav Ivanovic. Then Walter Samuel wrestled Didier Drogba over. So obvious, so outrageous, so ignored.
Sadly for Chelsea, the German referee, Wolfgang Stark, haughtily waved play on. It must have all been deeply confusing for Malouda as he ran in to deliver his corners; familiar faces kept disappearing in the box.
Frustration and fear ate away at Chelsea in the first half. Maicon again threatened, lifting a ball down the right for Eto’o to chase. John Terry, spotting the danger quickly, darted smartly across to clear.
Sneijder’s corners coaxed more sweatbeads from Chelsea foreheads. Fortunately for the hosts, Drogba demonstrated his defensive power, repelling one of Sneijder’s specials. Inter’s Dutchman then crashed a free-kick into the wall after Alex had sneakily blocked off an Eto’o run.
Still Inter menaced. When Maicon hoisted in a great cross from the right, Terry misjudged its flight pattern, allowing it through to Eto’o. The miscalculations continued, Eto’o heading down and over.
Increasingly aware of time’s unforgiving passage, Chelsea stepped up a gear, finishing the half promisingly. Alex swept a free-kick over. Nicolas Anelka began buzzing down the inside-right channel. Drogba started to break free of Lucio’s shackles.
Mourinho was living every moment with his team, willing them to make every tackle, every header, every clearance. Some of Stark’s decisions set the Special One off on the road to meltdown, Inter’s coach remonstrating with the fourth official when Chelsea were ludicrously awarded a corner after the ball had come off Drogba. Mourinho, warmly greeted by the Bridge at first, earned a brief flurry of catcalls when comically refusing to give the ball to Yuri Zhirkov, who was seeking to take a quick throw-in. Russians and Mourinho, Part 245.
Still Chelsea built. Still Inter blocked. Malouda teased the ball through but was brilliantly dispossessed by Samuel, the obdurate centre-half aptly nicknamed The Wall. When Drogba then chipped a perfect pass on to the chest of Anelka, Samuel and Julio Cesar combined to slam shut any window of opportunity.
The half concluded with Lampard bursting through, losing possession but earning a tirade from Samuel, who accused the England international of diving. Nonsense.
Still the visitors’ gamesmanship continued. Inter arrived late for the second half. When it did, Thiago Motta promptly body-checked Malouda. The ensuing free-kick was badly wasted by Drogba, whose 25-yarder dribbled through towards an untroubled Julio Cesar.
Lifting Chelsea’s spirits, Malouda was beginning to influence proceedings. After a brief moment of concern when Sneijder superbly released Eto’o and Turnbull rushed out to collect, Chelsea stormed through the gears, Malouda bringing a magnificent low save from Julio Cesar.
Brimming with intelligence and growing counter-attacking class, Inter should have wrapped the tie up midway through the second half. Zhirkov rescued Chelsea as Pandev was about to shoot. Then Sneijder seized on poor control by Terry to chip the ball over Chelsea’s ragged defence. Milito ran through but placed his shot wide. Bad miss.
Inter had the edge, Chelsea the edginess. Sensing the hosts’ apprehension, Mourinho’s men broke time and again on the counter. Some of their passing was immaculate, one pass from Esteban Cambiasso to Maicon was exquisite.
Ancelotti was ringing the changes, withdrawing the anonymous Ballack for Joe Cole and then sending on Salomon Kalou for Zhirkov. Kalou brought immediate pace and purpose, pleading vainfully for a penalty after a speedy break into the box.
Pushed forward, Chelsea were knocked out by a brilliant counter-punch. When Sneijder lifted a pass towards Eto’o, his response was majestic, the ball drilled right footed past Turnbull.
Chelsea were devastated. Mourinho ruled the Bridge. Again.


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Sun:

Chelsea 0 Inter 1
SHAUN CUSTIS at Stamford Bridge
WELL, we did not really expect him to lose did we? The Special One has still got it.
Jose Mourinho came back to the ground which he turned into a fortress as Chelsea boss and blew the walls down.
A goalless draw would have been enough to send Inter through to the quarter-finals.
But a clinical 79th-minute finish by Samuel Eto'o made extra sure.
And just to complete Chelsea's misery, Didier Drogba got a straight red card four minutes from time for a foul on Thiago Motta.
Mourinho had claimed in his Press conference that beating Chelsea was not the issue for him and the important thing was Inter making the quarter-finals.
But then he argued the Blues should never have axed him as boss - a point owner Roman Abramovich might be mulling over this morning as his Champions League dream lies in tatters for another season.
Whatever Mourinho's motivation for winning, he wanted it very badly indeed.
With a 2-1 lead from the first leg, Inter had the advantage.
Yet Chelsea were confident of turning the tie round, knowing a 1-0 victory would be enough.
They had to go with their third-choice goalkeeper, Ross Turnbull, because of injuries to Petr Cech and Hilario.
And they were, of course, without broken ankle victim Ashley Cole.
Judging by the speed with which Cole moved through the Press room before kick-off, though, it will not be long before he is back in action - which is good news for club and country.
It was fairly spikey early on, with Eto'o going down after a collision with John Obi Mikel's forearm and various altercations going on around the pitch.
Meanwhile, Michael Ballack was not far away with a 25-yard effort which went inches wide.
This Inter team was like Mourinho's Chelsea of old - strong in the challenge, giving little away and happy to mix it while getting up and down the field in numbers.
Mourinho was prowling his technical area manically, directing operations and complaining at Drogba roughing up his defenders.
The Inter chief was raging on 17 minutes when Goran Pandev was given offside as he broke away on goal.
He went looking for a screen to see a replay and, though he could not find one, his belief that Inter had been robbed seemed vindicated from the TV pictures.
It was scrappy stuff. But Drogba was proving a handful and, when the ball fell to him on the edge of the area, he released a screamer blocked by Brazilian defender Maicon.
Maicon is a brute of a man and was soon rampaging up the other end, with Yuri Zhirkov failing to get in a challenge.
As the cross came in, it cleared home skipper John Terry. That seemed to surprise Eto'o at the far post and his downward header bounced into the ground and over the bar.
It was a let-off for Chelsea, who were not looking comfortable.
Milito was crowded out on the edge of the six-yard box before he could get a shot in and Drogba was having to do an awful lot of work in his own box, heading away corners and getting in tackles.
Yet there was no better first-half tackle than Walter Samuel's, after Chelsea's man-of-the- moment Florent Malouda tricked his way past Lucio and looked set to score before the Argentinian's intervention.
It was all Chelsea now and Motta cleared Nicolas Anelka's effort off the line before the Blues had two penalty shouts.
First Lucio pulled back Branislav Ivanovic and then Samuel rugby-tackled Drogba to the ground and somehow got away with it - much to the bemusement of Carlo Ancelotti.
Eto'o could have finished it off for Inter but up to then was not having a good night.
When he got clear of the struggling Zhirkov, he seemed set to score.
Then, for no apparent reason, he hesitated and momentarily lost control, allowing Turnbull to smother.
The Inter bench was going mad. It was a great chance and they nearly paid double. Malouda went down the left and his shot almost sneaked under Julio Cesar by the near post.
There was some quality defending going on and Zhirkov redeemed himself to foil Pandev with a perfect last-ditch tackle.
Inter went close again, after Terry lost possession and Wesley Sneijder played in Milito, who snatched his left-foot effort wide. Then Motta put a header over the top from Sneijder's free-kick.
These were anxious moments for Chelsea and then suddenly, 11 minutes from time, it was all over.
Eto'o collected a fine ball from Sneijder, got away from Ivanovic and tucked his right-foot shot beyond Turnbull into the corner.
Drogba was then sent off and that completed a depressing night for the Londoners and their boss.

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Mail:

Chelsea 0 Inter Milan 1 (agg 1-3):
Samuel Eto'o strike ensures Jose Mourinho's Stamford Bridge return is special one as Blues dumped out of Europe
By Matt Lawton
As Jose Mourinho said, he continues to win the important ones. The ones that really matter. The special ones, you might say.
He won this one with a performance from Inter Milan that proved he had indeed done his homework. That demonstrated how much he had learnt from the three-and-a-half years he enjoyed here at Stamford Bridge and those seven frame-by-frame examinations of the first leg of this tie at the San Siro.
Mourinho did a number on the Chelsea players he says he still loves as well as the Chelsea manager he has rather less affection for. This was a triumph for tactical brilliance as well as courage and determination.
A victory for a manager who might not always entertain the purists but seems to deliver on his promise of big prizes.
There was no prize on offer on Tuesday night other than a place in the Champions League quarter-finals but for Carlo Ancelotti and his angry, exasperated players the trophy they so desired had nevertheless eluded them.
Why? Because the Italian champions were much the superior side. They were better organised; better on the ball; better in Milan, when they established a 2-1 advantage, and better here again.
In Samuel Eto’o they had their goalscorer and in the brilliant Lucio the perfect answer to Didier Drogba. So brilliant on this occasion that Drogba eventually allowed that temper to get the better of him and received a straight red card for a clash with Thiago Motta in the final few minutes.
While Chelsea lacked their usual fluency, the Italian champions struck a perfect balance between defence and attack.
Walter Samuel, Maicon and Javier Zanetti were immense alongside Lucio; Esteban Cambiasso and Motta terrific in the way they both protected their back four and controlled Chelsea’s midfield.
And alongside Eto’o, who could have had a hat-trick, Wesley Sneijder, Diego Milito and Goran Pandev posed a constant threat to Chelsea’s makeshift defence.
Chelsea were disappointing. They might have deserved a penalty when Samuel wrestled Drogba to the ground but this was not one to file away with the cruel luck of their European past.
They froze on Tuesday night, intimidated seemingly by the presence of their former master. Only Florent Malouda really impressed for Chelsea.
It amounted to the nightmare scenario for Ancelotti. The Italian was brought here to repeat what he had done on two occasions at AC Milan and deliver the ultimate prize to Roman Abramovich. Not lose to the petulant Portuguese the Russian eventually got sick of and sacked.
The pressure, we presume, will now be on Ancelotti, such is the madness in the court of Roman.
Never had Ancelotti seen his Chelsea side fail to score at Stamford Bridge but Mourinho has quite a record of his own here and it was his that remained intact. He will say he has never lost to an English side in this stadium, so that remarkable run continues.
Never has Mourinho lost two games on the bounce since he took charge of Inter and at no stage did he look like suffering such a setback in this tense encounter.
Chelsea’s opportunities were limited, their failiure to force a decent save from Julio Cesar a measure of just how disappointing they were.
As Ancelotti admitted afterwards, Inter were always in control and always dangerous on the counter- attack, with Eto’o and Pandev working tirelessly on the flanks.
It took a brave block from John Terry to deny Sneijder, as it did when Maicon stopped Drogba from scoring and Samuel when he did much the same to Malouda.
But the best chance of the opening half fell to Eto’o in the 35th minute when he met a cross from Maicon with a header that really should have hit the target and Mourinho’s men continued to dominate after the break.
Clear with only the inexperienced Ross Turnbull to beat, Eto’o really should have struck when he allowed himself to be tackled by Branislav Ivanovic. As should Pandev and Milito when Yuri Zhirkov produced a perfectly timed tackle to rescue the first situation before Inter’s Argentine forward put his shot wide.
Desperate to see his side score the one goal that could have sent them through to the last eight, Ancelotti first unleashed Joe Cole and then Salomon Kalou from the bench. But it was to no avail.
Inter responded accordingly and then produced the goal that left Chelsea with 12 minutes to score the two in return they needed to force the tie into extra time.
It was classic Eto’o. A goal that was as much about his pace as his finishing ability. First came the burst of acceleration that enabled him to get on to Sneijder’s ball and then the finish that both exploited Terry’s failure to play him offside and Turnbull’s inability to charge down the shot.
The desire to run down the touchline in celebration must have been immense for Mourinho but this being Chelsea, he limited himself to a shake of the fists before then returning to his seat. It was for others to jump for joy. This time anyway.
To end the match as they did — with Drogba getting sent off and Terry berating the referee — was sadly typical of Chelsea. But then they learnt that from the master too.
This time, though, Abramovich had to walk across the pitch to the sound of the visiting fans singing the Special One’s name. As Mourinho could no doubt tell him, Ancelotti might want to watch out.


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Independent:

Eto'o delivers killer blow as Mourinho proves point
Chelsea 0 Internazionale 1 (Internazionale win 3-1 on aggregate)
By Sam Wallace, Football Correspondent

There was a surreptitious clenched fist by his side and a short trot down the touchline as the excitement of Samuel Eto'o's winning goal took him out of his seat but Jose Mourinho checked himself just in time.
In fact, as his players ran over to celebrate wildly with Mourinho's staff by the touchline, the coach separated himself from them and, distracted by something trivial on a monumentally important night, he stepped on to the pitch to retrieve a match-day programme that had been thrown on in anger by a Chelsea fan. He passed within a few yards of Carlo Ancelotti but did not look at him.
Not in Mourinho's dreams; not in those dark days at the end of September 2007 when he mulled over the coup that unseated him at Chelsea can he have envisaged a night quite as satisfying as this. The day that he came back to Stamford Bridge and rubbed owner Roman Abramovich's nose in it with one of those textbook Mourinho performances in which his team embodies his own fiendish cunning.
Mourinho disappeared down the tunnel on the final whistle but afterwards he made one thing clear: Inter were the better team and richly deserved to eliminate Chelsea and progress to the Champions League quarter-finals. Not even Ancelotti was prepared to quibble with him on that point.
Mourinho had come back to demonstrate to Abramovich a point that the Portuguese coach made time and again during his years at Chelsea – that the club's success was as much about his leadership as it was about the owner's wealth. There are times when it is hard to take Mourinho seriously – and he is a relentless self-publicist – but last night his point rang true.
From his executive box in the west stand, Abramovich will have seen Massimo Moratti, the Inter president, walk across the pitch to the tunnel and take the adoring applause of his fans after the game. Great coaches have a happy habit of making the wealthy owners of football clubs look good, it is just a case of selecting the right one.
Mourinho did not try anything as predictable as attempting to win this game by holding on to his side's 2-1 lead from San Siro. Instead Inter attacked Chelsea relentlessly and, when they had to, they defended heroically. As a playmaker, Wesley Sneijder was incomparable. Walter Samuel and Lucio dominated in defence and Thiago Motta was a constant irritation for Chelsea.
Too much so for Didier Drogba who, for the third successive year, ended Chelsea's Champions League campaign in trouble with the authorities. In 2008 it was a red card in the final in Moscow; last year it was the rant at the cameras after the semi-final elimination by Barcelona; and last night there was another red card for a stamp on Motta's ankle which the sharp-eyed German referee did not miss.
Drogba is the recently crowned African footballer of the year but Eto'o upstaged him, taking his one major chance of the game in the 78th minute. He ran on to Sneijder's pass, holding off Branislav Ivanovic and beating the rookie goalkeeper Ross Turnbull at his right post. You could hardly say that it was Inter's only chance of the match.
Afterwards Mourinho said he had based his approach to the game on one of the few times a side had come to Stamford Bridge during his time in charge there and held out for a draw. Unusually, he picked out the performance of Manchester City in February 2005 during his first year at the club when City came to Stamford Bridge and got a 0-0 draw. "They made David James look like Lev Yashin," said Mourinho.
Last night he adopted the same approach, attacking Chelsea from the off. He attacked down the left, targeting Yuri Zhirkov with the full-back Maicon. At times Inter lived extremely dangerously, especially on corners when Samuel and Motta wrestled with the likes of Drogba and Ivanovic right under the referee's nose.
Naturally, Chelsea felt hard done by but there was no injustice here – not like against Barcelona last season – they were simply outplayed. There were decisions that Inter could complain about too, like the offside against Diego Milito in the first half when replays showed he was onside. Nevertheless, at the end John Terry went to remonstrate with Wolfgang Stark, literally shoving away John Obi Mikel when he tried to shake the referee's hand.
There were crucial tackles from Maicon and Samuel in the first half, both of whom threw themselves in front of shots in the latter stages that looked goalbound. In Chelsea's best period, at the end of the first half, goalkeeper Julio Cesar saved on 42 minutes when Nicolas Anelka had taken Drogba's ball from the left on his chest and bore down on goal.
Mourinho's players did not just stifle Chelsea tactically but they picked away at their tempers too, especially that of Drogba. They are a much more refined, tougher, savvier team than the one that crashed out against Manchester United last season. They are far more cynical too and in Eto'o and Goran Pandev they have two players whom Mourinho deployed wide to great effect.
When Samuel collapsed in the area with his arms around Drogba in the 44th minute there was an angry exchange of words between the two benches. Even Ray Wilkins, who is scarcely the finger-jabbing type, was involved in a row with a counterpart on the opposite side.
There were some good moments from Chelsea, among them the way in which Florent Malouda started the second half which suggested that he might be capable of winning the game. But Inter responded with what Mourinho described as an "almost perfect performance", adding: "We knew that if you don't control the game by having the ball you have no chance."
Ancelotti brought on Joe Cole after the hour for Michael Ballack. Sadly, the Englishman just looks miles off the pace. There were chances for Milito and Pandev, and Motta put a back post header over the bar. When at last Eto'o ran on to Sneijder's pass and scored Chelsea could not say that they had not seen it coming.
As he promised, Mourinho did not celebrate the Inter goal but, given the scope of his team's performance, it must have been a struggle.

Chelsea (4-3-3): Turnbull; Ivanovic, Alex, Terry, Zhirkov (Kalou, 73); Ballack (J Cole, 62), Mikel, Lampard; Anelka, Drogba, Malouda. Substitutes not used: Taylor (gk), Carvalho, Sturridge, Belletti, Bruma.
Inter Milan (4-3-3): Cesar; Maicon, Lucio, Samuel, Zanetti; Cambiasso, Sneijder (Mariga, 85), Motta (Materazzi, 90); Pandev (Stankovic, 75), Eto'o, Milito. Substitutes not used: Toldo (gk), Cordoba, Quaresma, Santon.
Referee: W Stark (Germany).

Man-for-man marking, by Steve Tongue
Chelsea
Ross Turnbull Must have been relieved not to have more to do in third Chelsea game. 7/10
Branislav Ivanovic Poor marking allowed Eto'o first-half chance and then the goal. 4
Alex Seemed to be controlling forwards well. Guilty of some poor distribution. 6
John Terry Solid with foot and head but caught out badly for goal. 6
Yuri Zhirkov Found Maicon a handful running at him and could not best him at other end. 6
Michael Ballack Is right of midfield his best position? Unable to influence game. 5
John Obi Mikel Did well breaking up attacks in first half but was overshadowed by Sneijder. 7
Frank Lampard A long time since he dominated a game. Unable to get on the end of anything. 5
Nicolas Anelka Not much joy out on the right and disappeared in second half. 5
Didier Drogba Forgettable night against the twin towers of Lucio and Samuel, culminating in red card. 6
Florent Malouda Found it all rather harder than playing West Ham at the weekend. Ended up at left-back. 6
Substitutes
Joe Cole Little chance. 6
Salomon Kalou Lively. 7
Internazionale
Julio Cesar Quiet first 40 minutes, then given some work which he did well. 7/10
Maicon Powerful in defence, with one terrific block, and caused problems going forward. 8
Lucio Enjoyed physical battle with Drogba and came out of it well. Booked. 7
Walter Samuel Helped Lucio deal with Drogba. One great challenge on Malouda to prevent a goal. 7
Javier Zanetti The captain kept Anelka quiet and organised his troops well. 6
Esteban Cambiasso Effective barrier in front of back four, allowing Chelsea few chances. 7
Wesley Sneijder A constant threat behind the front three with his passing and from set pieces. 8
Thiago Motta Tall midfielder covered up tidily and almost scored with header. Booked and misses next game. 6
Goran Pandev Did not justify surprise selection out on the left and soon made way. 4
Samuel Eto'o Wasted a good headed opportunity but then took his chance splendidly. Booked. 7
Diego Milito Fought hard but found Terry a difficult obstacle and missed a good chance when escaping. 6
Substitutes
Dejan Stankovic 6
Macdonald Mariga 6

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Guardian:

Chelsea crash out after Inter win in Champions League
Chelsea 0 Internazionale 1 Eto'o 78
Kevin McCarra at Stamford Bridge

José Mourinho returned to make one last mark on Chelsea's history. It is, to be precise, an ugly blot in the annals of the club. Internazionale ensured that they would be eliminated from the Champions League as early as the last 16 for the first time since 2006. The Portuguese has probably done even more profound harm to his old employers.
Chelsea disintegrated and Didier Drogba was sent off in the 87th minute when the referee, Wolfgang Stark, ruled that the Ivorian had stamped deliberately on Thiago Motta. There are greater issues than that to absorb the losers. The manager, Carlo Ancelotti, must sense some players are succumbing to wear and tear while othersare not cut out for this level. He might even have flinched when the visiting fans sang "Bye bye Carletto" at full-time.
When Premier League sensibilities are laid aside, there should be gladness that Inter performed with such focus. Europe's leading tournament badly needs to be enhanced again by the accomplishment once taken for granted and dreaded in Serie A sides. Fiorentina, let it be recalled, had already edged out Liverpool in the group phase.
Mourinho was victorious in every aspect. His system, with three forwards supported by the excellent Wesley Sneijder had Chelsea in distress. Inter also got back in numbers to deny the Stamford Bridge side any rhythm. With a 2-1 lead from San Siro, they did not even look as if they felt another goal was essential.
Just to make sure, they scored in any case. Sneijder released Samuel Eto'o 12 minutes from the end and the striker went clear of Branislav Ivanovic to shoot precisely beyond the right hand of the goalkeeper, Ross Turnbull. The Dutchman who devised that opportunity had an imagination and touch denied just about everyone else on the pitch, particularly those in Chelsea colours.
With Ancelotti's side still well placed in the Premier League, desolation ought not to engulf the club. It is more likely that a gnawing anxiety will be felt over the urgency of rebuilding for seasons ahead.
The side barely constituted a nuisance to Inter. Mourinho's position at Stamford Bridge had become untenable in the early autumn of 2007 because his pragmatic and almost world-weary style was no longer acceptable to the owner, Roman Abramovich. He is unlikely to have undergone a profound change of heart since then but is too shrewd not to know when boldness will pay dividends.
Mourinho observed afterwards that the selection of Ivanovic and Yuri Zhirkov, who are makeshift full-backs because of injuries to others, made it certain that Inter would put the emphasis on attack.That adventurousness brought about stalemate in the first half. Chelsea were not sufficiently imaginative and Inter were initially patient. Even then Maicon, the Brazil right-back, was at ease and could get involved in the kind of build-up that saw him link with Eto'o after 33 minutes, with Michael Ballack having to cover Diego Milito as the ball was pulled back into the centre.
Ancelotti, despite having many of Mourinho's men still in the squad, is supposed to show that his outlook is fundamentally more enterprising. However, he is also charged with putting paid to visitors of this calibre. Following this defeat the scale of that task will be wholly apparent to the Chelsea manager.
There will be broad awareness now that neither the panache nor the durability exists to deal with this kind of ordeal. It will suit Mourinho's vanity to know that unflattering comparisons will be made with his spell at Chelsea. That tenure was far more than a period of well-executed tedium.
After all, victories tend to require risk and imagination at some point. At his peak with Chelsea, Mourinho had Arjen Robben and Damien Duff to devastate the opposition and delight the crowd. His timing was good, too, since those were the days when the Chelsea enterprise enraptured Abramovich and inspired him to unleash his wealth spectacularly.
Nowadays such means are not apparent even at Inter but Mourinho's summer dealings did bring more style to the Serie A club. When the side was removed by English opposition at this juncture in each of the previous two seasons, they did not score a goal against Liverpool or Manchester United. The determination to break with that sterility has now prevailed and the evolution had been visible in Inter's first-leg win. And it was Mourinho's scheme to put the opposition on edge with his trio of attackers at Stamford Bridge.
Chelsea had trouble achieving fluency, particularly when there was so much difficulty in making an impact on the flanks. There was a messiness even to the complaints. Heated appeals broke out at set pieces when, for example, Walter Samuel had his arms round Drogba. Those are offences, yet it is rare for a referee to grant a penalty when it is tough for him to know who initiated this commonplace grappling.
All the same, everyone will be entirely clear that Chelsea never had a firm grip of Inter.


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