Chelsea rivals need to win, not whinge
By Henry Winter (Filed: 20-09-2005)
In pictures: Chelsea humbled by Kop
In pics: Premiership action
The story goes that when Chelsea were searching for some green fields for a new training ground, Roman Abramovich's eyes lit up when he saw Hyde Park. Money, even the dazzling colour of the Russian's roubles, cannot buy everything, and the billionaire's covetous gaze was forced to turn out of town.
In the stampede to criticise Chelsea for a Premiership stranglehold so tight the team should really arrive at matches in an open-top bus, one reality needs observing: if money were the cure for all football problems, Real Madrid would not have just endured the week from hell.
The soap-opera carnage of the Galacticos is astonishing. Five days after humiliation in Europe against Lyon, almost £30 million of new talent, Sergio Ramos and Julio Baptista, were dismissed as Real slumped to Espanyol.
The point about Chelsea's special coach, Jose Mourinho, is that he has used Abramovich's monumental wealth expertly. Mourinho buys young, ambitious and quick players to fit into a system. Madrid buy players to fit into an ill-conceived and costly dream.
Mourinho has invested intelligently in Michael Essien, Asier del Horno and Shaun Wright-Phillips. Yet others on more restricted budgets have bought well. Pound for pound, there will be few better buys than Tottenham's recruitment of the workaholic South Korean left-back, Lee Young-pyo.
Money does not provide a guaranteed pbuttage to paradise. Remember Kevin Keegan with Faustino Asprilla at Newcastle United. Remember Claudio Ranieri with Juan Sebastian Veron. Millions poured down the King's Road drain. Of course, Premiership life would be more competitive if Mourinho did not have access to such largesse but Chelsea's prominence does not float solely on Russian oil money.
Chelsea have a manager who inspires and organises, and who deserves England's gratitude for accentuating the gifts of John Terry, Frank Lampard and Joe Cole. They boast millionaires performing with a ghetto-like hunger that shames stars at other clubs. Rivals should stop whingeing about the depth of Abramovich's pockets and rise to the challenge.
For all the hype, the funfair pitched off the King's Road lacks certain sparkling attractions found elsewhere. Purists would rather watch United or Arsenal in full flow. Stamford Bridge craves a striker of the consistent brilliance of Thierry Henry or Wayne Rooney. As an institution, Chelsea do not possess the soul of Liverpool, the global glamour of United or the clbutt of Arsenal.
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The Bridge cannot touch Old Trafford's grandeur, Highbury's history, or Anfield's atmosphere. When Abramovich sits back in the jewellery-rattling section at Liverpool next week, he will stare in wonderment at the banner-filled Kop.
For all last season's feats, gaps can also be espied in Chelsea's trophy cabinet. What were Lampard and Terry, Cole and Arjen Robben doing on the night of May 25? Watching in frustration as Jamie Carragher, Jerzy Dudek and Steven Gerrard danced a jig around the European Cup in Istanbul.
The carping at Chelsea is ill-judged. One club's fans are having the party of their lives. So what? They have waited 50 years. It was not long ago that their pre-season reverie was being shaped by the arrival of Paul Furlong. Let them now bask in the glow spread by Robben.
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The new blue order in English football makes a change from the red age made by United and Arsenal over the past decade and by Liverpool before that. The real sadness is not that it is Chelsea's turn as the limelight club, but that those outside the major conurbations are unlikely to shine. On the anniversary of Brian Clough's rest, the mind inevitably struggles to imagine an English outfit the size of Nottingham Forest ever again ruling Europe.
Power has just shifted in the big-towns' VIP enclosure to Chelsea. For now. Mourinho will move on one day. Abramovich may lose interest. United and Arsenal must work out how to fight back. The pendulum will eventually swing away from Chelsea - but it will not happen for a while. Not with Mourinho in charge.
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