Villas-Boas’ Guus may be cooked at Bridge of sighs
With those surprising words in the aftermath of Chelsea’s defeat to Liverpool, Andre Villas-Boas revealed that perhaps he does not appreciate how little such sums mean to Roman Abramovich.
When you have as much money as Abramovich, the only scarce resource is time. That is why extraordinarily rich men are so impatient and that is why Villas-Boas cannot rely on Abramovich’s commitment to his project, no matter what assurances he has been given.
Villas-Boas knows a thing or two about U-turns. Before he arrived for his post-match press briefing, I spoke to another reporter who had also been there at the Aviva Stadium the night Villas-Boas’ Porto team won the Europa League.
We remembered how that night, the young Portuguese had been on the verge of losing his temper as he repeatedly denied that he was going to leave Porto in the summer for a richer club. He was totally committed to Porto and wanted to lead them in the Champions League. At the time, both of us had believed him and felt the seasoned tabloid reporters pushing the questions should just drop it.
Within a few weeks, the big-money offer from Chelsea had arrived and Villas-Boas was on his way to Chelsea. (It turns out that experienced tabloid hacks really do know a thing or two about football).
Villas-Boas’ belief that he is protected by the investment Chelsea have made is almost a challenge to the billionaire, because it hints that he is, at least for now, untouchable.
When Abramovich examines the league table and sees that Chelsea are now level on points with three credible Champions League challengers in Spurs, Arsenal and Liverpool, the economic rationale for keeping faith with Villas-Boas begins to ebb.
Chelsea’s dismal first-half performance, when they were ponderous in possession and devoid of dynamism in attack, suggests that whatever Villas-Boas is telling his players, some of them aren’t listening.
Credit is due to Liverpool, who looked yesterday to hustle Chelsea into mistakes in midfield, then quickly exploit space behind the defence.
Kenny Dalglish had surprised Chelsea here last season by playing three at the back; this time the tactics were different again but the performance was even better.
The razor-sharp exchange of passes between Adam, Suarez and Bellamy that created the opening goal for Maxi was beautiful football, and it looks like this quick-passing style is the best route into the top four for Liverpool. It is also worth pointing out that the back four did not look weaker for the absence of Jamie Carragher. Martin Skrtel is nobody’s idea of a dominant centre-half, but these days he and Daniel Agger are Liverpool’s best central defensive combination.
At right-back Glen Johnson had one of his best games for the club, crowned by the winning goal. In his efforts to explain what went wrong, Villas-Boas talked a lot and it was not always crystal clear what he meant. “Can we solve this with the players currently at the club? Of course. You focus on the details you have to get right and that’s what we are doing. But you can evolve in a different thing that you are not doing wrong but can get surprised in the opposite way where you thought you were strong. That’s the nature of football.”
Maybe that kind of thing played well at Porto but the Chelsea dressing room is a more difficult environment. It looks as though players are consumed with their own battles: Terry beset by scandal, Drogba and Lampard fighting the dying of the light, Torres nursing his permanently-bruised ego.
The players who are performing for Chelsea are the younger cohort, all relatively recent signings: Ramires, Juan Mata, Daniel Sturridge. Villas-Boas needs a few more like them, and quickly.
He is more likely to get exactly what he doesn’t need: a lot of speculation that Guus Hiddink, now a free agent after leaving his position as Turkey manager, may be about to return to Chelsea to help him out. It is unlikely Hiddink has serious designs on Villas-Boas’ job. He is a realist and he will understand that any manager would struggle to achieve much with Chelsea’s current squad.
Nevertheless, it will be interesting to see how Villas-Boas reacts if Chelsea try to appoint Hiddink in some non-executive “advisory” role — where his job is effectively to lurk in the shadows and embody an alternative way forward for the club.
Jose Mourinho reacted furiously to the appointment of Avram Grant in such a role in July 2007 and within a couple of months, Mourinho fell out with Abramovich and got the sack. The vacant job went to Grant, as Mourinho expected it would. The way Mourinho saw it, the arrival of Grant forced him to choose between his job and his credibility. Villas-Boas may soon face the same choice.
