Sheva for the shove?

IT is just over three years since Andriy Shevchenko became a Champions League winner with AC Milan and just over two since he was named the European Footballer of the Year.

There is no other player in the Premiership who boasts such cast-iron credentials, and yet the Ukrainian is currently playing with all the conviction of a greenhorn stumbling and bumbling his way into an uncertain career.

Here are some more relevant statistics. Seven joyless months at Chelsea have yielded just six goals and it is now 616 minutes since he last scored in domestic football. On the basis of his astonishingly frail performance on Saturday, that tally is set to increase.