Scolari sleepwalks into crisis of his own making

CHELSEA’S season is today crumbling around them and nobody should allow talk of a refereeing conspiracy to hide the fact that something is seriously rotten at a club that was once the most feared in the Premier League.

True, Chelsea’s 2-0 defeat at Anfield was partly down to an awful, even inept, decision by Mike Riley to send off Frank Lampard for a perfectly fair challenge on Xabi Alonso in the second half.

But it’s too easy to blame officials and forget that Chelsea also went into a match they had to win with a strangely negative attitude, leaving Didier Drogba and Deco on the bench, and took 75 minutes to even muster a shot on target.