Hiddink becomes a blueblood

THE end is in sight for Guus Hiddink and Chelsea, but there is no sense that the Dutchman has already emotionally checked out of Stamford Bridge.

If anything, the crushing disappointment of being jettisoned from the Champions League in such heartbreaking circumstances against Barcelona last Wednesday appears to have strengthened Hiddink’s affections for the club.

When he spoke yesterday about the bond he has forged with his squad during his 10-week stint as interim manager, he did not sound like a man itching to return to the job of taking Russia to the World Cup on 30 May.

“I could have come here and done my daily routine for three months but that’s not the way I like to work,” he reflected. “You have to get the feeling for a club and it can take time, but at Chelsea I had that after a week.

“And the players’ reaction to the Barcelona defeat shows also there is a strong desire and personality in this team. They are not players who just sit down with their luxury or whatever – they like to perform at a big club. That’s still enjoyable and, it’s true, that will be very difficult to leave behind. I love to work with this club. In the end, though, we part. Let’s not be too dramatic – that’s life.”

That mixture of warmth and phlegmatism might have hinted that the Hiddink-Chelsea love story may not end for good on May 30 – rumours suggesting a full-time return to the club following the 2010 World Cup have long been circulating – but, in the short term at least, there will be regrets.

Not only is Hiddink loath to leave a group of players who have come to think of him in the same elevated terms as Jose Mourinho but there is also chagrin at having failed to deliver the one trophy his boss and friend Roman Abramovich craves above all others, the Champions League.

The fact that Chelsea’s hopes were thwarted as much by the Norwegian referee, Tom Henning Ovrebo, as their own shortcomings will be of scant consolation to Hiddink when he comes to reflect on his time in the English capital, although he will baulk at the suggestion it has been a failure.

A squad that had palpably lost its motivation and drive under the relaxed regime of Luiz Felipe Scolari has been reinvigorated and Chelsea are once again a side to inspire fear, if not gushing admiration. Amid the delirium that accompanied Barcelona’s progress on Wednesday, the Catalans will have noted, ruefully, that it took 183 minutes to score and that they will have to subdue Manchester United in the Rome final without Daniel Alves and Eric Abidal, whose suspensions were earned in the course of keeping Chelsea at bay.

Such a feisty display would have been almost inconceivable during the fag-end of the Scolari era and Hiddink deserves credit for effecting the transformation. Training has been intensified, players reminded of their responsibilities and, tactically, Chelsea have gone back to basics, reverting to the high-energy pressing game which made them so formidable under Mourinho. Hiddink still has two targets within reach: third place in the Premier League, which will be all but rubber-stamped if they avoid defeat against their nearest rivals, Arsenal, at the Emirates Stadium tomorrow, and the FA Cup, where Chelsea meet Everton in the final at the end of the month.

“In February, lots of people would have raised their eyebrows if we said we’d get to any final,” he said. “But, with the FA Cup, we’re very determined. I want to leave having won something.”

Hiddink cut a largely relaxed figure yesterday, a world away from the poisonous atmosphere that hung thick over Stamford Bridge 48 hours before.

There were even one or two jokes. When asked whether his post-match comments had contributed to Ovrebo going into hiding, Hiddink replied: “There have been times, after certain defeats, where I’ve had to drive away from a stadium by putting my foot on the gas.”

Whatever happens in the remainder of the season, Hiddink’s sleek black Mercedes is always likely to be welcome at Stamford Bridge.

Meanwhile, FIFA president Sepp Blatter believes referees in charge of major matches should come from fully professional leagues.

“I will repeat it, and I have been saying it for 10 years at least, we must improve refereeing,” he said.

“Improving refereeing in professional football means it’s time to have professional referees and we should only use professional referees in high level competitions.

“We have professional referees in England, we have professional referees in all sports in France. We have this kind of professionalism in Italy during the season, they are under contract.

“We have had professional referees in Mexico, in Brazil and in Argentina. We don’t have it in Germany – they are paid per match – and I think this is one of the most important things that refereeing is their profession, this is their job.”