Abramovich must take his share of the blame

IF Roman Abramovich is looking for scapegoats for Chelsea’s disappointing season and a painful Champions League defeat against Manchester United — and of course he is — then maybe it is time to look in the mirror and consider his own part in the way the club has disintegrated over the last 12 months.

The reality is that manager Ancelotti will pay the ultimate price for a miserable campaign both at home and in Europe; his squirming body language before and after this week’s tie told you that, no matter what the briefings may be from Stamford Bridge.

But the Italian, who performed miracles with an ageing squad last season to win the double, should not be the only subject of discussion when the post-mortem on Chelsea’s dream of becoming the biggest club in the world is performed.

It wasn’t Ancelotti, after all, who rocked the boat by insisting assistant manager Ray Wilkins be sacked just when things were going so well earlier in the season; it wasn’t Ancelotti who took his foot off the pedal and stopped funding transfers at a time when the club’s squad was getting old; and maybe it wasn’t even Ancelotti who insisted an out of form and out of touch Fernando Torres started ahead of Didier Drogba in the club’s most important game of the season.

It is seen as heresy at the Bridge to criticise Abramovich after everything he has done for the Blues, pumping almost £1bn into the club since arriving in 2003 and transforming them from Premier League also-rans to an accepted member of the ‘big four’; but that doesn’t mean his blueprint for the football club should go unedited. And it doesn’t mean everything he does is perfect.

If the Russian had not fallen out so spectacularly with Jose Mourinho then maybe Chelsea’s dynasty would be even stronger right now; and maybe if he had provided proper replacements for Ricardo Carvalho, Michael Ballack, Deco, Joe Cole and Juliano Belletti, who were all allowed to leave at the same time, then perhaps this season would not have been so painful.

His sudden change of heart in January, spending £75m on Torres and David Luiz, came too late but despite evidence to the contrary this may not be the time to panic by offloading the manager.

Luiz, for certain, will become a Chelsea hero in future and surely Torres cannot continue to underperform so miserably if he is able to enjoy a full pre-season with Chelsea this summer.

Ancelotti has already proved throughout his career that given the tools he can deliver success, so who do Chelsea believe can do a better job?

Mourinho would return like a shot if asked, but is his rekindled relationship with Abramovich really strong enough to go the distance? And if not the Special One then who in world football — short of Barcelona manager Pep Guardiola — has better credentials than the man already in charge?

These are the questions currently obsessing Abramovich but you suspect that introspection and self-analysis are not qualities high on his curriculum vitae.

Goalkeeper Petr Cech, the only Chelsea player willing to face up to the media after Tuesday’s defeat at Old Trafford, when the rest of their highly-paid squad refused interviews even with the club’s own television station, is one of few to talk sense this week; at least attempting to see the bigger picture.

“We are not only playing for the manager or only for the owner,” he said “We are playing for the entire club, which is the supporters — we know who supports the club all over the world — the players and all the staff and everybody involved in Chelsea. So it’s a big number of people you play for.

“As a team we win together, we lose together. We are in the same boat and we try to guide the boat to the harbour as safely as possible.

“It’s disappointing, always, if you are a part of a club and you don’t win a trophy all season. After winning a double last season, everybody thought that we were going to defend the titles.

“We have to move on after this defeat and think about the league. If we finish second of course the season will not be remembered for trophies but you will at least remember that you finished second with your head up. We need to go and qualify ourselves to have another go in the Champions League next season.”

Just that last sentence will send a shiver down Abramovich’s spine; after all he appointed Ancelotti to win the Champions League not to qualify for it — that part of the equation was seen as a given.

But when the Russian is writing out his manager’s P45 in June, maybe he should spare a minute to think about his own mistakes too.