Seeing Stars

You could safely bet that Jose Mourinho watched Arsene Wenger’s young team’s remarkable Carling Cup performances at Anfield and White Hart Lane – though whether you would get him to admit as much is another matter entirely.

Right now, the man who describes himself as ‘Special’ and has spent hundreds of millions of pounds of Roman Abramovic’s money building a team that can win trophies but not hearts must be desperately worried. Behind all the bluster and bravado he knows that the group widely touted as the most impressive in the Premiership has been decimated by a handful of injuries to key players – so much so that he announced recently that Newcastle United have a stronger squad. He also knows, deep down, that there is more than a hint of hypocrisy in the claim that his approval is governed entirely by whether his players “work and perform” – especially when Shevchenko has to work harder than everyone else and no-one appears to notice that Ballack doesn’t work hard at all. But above all he knows that Arsenal are superior. Vastly superior. Not just because they have elevated football to an art form, against which the mechanical rituals of the plutocratic artisans from Chelsea makes an embarrassing contrast. But because they can field a young team with an average age barely over 20, full of players of precocious talent, extraordinary commitment and unquenchable spirit.

For all their riches, Chelsea simply cannot match Arsenal’s young guns – any more than their manager can match the genius of Arsene Wenger, who has not spent hundreds of millions of pounds, or wasted time on self-promotion or tasteless abuse of his rivals. He has simply concentrated his attentions upon the fine art of football. And he is well on the way to creating a masterpiece.

And what it all amounts to is this. If Arsenal reach the Carling Cup final, the only way Chelsea could beat them is to field a team of young stars. If they can find any.