AVB must emulate Sir Alex and face down current crisis

Chelsea players head to the touchline to celebrate Ramires's goal with AVB at Molineux.

     Three days and two games in the topsy-turvy world of Chelsea football club has seen them go from potential title challengers, to no-hopers, and back to challengers again. At least in the eyes of their manager Andre Villas-Boas. After losing to Aston Villa on Saturday, the Portuguese dismissed his sides chances this season saying that the league title was no longer a realistic possibility for them. Two days on however, AVB feels that "if we go on a run of five or six wins we can be fighting for this league." But then, we've always known that Chelsea are not averse to change, from the owner right down to the playing squad. 

     The Stamford Bridge managerial merry-go-round has, arguably, side-tracked the club down the path that has led to their current state of flux. Seven managers in seven years. Furthermore, of the six managers other than Villas-Boas, five (Grant, Scolari, Wilkins, Hiddink and Ancelotti) have been given less than two years to create and maintain the aura of success which the club became accustomed to under Jose Mourinho.

     Results this season have been erratic too and, once again, the manager is immediately facing flak. This is football however, and managers are only too aware of the pressures for instant success that they face, especially at clubs like Chelsea, Liverpool or Manchester United. What's most interesting about the most recent criticisms of AVB is that they have come from within the players' dressing room.

     Such voices of internal dissent, given intense coverage by the tabloid press yesterday, would be more credible were they being heard for the first time along the King's Road. There were grumblings from within the dressing room that, while they may not have been ultimately responsible for the managers' sackings, certainly did more harm than good to highly reputable managers in the Chelsea hot-seat previously. There were rumours of internal unrest in the last days of Carlo Ancelotti (one of Europe's most successful foreign managers), while it seems no secret that so-called 'player power' spelt the early demise of Luiz Felipe Scolari (a World Cup and Copa Libertadores winning coach). 

     Neither of these coaches were 'tactically inept', a common catch-all term for "we don't like this guy very much", and nor is Andre Villas-Boas. He is a record that, in two-years as a top-flight manager, includes a Portuguese League title, a Europa League title, and the record for most wins in Europe in a single season by a Portuguese club.

     In Chelsea Villas-Boas inherited club heaven, but one that contains too many fading stars. There is huge respect in the footballing community for the successes of players like Frank Lampard, Nicolas Anelka and Alex, but there can be no room for sentiment if success is the goal. Roman Ambramovich need only look to Sir Alex Ferguson, still delivering trophies at 70 years of age, 26 years after taking charge at Old Trafford.

     Ferguson has built and rebuilt teams and then rebuilt them again, each time emulating and surpassing the achievements of the previous. In that time many great players have been put to pasture by Sir Alex, knowing that their abilities no longer matched their influence and reputation. Greats of the game have nobly moved on (Bruce, Robson, Cantona) while other legends went less quietly (Keane, Strachan, Beckham). There have been those two who have left for apparently undermining the manager's authority or the direction of the club (Ronaldo, Stam, Strachan, Beckham, Rooney next?). But they have gone. Sir Alex Ferguson remains. Success reigns.

     Both Roman Ambramovich and Andre Villas-Boas know that Chelsea have reached the cusp of change. Their ageing squad needs to be revamped, even if some are dragging their heels and being all to vocal about it. It doesn't happen overnight, Sir Alex will attest to that. It is, to use a footballing cliche, a process of transition; a transition that has already begun at Chelsea and must been seen through to the end. That is why Anelka, Alex and likely Malouda are already on their way out the door, and why Lampard finds his role reduced and many are speculating he will join Beckham or Mourinho elsewhere.

     That Villas-Boas might have been more dignified and offered some credit rather than silence in response to Lampard's goal against Wolves yesterday is a fair assessment; as is the fact that his barring of Nicolas Anelka from the club's Christmas party seemed both personal and mean-spirited. However, he must be resolute, and so must his boss, Mr Ambramovich. After all, how many managers can the Chelsea players blame for their poor form on the pitch? With seven in seven years, and inconsistent success, there is only one constant...the key players, not the manager.

     It seems no surprise at all that stories of AVB's apparently petulant behaviour towards the likes of Lampard and Anelka would surface at a time when they are either set to leave or looking likely to leave the club. For Lampard it is becoming a bitter demise, but Chelsea's directors and fans must not allow their nostalgia or sentimentality disguise the fact that the Stamford Bridge careers of Lampard and others of his vintage are nearing their conclusion. 

     The club must silence this 'player power' and persevere in order regain success. Ambramovich must give AVB the time and support needed to overhaul an unbalanced and inconsistent playing squad and mould it in his own image. Villas-Boas must face down these challenges in the same way that Sir Alex Ferguson has done time and again at Manchester United.

      As the Chelsea players were pictured celebrating Ramires's goal against Wolves with their manager, it was significant to note the presence of the new guard and the absence of the old. There was no Lampard, Terry or Malouda. Instead, a beaming Andre Villas-Boas stood surrounded by many of his own: Romeu, Ramires, Meireles and Luiz.

Andy Carroll...target man or targeted man?

     Liverpool host Newcastle United tonight without the controversial but ineffably talented Uruguayan striker Luis Suarez, paving the way for Andy Carroll to make only his 10th start for the Reds in almost a year.

     The 6ft 3in target man, now being dubbed a £35m misfit by many, signed from Newcastle last January at the same time as Suarez and while both players were highly coveted only one has made any on-field impact for their new club. 

     That Andy Carroll was signed for a record fee for a British player at the age of 21 has only served to magnify his recent shortcomings. A strike rate of one goal in very nearly six games is not what Liverpool fans are entitled to expect from a player Kenny Dalglish elevated to the eighth most expensive in history, hence the lukewarm response from both Koppites and the media.

     Comparisons are naturally being drawn with Suarez who arrived in tandem with the big Geordie but for almost £13m less. These comparisons are less than flattering for Carroll and, although he has cost Liverpool almost £7m more per goal than the Uruguayan, they go beyond the financial. Carroll's contribution is a meagre four (yes, four) goals in the famous red shirt, while Suarez has three times as many, netting his first after just sixteen minutes in last season's home fixture against Stoke. 

     It is not unsurprising then that the Kop would have embraced Suarez in a very public way while Carroll feels like something of the black (and white) sheep of his new family. Even with their previous clubs the difference between the two hit men is stark. In five years and 80 appearances for Newcastle, Carroll bagged thirty-one goals. Not bad, maybe. Luis Suarez had 81 goals in 110 games at Ajax; 49 in all competitions in a single season.

     So, are Liverpool likely to be worse-off for having to make the Carroll-Suarez switch up front tonight? Both history and the form book would say 'yes', which is why there has been such significant newspaper analysis today. However, in the longer term Dalglish's judgment on Andy Carroll may yet prove sound.

     Most football-savvy fans and reporters, even those who view Carroll as a flop, would be hard-pressed to deny that a significant chunk of the record transfer fee was paid in exchange for the young striker's potential rather than immediate impact. Why else would a club be willing for fork out such a huge sum for a player who's goal tally was seemingly unspectacular?

     This is where such comparisons break down. Goals, alas, goals in one place don't always translate into goals in another: Darren Bent suffered a lean time at Spurs between cracking stints at Charlton and Sunderland; Diego Forlan flopped at Manchester Utd, but has been prolific virtually everywhere else; and little needs to be said about the fortunes of Fernando Torres. So, with goals a somewhat unreliable predictor of future success, it's clear that Liverpool must have adopted longer-term thinking with the Carroll transfer.

     Furthermore, Suarez had played for three different clubs in two countries, enjoying success with all of them, as well as a starring role for Uruguay at the 2010 World Cup prior to joining Liverpool. His journey to the top has been much more incremental and he is much closer to the finished article than Carroll, who many would describe as rough-around-the-edges. Andy Carroll has only played only 16 games in an injury-blighted year with Liverpool and a significant number of games for just one other club, for which his performances in the first-half of last season thrust him into the spotlight before any £35m cheques were signed.

Will the Kop finally be singing their Carroll at last against Newcastle?

     What might give Liverpool and England fans a glimmer of hope for the future of Andy Carroll as a top European and international footballer is to remember the devastating impact the relatively inexperienced player had in Premier League games against the likes of Aston Villa and Liverpool for the Magpies last season. 

     The man who was tipped to have a bright future by Italy legend Gianluigi Buffon, who faced an 18-year-old Carroll in 2007, has also been praised highly by his former manager Alan Pardew. Pardew has described the effects of losing Carroll last season in unequivocal terms. He has pinpointed the loss of the striker as a key reason for his side's poor performance away to Fulham last season. "There is no doubt it was an after-effect of the sale", claims Pardew. "When Andy left, it was as disappointing a week as I have felt at this club", he added, highlighting just how much he felt he had lost with the departure of Carroll to Liverpool.

     Perhaps the (now controversial) record-breaking transfer of year ago that left Alan Pardew "feeling dejected" may yet lift the spirits of a Kop robbed of their new talisman through suspension and leave Kenny Dalglish feeling vindicated.