One day he said and we don’t know who or when a team

“One day,” he said, “and we don’t know who or when, a team will be unlucky and we will score every chance and it will be four or five nil.” Perhaps his former club Porto in the Champions’ League on Wednesday? “For me, that is just a match I want to win because if we win we have six points in two matches, and we almost have two feet in the next round of the Champions’ League,” he said without emotion.Middlesbrough, too, have midweek European entertainment, defending a 3-0 lead in the Czech Republic against Banik Ostrava. On Saturday, they were weakened by injuries – Gaizka Mendieta the biggest miss in a predictable side – and then lost Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink to a head wound, Ray Parlour to a knee gash and Mark Viduka and substitute Joseph-Desir?ob to hamstring niggles.”We’re struggling at the moment looking at them walking out of the dressing room,” said the manager Steve McClaren, “but we’ll look at them on Monday and see what comes back – if anything.” But it was not just absenteeism that caused Boro’s downfall because on the day their most reliable player was the 37-year-old Colin Cooper and the most exciting, the 18-year-old substitute James Morrison.After half-time, Hasselbaink was forcibly returned to the dressing room to change a blood-splattered shirt. That is something we are coming up against and you are not always going to win three or four nil.”Mourinho issued more of a threat than a promise. “A lot of it is down to a) we have not converted as many as we want to and b) teams defend against us. Boro are an exciting, fluent team and we ended up making them defend for most of the game. “You have to have a foundation before the goals come,” he said. He hung behind the defence and had the power and sniff of goal to win the game.” He also explained why this was only Chelsea’s seventh goal in seven Premiership games.

“So the goal arrive, I don’t know how to say in English,” and, wordless, Mourinho breathed a volcanic sigh of relief.Lampard, whose cunning low free-kick created the 81st-minute opening, explained the goal and the scorer: “I spotted Didi and cut it back He darts around and has an instinct for goal For this one he was clever. When a team is playing so well it is a case of putting the ball in the net and not on the post or not letting the goalkeeper save.”Finally, – just as the third consecutive 0-0 seemed inevitable – Drogba found the target, missed the woodwork, beat the keeper and put the ball in the net. “When the team isn’t doing enough to score goals you have to improve the way you play. And 310 minutes since Chelsea’s last goal.”I was thinking during the game that with a team playing like us I shouldn’t be too worried about being scoreless,” the Chelsea coach, Jose Mourinho, said afterwards. Not even close: an ugly left-footed slash horribly wide, and a header directed so poorly that it went away from the goal as if repelled by magnetic force.
A bit closer: desperate blocks by Gareth Southgate after wicked near post crosses from Paulo Ferreira and Alexei Smertin, and then a thump in the back from Franck Queudrue as another enticing Damien Duff ball flew overhead.Closer still: a slam against the underside of the bar which was so venomous that William Gallas was not athletic enough to turn in the bouncing ricochet.All Didier Drogba. And their goalkeeper is strong; we clattered him, no question,” he remarked. “I said to the players afterwards: ‘Why not that level of drive and desire against Everton?’ But we found out what Arsenal are made of and that’s pretty strong stuff.”Goal: Cole (14) 0-1.Manchester City (4-4-2): James; Mills, Dunne, Distin, Sun Jihai; S Wright-Phillips, Barton, Bosvelt (McManaman, 76), Sibierski; Macken (Flood, 76), Anelka.

Substitutes not used : Waterreus (gk), Jordan, B Wright-Phillips.Arsenal (4-4-2): Lehmann; Lauren, Tour?Campbell, Cole; Ljungberg (Fabregas, 88), Edu, Vieira, Reyes (Clichy, 64); Bergkamp (Van Persie 88), Henry. Substitutes not used : Almunia (gk), Cygan.Referee: N Barry (Scunthorpe).Booked: City: Bosvelt.Man of the match: Cole.Attendance: 47,015.. But for a sublimely taken goal from Ashley Cole that even his hero, Roberto Carlos, would have struggled to emulate, they would have deserved their point.And this, of course, neatly sums up City under Keegan. They excelled against potentially the finest team in Europe just as earlier in the month they had collapsed to an earthly Everton side, who would no more attempt Wenger’s sophisticated brand of football than Sid James would have embraced method acting.Keegan, who stated that he would not be playing Robbie Fowler again until the striker had taken time out of the game to improve his fitness, pointed out that while many extol the beauty of Arsenal’s play, their strength is often overlooked.”To go 47 games without defeat, if you are not physically strong, mentally strong, it does not happen. From a man who would rival John Motson for an interest in the minutiae of football, that was some compliment.And yet a year ago, the uncompromising tackling, the sight of bodies clattering into Lehmann, would have produced a reaction from Arsenal and maybe a red card. Arsenal, however, drew not even a yellow from Neale Barry’s pocket and it is worth stating that this season they have suffered half as many bookings as their opponents.”We don’t get nervous, we don’t get upset, we don’t get stupid yellow cards and we deal well with the situation because now we get games that feel like cup-ties everywhere we go,” said Wenger. “Even a year ago, we were known for sometimes over-reacting and on that side of the game we have made fair progress.”We got a big lesson taught by the Manchester United game and, from then on, if you look carefully at our record, we have taken the consequences and learned well I feel the players have responded remarkably.