Madam, - I always enjoy reading Andrew Fifield's column on the Premiership, but it beats me how he can conclude that Jose Mourinho's three-year reign at Stamford Bridge was a failure. In those three years, Chelsea won the league title for the first time in 50 years, retained it the following year, and reached the semi-final of the Champions League twice - not to mention winning the FA Cup and League Cup. If that's failure I wish the club I support, West Ham, could have some of it.
There used to be an old saying in football that you can't buy success. Well, Roman Abramovich has certainly disproved that maxim by pouring millions of oil roubles into a previously stagnant club and reaping the rewards. I would be willing to bet a sizeable wager that Mourinho's departure may well precipitate a sequence of events - the sacking of the new manager, the disillusionment of the owner, and a mass exodus of star players - that will see Chelsea sinking to its former level within a year or two.
- Yours, etc,
JOE PATTON, Chapelizod Court, Dublin 20.