Ancelotti rouses Deco from his slumber

SOCCER ANGLES:Chelsea have shown they are up for the challenge of regaining the title with performances of power and imagination, writes MICHAEL WALKER

EVEN NEWSPAPER columns sometimes acknowledge the need for restraint. Having said that, it’s been some start to the new Premier League.

It’s only one week old and already we have seen Manchester United and Liverpool lose, Manchester City win, Tottenham do so twice and, particularly heartening, the three promoted clubs, Wolves, Birmingham and Burnley discover what a Premier League win tastes like. The whole shebang has burst back.

In addition we have seen Arsenal dismantle Everton and Chelsea scrape past Hull. Then Chelsea walloped Sunderland.

The latter performance was one to be witnessed in the flesh. Yes, it is premature, but it felt like a blue siren sending out a warning to the field that this version of Chelsea are the real thing.

From the resilience of John Terry at the back, the movement and pace of his full-backs, Jose Boswinga and Ashley Cole, through Frank Lampard to Didier Drogba, this was a display of physical power and impressive speed of thought.

One of Steve Bruce’s priorities at Sunderland is to improve the masculinity and aggression of the squad he inherited, which goes back to Niall Quinn’s reference in May to too many “frilly players” occupying space at the Stadium of Light.

Bruce has been successful, introducing Lee Cattermole and Lorik Cana to the midfield and Darren Bent in attack, who can be only an improvement on Djibril Cisse.

But though Cattermole and Cana bit into tackles, Chelsea rode them. Bent put Sunderland ahead, just as Stephen Hunt had done for Hull last Saturday, but Chelsea rode that as well. Sunderland retreated into 4-5-1 but Chelsea came again, and again.

Some of Drogba’s play was truly stirring, a throwback centre-forward’s contribution.

He was bullying Anton Ferdinand to the extent Bruce was visible on the touchline gesturing to Ferdinand with one fist slapped into the palm of the other.

But it was not all power. Chelsea possessed imagination in the form of the little man drifting around Drogba’s scene and who was just as pleasing on the eye as the striker.

For quite a while now, Deco has been a forgotten figure at Stamford Bridge. Signed by Felipe “Big Phil” Scolari last summer — for €9 million – Deco moved to the periphery around the time Big Phil was moved out altogether after the turn of the year. By the time of the FA Cup final, Deco did not even make the bench. If Guus Hiddink fancied him, he did not show it and by June Deco was in the press talking about “not liking my Chelsea experience”.

On Wearside he looked as though he has found something to like. Whether it is Carlo Ancelotti or simply August sunshine that has roused Deco remains to be seen, but he was so good on Tuesday night that Sunderland fans applauded him off the pitch when he was replaced late on. They can be a generous crowd at Sunderland; the last time they did this was with Thierry Henry.

Deco barely looked up. Presumably that was due to concentration rather than lack of appreciation. He had certainly shown no vision problems earlier, making angles, pushing passes, beating men and scoring an excellent goal. It was reminiscent of Zola.

So often in the past five years Chelsea have relied on the Terry-Lampard axis and Drogba’s deeds up front, that to have this kind of alternative would surely lift them a level.

And one would expect Nicolas Anelka and Florent Malouda to prosper again. That gives Ancelotti a strong hand.

Caveats must be introduced of course: the season is two games old and Chelsea won the first of these courtesy of a fluke chip by Drogba. So we cannot get carried away.

Another is that we have been here before with Chelsea, and as recently as this time last season.

Then Scolari was the supposed new force at Stamford Bridge and we got ourselves in a lather about that. Chelsea rattled out a series of early Premier League wins and the talk from within the club was of new style and Brazilian philosophy. Deco was centrally involved and was voted player of the month for August.

If it happened once, it can happen again, so if November, say, brings an unconvincing Champions League performance in Romania or somewhere, then Ancelotti would do well to check his back.

But the mere fact that he corrected his own grammar on Tuesday made you warm to him. Ancelotti began by saying “we was” before switching to “we were”, which should be a lesson to those managers who speak English as a first language.

He talked up Deco and said that he would not be allowing his articulate Portuguese to depart. And if Deco flourishes even in winter, we may once again be forced to try to like Chelsea as well as admire them grudgingly.

Behan scores

ONE MONTH after he swapped Cork City for Hartlepool United, Denis Behan scored his first goal in English football on Tuesday night. The 25-year-old from Tralee has made an immediate impression on the locals and, just as importantly, on his manager, Chris Turner.

Hartlepool are yet to win in the league but Behan is not to blame for that. “In our two home games Denis has been by far our most creative player,” Turner said.

Hartlepool host Burnley in the League Cup on Tuesday night and Burnley know the meaning of an upset.

Rhodes making a point

AT PORTMAN Road a couple of weeks ago, in among the tributes surrounding the Bobby Robson statue and amid the customary new-season anticipation, there could be heard a grumble. It concerned a 19-year-old striker called Jordan Rhodes, whom Roy Keane had sold to Huddersfield Town in the division below.

According to comments in the local paper, a number of Ipswich fans clearly regarded Rhodes as a prospect. In Keane’s big new-season press conference, the name of Rhodes was brought up and Keane said that it had been with great difficulty that he had decided to sell him.

But sell Rhodes he did and Ipswich fans have noted Rhodes scored on his Huddersfield debut, got two in the League Cup three days after that, then snatched another two against Southampton.

Ipswich, meanwhile, have played three Championship matches – drawn one, lost two – and go to West Bromwich Albion today. They will have one ear on the score from Bristol Rovers, where Huddersfield and Rhodes are.

And if he scores again, they may not be overly receptive to the argument that he is doing so one division down.