Jose Mourinho's joy at beating Barcelona must have been dampened yesterday when the English Football Association said that Reading's Republic of Ireland midfielder Stephen Hunt will not face disciplinary action for the challenge that left Petr Cech with a fractured skull. Chelsea's manager had called for Hunt to be punished but the governing body decided it was impossible to prove violent intent.
The referee Mike Riley, whose last-minute omission from the roster of referees for this weekend's fixtures was described by the Premier League as an "administrative error", confirmed the incident had been seen by the match officials at the Madejski Stadium last Saturday.
Fifa's guidelines allow retrospective action only after a clear and obvious error - the FA gave Manchester City's Ben Thatcher an eight-game ban this season for an elbow on Portsmouth's Pedro Mendes, for which he was booked, after concluding that the defender had behaved with malice. The FA's rule of thumb is to act where it feels a player would have merited more than a three-match suspension had he been sent off.
Cech was yesterday moved to a hospital closer to his home and was said by Chelsea to be improving and walking unaided.
Hunt has called the collision "a terrible accident" and his manager, Steve Coppell, hopes the midfielder will not be affected by the incident. Now Hunt wants to get back to concentrating on his football and has urged Coppell to pick him for this weekend's sell-out clash with Arsenal even though Bobby Convey has returned to full fitness.
"I just want to forget about it now and get on with playing football. The main thing is Petr Cech will be okay. That's all that really matters. If I could change what happened I would but I can't. The whole club and everyone else who knows me has shown me terrific support. But I don't try to injure players."
Mourinho has confirmed that Andriy Shevchenko will be on the bench for one of three Premiership and English League Cup games in a eight-day spell from tomorrow. The Ukrainian has scored one goal in 11 European and Premiership matches but the manager emphasised that his spell on the bench would be simply rotation.
Chelsea have lost and drawn at Camp Nou in the past two seasons but there will be pressure on Barcelona to win when the teams meet there in a fortnight. "We only have four points and if we want to proceed we have to get the points against Chelsea and Werder Bremen," said Giovanni van Bronckhorst.
The left back praised Chelsea's defence but said: "Last year they were a bit more dangerous with three strikers up front and the speed they had." Drogba is arguably doing the job of three strikers at the moment.
