There’s something about Chelsea — enduring and pervasive. Something that when they face monumental odds on glittery nights in Europe, they react like champions. Unheralded men turn into heroes. Heroes turn into legends.
When they were down 1-0 in the 2012 Champions League final against Bayern Munich due to Thomas Mueller’s 83rd-minute goal, up propped Drogba.
That final was no flash in the pan. The second-round clash against Napoli had required a comeback of epic proportions after going down 3-1 in the first leg to Napoli at the San Paolo stadium in Naples. It finished 4-1 in the second leg.
As teams with new money soon discover, much like Abramovich’s Chelsea did, learning to withstand adversity on the great stages of world football takes time. The DNA of a team is often forged in the fires of failure. One mis-kick can change careers. John Terry knows. Chelsea know, having been at the wrong end of it in 2007-08.
Football, like all sport, can be cruel but equally, it can be redemptive. Again, Chelsea know.
There is an undercurrent running through this Chelsea team. Since 2004, they have changed coaches 10 times, bought some of the finest talent, but one constant has remained – their core. Terry, Lampard, Cech, Drogba, Cole, Ivanovic – these are names one associates with their coach Jose Mourinho.
In football, when the pressure is on and the heat is about to singe, there are a handful of people you can rely on. Mourinho is one of them.
They bought into him the same way he bought into them. Even though he wasn’t with the team then, the 2012 victory was borne of the mentality Mourinho revels in most – the siege mentality.
Now as then, the odds were stacked against them, and the heat was on. Mourinho complained about not having strikers. He lambasted his players for letting in a joke of goal in the first leg in Paris. Publicly, the campaign was practically deemed over. Privately, they never gave up.
(Hormazd is senior sub-editor based in New Delhi)
hormazd@expressindia.com
