Jose Mourinho has set Chelsea a target of nine more wins to clinch their first title in 50 years after a bruising 1-0 Premiership victory at Blackburn Rovers.
An ill-tempered encounter saw the Chelsea manager refute claims from opposite number Mark Hughes that he is an ungracious victor, after seeing his side move a commanding 11 points clear of Manchester United at the top of the table.
Mourinho’s champions-elect chalked-up an eighth consecutive victory — all accompanied by a clean sheet — courtesy of a sixth-minute goal from Arjen Robben.
Dutch international Robben will on Thursday undergo X-rays on a badly bruised foot, after limping off shortly after his goal following a shuddering challenge with Blackburn midfielder Aaron Mokoena.
Mourinho dismissed Hughes’s claims that he failed to shake the Welshman’s hand at the final whistle, as the Portuguese coach joined his players’ post-match celebrations in front of the Chelsea fans, in scenes reminiscent of his head-long charge down the Old Trafford touchline last year following his former club Porto’s Champions League victory over Manchester United.
Mourinho said: ”It’s ridiculous to claim I snubbed him. I was happy and I just wanted to be with my players. If he’d have been there, I would have shaken his hand, no problem.
”It was a vital victory. Now we need to win nine matches and draw one. I don’t care what the other teams do, we’re just concentrating on ourselves.”
Former Chelsea forward Hughes insisted that on this showing, there are better Premiership sides than Chelsea: ”You have to be gracious in defeat, but you also have to be gracious in victory.
”I was upset that the opposing manager didn’t see fit to shake my hand. He was too busy celebrating on the pitch; perhaps he’s still out there now.”
Chelsea remain on course for an unprecedented quadruple of domestic and European honours this season thanks to Robben’s ninth goal of the season, finished with a devastating left-foot shot across American goalkeeper Brad Friedel following Frank Lampard’s searching 40-yard pass.
Mourinho fears Blackburn’s over-physical tactics will be replicated in his side’s 13 remaining games, and he added: ”It was a fight, and we fought. Blackburn tried to intimidate us, because they couldn’t beat us with football.
”Robben’s in a lot of pain and he has to go for X-rays. I don’t know if going to be out for weeks or months. They were nasty and hard and tried everything but we showed we were ready.
”We’ve not won the title yet but this leaves us in the best position since the start of the season.”
On a pitch Mourinho criticised for being overly watered, the visitors were indebted to goalkeeper Petr Cech’s stunning 34th-minute penalty save from Scotland striker Paul Dickov, after a foul by Paulo Ferreira on Robbie Savage.
It enabled Chelsea to equal Arsenal’s Premiership high of eight straight clean sheets to leave them four short of a season-best 23 shut-outs, also set by the Highbury club in 1997-8.
Dickov’s late challenge on Chelsea’s Czech international goalkeeper in an effort to force home the rebound led to the first of four separate fracas between groups of players, and set a bad-tempered tone for the remainder of the contest, the gross leniency of referee Uriah Rennie not helping matters as some quite shocking thuggery by both sides went unpunished.
In the process of denying Dickov, Cech also eclipsed former Manchester United goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel’s mark for the longest spell without conceding a Premiership goal, stretching his remarkable unbeaten run to 781 minutes, a shade more than 13 hours. — Sapa-AFP