Premier League 
/ Richard Aikman / 04 March 2012 / Leave a Comment 
He was a genius less than a year ago - is he really a busted flush now?
"The Stamford Bridge boo-boys should recognise that the problem is less with the ‘dead man walking’ than it is the zombies under his charge."
Football's new economic realities mean Chelsea cannot simply spend their way out of the current 'crisis' and with so much dead wood in the ranks the best option must be to stick with Villas-Boas, says Richard Aikman
Watching André Villas-Boas trudging through the bowels of the Stadio San Paolo in Naples two weeks ago was a sorry sight. The Chelsea manager cut a disconsolate figure; head down and wearily bringing one leg before another, he had the air of a convict on his way to death row.
Fast forward 12 days and, after league defeat no.7, it now just seems a matter of when rather than if the Portuguese tactician's three-year plan will be brought to a premature end. The young tactician who could do no wrong at Porto last season has not made the transition to Stamford Bridge quite as seamlessly as the Special One, as odds of around [1.25] about his imminent exit would suggest.
The only surprise is that he has lasted this long. Roman Abramovich is the most trigger-happy owner in the English top flight and at a club where coming second or losing the Champions League final on penalties is deemed a failure, Villas-Boas' continued employment is a remarkable feat of survival.
There are many naysayers, and it has been a fierce baptism of fire for the Portuguese, but if he was hired to implement a "three-year plan" then he should be given the time to do so. Rome was not built in a day, and if we think back far enough it is worth remembering that Manchester United are now enjoying the rewards from having kept the faith in a manager of their own who won nothing in his first three seasons at the club. In the autumn of 1989 supporters at Old Trafford unveiled a banner that read: "Three years of excuses and it's still crap...ta-ra Fergie."
The difference between the two cases is expectation. Sir Alex Ferguson took over a club languishing at the wrong end of the table and which had not won the league for 19 years, while Chelsea's memories of the Jose Mourinho years and Carlo Ancelotti's double-winning season remain fresh in the mind.
For Abramovich, though, simply winning is no longer enough. He wants his Chelsea side to win with panache; he wants players to come through the youth system in the way the graduates of Barcelona's Masia academy do on a conveyor belt of self-sustaining success; he wants a mantra like the one used by AC Milan: "Vincere e convincere" (Win and convince). But this takes time ? it is a work in progress.
Villas-Boas is trying to completely revolutionise a side who have largely been brainwashed in the defence-first Mourinho way.
"There is so much pressure to succeed," the Chelsea coach said recently.
"I agree with Louis Van Gaal when he says it is much harder to defend an attacking philosophy. It is definitely easier to defend a cautious, defensive organisation with a compact block than to defend creativity, talent and attacking fluency. Positive teams will clash with those who 'contain and counter' and it will not be easy to triumph."
This is exactly the difficulty Chelsea came across at West Brom on Saturday, at Napoli a fortnight ago and at Everton last month. But the reason today's newspapers are suggesting Rafa Benitez or Pep Guardiola are preparing to replace Villas-Boas is because he has lost the dressing room. The powerful clique of players who are finding themselves increasingly marginalised by Villas-Boas are able to undermine their coach because results are not justifying his methods in the short term.
Arsène Wenger met with similar resistance from the old guard when he first arrived at Arsenal, but he had the good fortune to win the double in his first full season in charge, so the cynics in and outside the camp were soon silenced. These days, though, the Premier League is a far more competitive place than 14 years ago and playing the long game means running the risk of missing the Champions League money train. Chelsea are odds against to finish in the Top Four.
Abramovich is hardly strapped for cash but the UEFA Fair Play rules means that he will soon no longer be able to throw unlimited funds at the problem - and neither does he want to - but in Villas-Boas's defence he has not really been able to bring in his own men yet. Since his arrival only Juan Mata - the one consistent performer in the side - Raul Mereiles and Gary Cahill are established players to have arrived on AVB's say-so and Chelsea's is a side that needs a full-scale overhaul if they are to challenge for further honours.
Hard as it may be for Blues supporters to accept, it is time to respect these new austere times. Instant gratification is no longer the way forward. And the Stamford Bridge boo-boys should recognise that the problem is less with the 'dead man walking' than it is the zombies under his charge.
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