Andrew Fifield On The Premiership: Jose Mourinho once suggested, tongue firmly placed in that finely chiselled cheek, that England would hold a national holiday if Chelsea ever lost a Premiership match. His prophecy was slightly overblown, but there was a distinct whiff of schadenfreude in the headlines of yesterday's sports pages after Chelsea's 3-0 trouncing at Middlesbrough.
Even clubs who have long since failed to stay in Chelsea's slipstream responded to the season's most startling result with glee. Arsenal's supporters, who have seen their club ping-pong uncontrollably between crises in recent weeks, roared more loudly when they heard the result from the Riverside than they had moments before when Gilberto Silva snatched a last-gasp equaliser against Bolton.
Mourinho has long maintained Chelsea are the victims of a media conspiracy aimed at turning them into the team everyone loves to hate, but if the English nation did raise a glass to their tumble on Teesside, then they only have themselves to blame. Winners are rarely popular, but it is Chelsea's boorish behaviour - and in particular their apparent belief that they are above the laws of the game - that has left a sour taste.
The charge-list is lengthy, from a tentative attempt to persuade Sven-Goran Eriksson to abandon his post as England manager, to the tapping-up of Ashley Cole and the supposedly "chance" meeting between Chelsea officials and Manchester United's Rio Ferdinand in a London restaurant. It all smacks of a club that holds the rest of the footballing world in contempt.
Chelsea know they have a PR problem. The club organised a press briefing last weekend to promote a community initiative involving local schools, and Peter Kenyon, their chief executive, made positive noises about trying to alter public perceptions of the club.
"We don't want to be seen as arrogant," he pleaded. "We don't consciously go out there to be controversial."
Kenyon may now be prostrating himself on the altar of public opinion, but nobody has been more heavily implicated in Chelsea's misdemeanours than he. It was Kenyon, too, who suggested last summer that the winners of this season's Premiership would come from "a select group of one", a remark that would be funny if it weren't so breathtakingly conceited.
But, try as he might, Kenyon is not the biggest obstacle to Chelsea winning public acclaim. That dubious privilege falls, ironically, to the club's biggest asset - Mourinho himself. The Portuguese is an erudite, engaging man and his rhetorical posturing is heaven sent for hacks hungry for a news line, but his lack of graciousness in defeat is staggering.
He has refused point blank to give any of the opponents who have managed to vanquish his imperious side a modicum of credit. Manchester City last season were lucky; Liverpool's triumph in the 2005 Champions League semi-finals was due to a linesman's flag rather than the efforts of his flagging side; Manchester United's win at Old Trafford in October was a fluke.
Mourinho did not even acknowledge that his team had lost to Charlton in this season's League Cup; to this day, he maintains Chelsea drew with the Addicks rather than losing on penalties. Do not be surprised if you see three managers striding out at the Millennium Stadium on February 26th.
Natural-born winners always find defeat hard to stomach, and it is true that Mourinho has had little practice in being beaten since he took up his first managerial post in 2000. His career path, from Setubal to Stamford Bridge, has been sprinkled with stardust. But sport's true greats are defined by their dignity as much as their medals, and Chelsea's mercurial manager has been too busy amassing the latter to master the art of losing gracefully.
But that might be about to change. It would be ludicrous to talk of Chelsea suffering a slump when they are still 12 points ahead of their nearest rivals, but a run of two wins in seven games at least proves they are fallible. The manager's professed ambition of winning his second consecutive championship on April 9th may have to be revised.
More concerning for Mourinho, particularly with the club's Champions League tie with Barcelona looming large, is that the defence that once appeared unbreachable has suddenly sprung a leak. The champions have kept just one clean sheet in their last eight games and Ricardo Carvalho, in particular, is playing as if someone has poured lead into his boots.
Chelsea's stuttering form should not affect the outcome of perhaps the most incessantly one-sided title race in recent history, but it might just enable Mourinho to hone his losing skills. He already seems to be learning. On Saturday, he claimed that his side "deserved to lose", even if he also muttered darkly about Middlesbrough "playing with 10 defenders" after forging in front. There is still room for improvement, but at least it's a start.
