Joe Cole sends Chelsea to another final
By Tim Rich
Sport.Telegraph, 24th January 2008
Avram Grant's attempt to convince the world that Chelsea were not especially
bothered by the Carling Cup sounded false from the moment it left his lips.
Not since Don Revie constructed his all-white machine at Leeds has there been
a club who have set out so remorselessly to win everything. 'The Special One'
did not get his name by picking and choosing his trophies and nor, it seems,
will his successor.
The Carling Cup was the first silverware Jose Mourinho won as manager of
Chelsea and for the third time in four seasons they find themselves in the
final. Although Tottenham, their opponents on Feb 24, reached Wembley rather
more spectacularly, this semi-final was at least settled by an exquisite
goal, a long ball from Florent Malouda that Joe Cole controlled instinctively
with one touch and buried past Tim Howard with the second.
It was a wonderful move but not one the romantics would have wanted. The
People's Club had been beaten by a billionaire's plaything. However,
Everton did not do nearly enough to reach their first final since 1995.
Their manager, David Moyes, had said that to reach Wembley they would
have to play as well as they had ever done against a side they had not
beaten for eight years. This, they never remotely did.
Perhaps Everton were tempting fate by printing the Wembley Arch on the
front of the matchday programme. Perhaps they were tempting fate by
playing reruns of their finest semi-final, the defeat of Bayern Munich
in 1985.
But when you have a history, it is as well to remember it and at Goodison
they sang and screamed about it. Grant was right; this semi-final did mean
more to Everton than to Chelsea, who took an embarrassingly small contingent,
some of them from Cyprus, to Goodison. But it was not because Everton are
a small club.
Interrupted only by a minute's silence for Wally Fielding, who played more
than 400 times for the club in the immediate post-war years, Goodison provided
plenty of evidence for Arsene Wenger's theory that it is a naturally more
intimidating venue than Anfield. Both provide grand theatre, but the noise
from the Gwladys is not as self-conscious as that from the Kop.
Everton might have been carried away by this riptide of emotion but, instead
of indulging in cavalry charges, they attacked cleverly through Mikel Arteta
and Manuel Fernandes, who having stalked out of Goodison in the summer has
now stalked back in after falling out with the Valencia manager, Ronald
Koeman.
Their best chance of the first half fell to one of Everton's more regular
threats, the centre-half Joleon Lescott, whose own goal may have decided
the first leg at Stamford Bridge but who had also scored seven times for
Everton. It was a toss-up whether he or Tim Cahill would reach Arteta's
corner first but Lescott's header was saved at full stretch on the line by
Petr Cech, who yesterday morning had become a father for the first time.
And until Everton relaunched their attacks around the hour mark, that was
almost his only real piece of work in a contest that became less emotional
and more attritional as the minutes ticked relentlessly by. Only in terms
of atmosphere did it compare with Tuesday's semi-final at White Hart Lane.
Although both sides had lost a significant number of players to the Africa
Cup of Nations, Chelsea were also deprived of the injured Michael Ballack
and Frank Lampard, whose father's goal had deprived Everton of a place in
the 1980 FA Cup final. John Terry, still nursing his injured foot, met
England manager Fabio Capello for the first time, in the directors' box.
Nevertheless, Chelsea were still hungry and knew that a single goal,
especially if it was the first one of the night, would virtually see them
to Wembley. Joe Cole and Florent Malouda were both given openings and both
shot into the crowd but it was Nicolas Anelka who provided the most obvious
threat. For Phil Jagielka the task of marking him must have been like
having to stand guard over a panther.
Just after the interval, he finally broke free, driving his shot almost
on to the intersection of post and bar but had the top of Jagielka's head
not made contact with the Frenchman's shot, it would almost certainly have
been the decisive goal Chelsea craved.
For someone whose collective transfer fees amount to more than £80
million, it could be thought Anelka might not be overly motivated by this
competition but despite winning the Double in his first season at Arsenal,
he has not seen much silverware since lifting the European Cup with Real
Madrid in 2000. Even to big players, the Carling Cup matters.
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