Chelsea focus on Champions League

LONDON (AP):

Chelsea's players set their sights on winning the club's first Champions League title, after delivering the London club's first double.

Chelsea defended their FA Cup title on Saturday by beating Portsmouth 1-0 - a week after capturing their first Premier League title since 2006.

As Chelsea's players paraded the two trophies on an open-top bus parade of west London yesterday, goalkeeper Petr Cech was focusing on the trophy that has eluded him.

"I hope this is the first achievement of a long cycle, that we will be able to defend the title and compete every year to win the double," Cech said. "As well, we can't forget it is just the Champions League missing for this club. I can see this club going forward again, this is a massive moment and it can give us a lot of confidence for next year."

Cech was part of the Chelsea team that lost the 2008 Champions League final on penalty kicks to Manchester United.

Manager Carlo Ancelotti has experience of winning Europe's elite club competition in 2003 and 2007 as AC Milan coach.

"This team has the quality to win the Champions League without any changes," Ancelotti said at the end of his first season at Chelsea.

Neither Deco nor Ricardo Carvalho played at Wembley Stadium on Saturday and are likely to leave, while midfielder Joe Cole is yet to agree a new contract, with his current deal ending in the off season.

"My focus is the World Cup now," Cole said. "I've got an opportunity to go to South Africa, I want to go there and I want to play, so that's where my full focus has to be."

Ancelotti brings back the Blues' swagger

LONDON (AP):

Chelsea has the statistical proof that their third English Premier League title in six years was fully deserved, scoring a record 103 times for a goal difference of 71 and six wins in six games against their big three traditional rivals.

The Blues finished the season with an 8-0 thrashing of Wigan two Sundays ago to become the first Premier League team to score a century of goals and the first in top-flight football since Tottenham in 1963. And behind those figures was the impressive way Chelsea did it.

While Jose Mourinho's two title-winning teams, in 2005 and '06, were pragmatic rather than stylish, Carlo Ancelotti marked his first season in English football by creating a Chelsea team that blew away many of its opponents with a swagger - even if they only beat Manchester United by one point.

Since Mourinho guided Chelsea to its first league title for half a century, Chelsea has had four more coaches to try and wrest the title back from Manchester United, which had won it three seasons in a row.

It looked as if the balance of Premier League power had swung back to Old Trafford.

Hot favourite

But the club from a fashionable part of West London is now hot favourite to complete the rare league and cup double by beating the Premier League's last-place team, Portsmouth, in next weekend's FA Cup final at Wembley.

Until it began winning titles regularly from 1997, Chelsea were taunted by their rivals for having little history - just one league championship, one FA Cup, one League Cup and one European Cup Winners' Cup to show for a club formed in 1905. Chelsea would play football with panache but little depth and was considered something of a lightweight in the race for trophies.

How that has changed.

"We can win a double and, if we do, it will be a very good achievement, a first for the club and a piece of history," Ancelotti said the day they captured the league title. "It won't make people forget Jose Mourinho, because he won two (league) titles here and did a fantastic job. But it's important to keep making history."

With the addition of the FA Cup on Saturday to their third Premier League triumph, the club now has won 11 domestic trophies from 1997 onward.

In his first season in English football, it would have been easy for Ancelotti to become distracted by the mind games played by rival coaches, notably Manchester United's vastly experienced Alex Ferguson.

Few changes

But the man who led AC Milan to two Champions League titles lifted the pressure off himself and his players by making as few changes as possible from the squad he had inherited from the previous men in charge.

Rather than plunder his old club for players he knew well, Ancelotti trusted those already at Stamford Bridge.

He also refused to look too far ahead. Even when the championship was within sight, he would only concentrate on the next game, never allowing himself to think about winning the league and cup double, one of the most sought-after achievements in one of the toughest leagues in the world.

Ancelotti managed to harness the talents of strikers Didier Drogba and Nicolas Anelka, two players known to have fragile temperaments and they have rewarded him with plenty of goals and assists. With three against Wigan, Drogba finished top Premier League scorer with 29. Frank Lampard scored 22 league goals from midfield.

Chelsea also hit seven goals in games against Sunderland, Aston Villa and Stoke, and 17 without reply in consecutive league and cup matches against Atletico Madrid (4-0), Blackburn (5-0) and Bolton (4-0 and 4-0).

Ancelotti didn't panic when Chelsea went into a dip midway through the season, with only one win in seven games. His team hit back with six wins in a row to make sure it stayed in the title race.

In a season where the title race had been closely fought from start to finish, Chelsea had to shrug off allegations in the media about the private lives of John Terry and Ashley Cole, who were both reported to have had affairs.

Speculations

Terry even had the England captaincy taken off him and there was speculation that it had affected his form.

"But it's not about my form or anyone else's form, it's about Chelsea winning things," said Terry. "That puts a smile on the fans' faces and if we can do that, that makes us happy as a group of players."

While the scandals dominated the front pages of the media, Ancelotti remained calm and in control of what happened on the field.

After joining a select group of managers - Ferguson included - by winning the league and cup double, he will now sit with the club's billionaire owner, Roman Abramovich, and plan for next season.

Ancelotti says he is not likely to ask the Russian to finance big-money signings, even though the club has been linked with Liverpool striker Fernando Torres.

"Spending is not the main thing. This squad is good enough for next season," Ancelotti said. "I think the club can invest money for any player but only if it's necessary. If it is not, we can keep the money.

"Our academy is working very well and our philosophy is to grow our own players for the first team. That is our aim, not signing Fernando Torres. He is a fantastic player but we already have Didier Drogba and Nicolas Anelka."