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UEFA Champions League: Only the final will satisfy Chelsea's ambition [Tue Sep 13th, 2005]
London (Reuters) - Reaching the UEFA Champions League final is a natural next step for Chelsea, according to manager Jose Mourinho, who plans to get his multinational side to Paris next May despite being drawn in the toughest group.
The standard of football in the Champions League is better than any other competition, World Cup included, Mourinho said.
"Champions League is the crown everyone wants to have," he told a news conference before Tuesday's Group G opener against Anderlecht.
"Chelsea want to dominate in England and in the next five years we have to win the Premiership again," he said. "But I think the natural consequence is to succeed in the Champions League.
"I don't know whether it will be this season or next, but we have been in the semi-final the last two years and we want the next step, and the next step is to play in the final."
The ambitious London side bankrolled by Roman Abramovich went out last season to eventual champions Liverpool and the season before, under Claudio Ranieri, to the Monaco side that Mourinho's Porto beat in the final.
WINNERS' LUCK
Any winning team needs luck, Mourinho said, and Chelsea were not lucky in the draw which put them in a group alongside Liverpool, dangerous Spanish side Real Betis and experienced European campaigners Anderlecht.
"You can be the best team and not win Champions League," he said. "You need luck. It is a knockout. There are penalties There are small details that change games.
"There are perhaps 10 teams who could win and you cannot say in May that nine of them have been failures because the difference between success and failure is nothing."
Despite a long European pedigree, including two Cup Winners Cups and a UEFA Cup, Anderlecht's ambitions are rather less grand than the nouveaux-riches at Stamford Bridge.
They have lost their last seven Champions League games and do not figure in Mourinho's 10 possible winners.
"We can't live in the past. You have to accept the reality," coach Frank Vercauteren said.
"As a sportsman you always have to play to win even if this is one of the most difficult games you can get to start the Champions League.
"We are underdogs. The only thing I can ask my team is to do their best," he added.
Though Tuesday's encounter is unlikely to spark controversy, Mourinho hit as many headlines during last season's campaign for his outspokenness and criticism of officials as for his side's success on the pitch. He earned UEFA wrath and a two-match suspension.
Mourinho was defiant and conciliatory at the same time, saying he was starting the season with a clean slate but adding darkly: "If something strange happens I have to do what I have to do."
Chelsea start on Tuesday without left backs Asier Del Horno, who has a muscle strain, and Wayne Bridge, who has not played since breaking his leg last February.
Claude Makelele, who injured his knee playing for France last week. trained on Monday and could be fit for his holding midfield role.
Anderlecht defender Vincent Kompany, who had to come off the pitch 10 minutes from the end of his side's 3-1 win over Excelsior Mouscron on Saturday with a recurrence of a back injury, said he would play.
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