Back in May, when Chelsea failed to beat Arsenal at Ashburton Grove, thereby handing the title to Manchester United, Arsenal fans took great delight in singing "Sacked in the summer, you're getting sacked in the summer" to the hyperactive Jose Mourinho. Bordering on obnoxiousness as always, the Portuguese manager had charged on the field at full-time, gesturing wildly to the crowd and trying to be the focus of attention.

Although that little interchange amused many, tellingly not a lot of eyebrows were raised - Mourinho was clearly not too happy with how things were being run at Chelsea, and Chelsea were allegedly not too happy with the style of football played under Mourinho, and his unwillingness to be pushed around by their collection of suits - Kenyon, Buck, Abramovich and Zahavi, of which only the latter can have some claim to being a "football man".

Add to that the appointment of Avram Grant from Portsmouth as Director of Football (not to mention the arrival of Frank Arnesen many months earlier to oversee the scouting and talent acquisition) and Chelsea clearly seemed to be building the sort of system that makes a manager's wishes irrelevant. In someways they have jumped from being small to "big" in a very short span of time, and without really having the structure to match. They have hurriedly tried to cobble together a "structure" at the club, and this smells of an insecurity towards the age-old foundations established at powerhouses like AC Milan, Barcelona, and closer-to-home... Arsenal and Manchester United.

I don't think Abramovich liked the fact that Chelsea were reliant for success on Mourinho, especially with the disagreements over playing style and the arrival of certain personnel (Shevchenko, Ballack, Wright-Phillips), and so he decided to establish a "continental-style" structure that would oversee everything to do with the sporting aspects of the club other than the actual coaching, tactics and and operations of the first-team. Any manager arriving in the future would have to work within these constraints, but Mourinho had been there before it all, and was the man responsible for delivering Chelsea's first meaningful silverware in 50 years, so it was never going to work well.

Mourinho may not have played terrific football, or thrilled many (or any), but he had a talent for figuring out how to win or draw football matches. I can't remember any games where they every looked out of a tie, and their resilience and solidity were incredible. You can't hire a manager to win you titles, and when he wins you titles, start telling him how to do his job.

So out goes one of the brightest young managers in Europe, the only surprise being that it was a month into the season instead of before it. Whoever comes in now will have a difficult task, because they can't afford to let performances flag. Avram Grant has stepped up to the mantle for now, but two of the names being bandied about are Fabio Capello and Guus Hiddink. Capello seems unlikely, given his fondness for signing Italians wherever he goes (and the fact that the transfer window doesn't reopen for some months), and when you factor in the Russian connection, and his friendship with Abramovich, Hiddink is not the unlikeliest candidate in the world. Harry Redknapp is a less-likely figure, but another shrewd operator, and someone who likes to play exciting football.