A new season, eternal hope springs far and wide, and nowhere is there a keener sense of anticipation, amply justified, than at Chelsea, who believe that they are well equipped to dethrone Manchester United as Premier League champions. Their optimism is founded, credibly enough, on the fact that they threatened to do it last time, when they were runners-up and lost the European Cup final, also to United, on penalties.

Logic dictates that if they were that close under Avram Grant, a lame-duck manager who had little, or in some cases no respect from the players, they should do even better with Luiz Felipe Scolari, whose pedigree can’t be faulted. “Big Phil” has quickly made the favourable impression that was widely expected when he took charge on finishing his stint with Portugal after Euro 2008.

The two summer signings to date, Jose Bosingwa and Deco, both of whom played for Scolari’s Portugal at the European Championship, have improved the team and there is the promise of more to follow. Right-back has been Chelsea’s achilles heel for the past two years, Paulo Ferreira’s defensive shortcomings leading Grant and his predecessor, Jose Mourinho, to play Michael Essien, among others, there, out of position. By all accounts, Bosingwa has been looking the part. Chelsea have also lacked a playmaker, which is one of the reasons they resorted too readily to the long ball game. Deco is the pass-master to remedy that.

If the near £20m bid for Real Madrid’s Robinho is successful, Scolari will have the depth in striking resources that United lack. All the indications are that he favours a composed, constructive style — the attractive football for which his boss, Roman Abramovich, has long been pining. In their pre-season friendlies, prior to the real thing next Sunday, Chelsea have played through Deco, with him often taking the ball from just in front of the back four to set things moving. If he is to be their key man, one can envisage the likes of United and Liverpool detailing Owen Hargreaves and Javier Mascherano to mark him out of the game, but Scolari will doubtless have a Plan B.

Already the shape of the team and their mode of attack has changed. Mourinho and Grant favoured wingers to supply and support Didier Drogba in a 4-3-3 formation. The early signs suggest Scolari is content to let his two adventurous full-backs, Bosingwa and Ashley Cole, provide the width, raiding either side of conventional midfielders in a 4-4-2 configuration. Deco and John Obi Mikel, who may well give way to Essien, have been deployed just ahead of the back line, Mikel defending à la the departed Claude Makelele and allowing the playmaker to pick out the runs made by Frank Lampard and Joe Cole, which he has been doing to telling effect.

Up front, Nicolas Anelka is at last showing decent form, but would presumably be the one to give way to Robinho as the rapier-foil for Drogba, whose threat to leave has been withdrawn in the light of the managerial change. Back-up is always important, and there is strength in depth in the likes of Carlo Cudicini, Wayne Bridge, Alex, Florent Malouda, Shaun Wright-Phillips and Salomon Kalou. All things considered, it is a team that ticks all the boxes — powerful, resilient, clever and full of goals — and it is not hard to imagine them getting the better of United. It was easily forgotten, amid all the “Glory, glory Man United”, that Grant’s Chelsea were hit hard by injuries and absences at the African Cup of Nations.

Petr Cech, John Terry, Ricardo Carvalho and Michael Ballack were all hors de combat for significant spells and their main striker, Drogba, made only 17 starts in the league and was consequently down to eight goals, after rattling in 20 the previous season. It was much the same for Lampard who missed 14 league games. No Chelsea player was able to make more than 28 league appearances, whereas Wes Brown, Patrice Evra, Nemanja Vidic, Rio Ferdinand, Michael Carrick, Ryan Giggs, Carlos Tevez and Ronaldo all made more than 30 for United.

Chelsea are stronger for the arrival of Scolari, Bosingwa and Deco, with Robinho to come, but United are reliant on the same personnel. It could all change if they eventually manage to sign Dimitar Berbatov, but as things stand the Lovejoy beer money is on the boys in blue. Mind you, it was last time.