Chelsea will give Luiz Felipe Scolari until the summer to show that he is up to the job of taking the club forward. The board is desperate for the Brazilian to succeed after the previous two managers departed in the space of eight months, but concedes that it will have to review Scolari’s position if his side are not challenging for honours at the end of the season.

José Mourinho and Avram Grant left Chelsea within months of their abortive attempts to capture the Premier League and Champions League, but failure to win silverware is not necessarily viewed as a sacking offence. Rather, the club’s minimum expectation of their manager is that Chelsea should be in contention for the leading prizes at the end of the season, giving added significance to the Champions League first knockout round tie against Juventus, the first leg of which is on February 25.

An early exit from the one competition that Chelsea have yet to win under Roman Abramovich, the owner, could bring trouble for Scolari, who signed a two-year contract with an option for a year’s extension last summer, especially if they also fall out of contention in the Barclays Premier League. They are second, four points behind Liverpool, but after Sunday’s 3-0 defeat away to Manchester United, they have the champions breathing down their necks, one point adrift with two matches in hand. Defeat in their FA Cup third-round replay away to Southend United tomorrow would not help.

Chelsea would still be extremely reluctant to dismiss Scolari, not least because the huge payoffs awarded to Mourinho and Grant have damaged their hopes of breaking even by 2010, as is expected to be revealed when their annual financial results are published next month. Parting company with him this summer would mean that one year’s work would cost them £10 million.

In addition, Scolari has generated a huge amount of goodwill in six months at Stamford Bridge, promoting better relationships between departments, softening the club’s image among non-Chelsea fans and, on occasions at least, improving the quality of the team’s football.

However, a run of one win in six matches has raised doubts over Scolari’s abilities, especially his training methods. Eyebrows were raised among the players when they were forced to play an 11-a-side, 90-minute practice match in training on Thursday, an unusual occurrence given their workload, which last season amounted to 62 matches. There was no post mortem yesterday over the United defeat, but Scolari will hold a team meeting before training today.

The board insists that the players should take responsibility for their performances rather than blaming the manager, a view Scolari, 60, seemed to support yesterday by questioning his side’s mentality. He also confirmed that no signings would be made this month despite recent results, a decision with which he said he was happy.

“I spoke with Peter Kenyon [the chief executive] a month ago and ten days ago and there will be no new players coming in,” Scolari said. “This is my squad and I’m happy with it. What I need to change is the attitude or the mentality, not the players.

“There are two options. Either I stick with the same players and they raise themselves, or I change them and try some different players. We’re not playing well enough to win any competition.”