By Matt Hughes

THE SO-CALLED TITLE RACE IS already resembling a victory parade. In all probability, Chelsea can go ahead and book the open-top bus for their championship-winning celebrations, but they would not fill Sloane Square, never mind Trafalgar Square. Like the man himself, José Mourinho’s team are easy to admire but difficult to love.

Mourinho was rightly welcomed into English football as a breath of fresh air last season, the cheeky upstart who could upset the Manchester United/Arsenal duopoly, but the wind of change has blown too strongly. Two powerhouses have simply been replaced by one.

Sir Alex Ferguson and Arsène Wenger have yet to fly the white flag, but other managers are recognising Chelsea’s dominance as a problem for football as a whole. After seeing his Charlton Athletic team’s 100 per cent record clinically destroyed on Saturday, Alan Curbishley spoke of the unprecedented nature of Chelsea’s threat, wise words rather than sour grapes.

“I don’t think football has been given this problem before,” Curbishley said. “We’ve always had big clubs and Chelsea can point to the fact that Sir Alex has spent £25 million on (Wayne) Rooney and £30 million on Rio (Ferdinand), but Chelsea have taken the short cut.They can buy Rooney or Rio whenever they want. It’s unprecedented and a challenge to all of us.”

The question being asked is who can cling to Chelsea’s coat-tails through the dark days of winter, with no one yet providing a satisfactory answer. Curbishley’s belief in the inherent competitiveness of football led him to insist that somebody would, without sounding convinced.

“It’s up to the Champions League clubs to respond,” he said. “Someone will stop them — someone stopped Arsenal — but at the moment they’re going into games knowing that they can score and it’ll take something fantastic to score against them.

“The difference is the squad. Arsenal are looking a bit vulnerable at the moment without (Thierry) Henry and (Patrick) Vieira, but Chelsea could come in without (Claude) Makelele and (Didier) Drogba or (John) Terry and it wouldn’t make any difference.”

Mourinho’s many admirers in Portugal used to explain FC Porto’s dominance on the lines of “if they play well they win, if they play badly they win” and the same pattern of inevitability is emerging at Chelsea. Mourinho was so relaxed that he watched much of the match casually slumped on an advertising hoarding and only the physical presence of Darren Bent caused him to get to his feet. In the first half, Bent, recently called into the England squad, gave Chelsea ’s back four more problems than they have had all season, with Ricardo Carvalho resorting to a series of cynical fouls, but Charlton failed to profit from his labour.

In the second half Chelsea made them pay, Hernán Crespo heading home a cross from Michael Essien and Arjen Robben curling a left-foot shot past Stephan Andersen, the Charlton goalkeeper, for his first goal of the season.

With Mourinho uncharacteristically silent, it was left to his assistant, Steve Clarke, to praise the players. “We got together at the start of the season and asked them if they had the same desire and hunger to do it again,” he said. “The answer has come back from the players.”

Arsenal and United need to provide some answers of their own.