NOTHING was more appropriate at Wembley yesterday than the weather, a day from high summer to say farewell to Guus Hiddink and consider the end of football’s great holiday romance. Four months of fun, excitement and mutual attraction. All that it lacked was the manager to dress in black leather, Chelsea’s players to don Olivia Newton-John wigs and we, the chorus, to chant: “Was it love at first sight?”

He came from Russia with Roman Abramovich’s blessing. They, the underperforming stars, had been in a bad relationship with a Brazilian and needed a new face, more fun in their football lives. The beauty of the relationship was that whatever way it went, it wouldn’t last more than four months. The tragedy of it was that, unexpectedly, they discovered feelings for each other.

At the end Hiddink hugged every Chelsea player and it wasn’t the gentle embrace of the emotionally reserved but the clasp of heartfelt feeling. What hope did Everton have against such forces? As he hugged his players, what did the manager whisper into their ears: “Summer lovin’, had me a blast . . . Summer lovin’ happened so fast . . . I met a team crazy for me”? They did like him, no one doubts that.

So much so that in mid-season, a limping Chelsea rediscovered their true selves after Hiddink’s arrival and learnt to compete again. A team humiliated at Old Trafford, beaten comprehensively at Anfield and embarrassed in a 0-0 draw with Hull City at Stamford Bridge was unlucky to lose to Barcelona in the Champions League semi-final. We now better understand how wondrous a victory that would have been.

Under the Dutch manager, Chelsea played 13 games in the Premier League; they won 11, drew one and lost one. They were in the fifth round of the Cup when he arrived and yesterday’s victory means he leaves as a winner. It is the least he deserves. Without ever reaching for a trumpet, he brought order where there had been chaos and went about the job in a way that made few enemies. It says something that in Chelsea’s last Premier League game, the Sunderland fans at the Stadium of Light should have been entreating him to come and join their club.

From the start, Hiddink had the sense and the humility to ask senior people in and around the team what needed to be done and would have been encouraged to hear most say that training had not been intense enough under Phil Scolari. He heard also about the lack of organisation on and off the pitch; a side that was once masterful in defending set-pieces had become poor. Tougher training quickly produced a tougher Chelsea, and Hiddink quickly improved the organisation. The team again became fiendishly hard to beat.

Just as importantly, players unloved and unproductive under Scolari found new leases of life. The change in Didier Drogba has been dramatic, the centre-back Alex has grown under Hiddink and Florent Malouda has blossomed into one of the team’s most important players. Malouda says he is fully fit for the first time this season and that explains his form but it is clear that Hiddink has brought purpose to his play. The improvement in performance level has been miraculous.

The players liked Hiddink and it was clear from their approach to yesterday’s game they wanted to end the relationship properly. Someone asked Everton manager David Moyes if the Hiddink situation had not worked against his team and while Moyes suggested every team had its own reasons for wanting to win, he did say that Hiddink was both “a good coach and a good man”.

That is what has endeared Hiddink to us. He came to what we like to believe is the most competitive league in football, took the reins of a club on first-name terms with angst and yet never seemed less than perfectly calm. Encouraged by Chelsea to stay on, he remained loyal to his Russian employers who had given him a sabbatical to have the dalliance with Chelsea. That kind of loyalty is not common.

The Hiddink calmness became part of the team and when they went behind to that Louis Saha goal after just 25 seconds, Chelsea never for an instant showed any signs of panic. They were by some distance the better team in the first half and it was appropriate that Malouda and Drogba combined to score Chelsea’s first goal.

Perhaps Joleon Lescott could have done more to stop Drogba getting to Malouda’s excellent cross, but the greater truth is that when the centre-forward surges forward to connect with a well-struck cross, there isn’t much anyone can do.

In the ebb and flow of Chelsea’s form, Frank Lampard is about as close as the team comes to a constant. He is never bad, he always tries and his eye for goal is perennially sharp. What you loved about yesterday’s Cup-winning shot was not just the power of the strike but the speed with which he regained his balance after Phil Neville’s tackle caused him to slip.

As the ball flew into the far corner, it was almost the perfect end to the Hiddink-Chelsea summer lovin’. Perhaps not quite so perfect, because there is a bitter sweetness to the triumphant ending when it is only the triumph that is desired. Carlo Ancelotti or whoever, the act will not be an easy one to follow.