Experience wins over exuberance

These are the contests that Premier League rookies are desperate to win. They try their luck in the English pinball game and find Sir Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger arraigned mightily against them. Andre Villas-Boas has a CV to be proud of but is too young and inexperienced to be found on management's Mount Rushmore. To get there he needs victories over the Manchester giants, Arsenal, Liverpool, Tottenham Hotspur and these days Newcastle United. Wins in tight games establish an aura, a sense of conquest on hostile ground. Fifty minutes into this thrilling battle at the Bridge, Villas-Boas must have thought he had Ferguson licked. Chelsea had burst from the dressing room after the interval to score a goal from the icons. Fernando Torres, that mostly blunt £50-million (Dh183 million) weapon, swung a cross to the far post 22 seconds into the half and Juan Mata met it with a net-busting side-foot volley. Two-nil, and Stamford Bridge was snow-meltingly hot with joy. Better yet, when Mata curled in a free-kick five minutes later it bounced off David Luiz's extravagant coif and into the net via Rio Ferdinand's shoulder. This, surely, was Villas-Boas' chance to complete a notable Manchester double. Chelsea beat City 2-1 here in December but had lost 3-1 at United and were twice beaten by Liverpool in league and cup. Most painfully they were whacked 5-3 by Arsenal on their own turf in another episode of the Robin van Persie show. Now all Chelsea needed to press home their gains was 40 minutes of calm, of stubbornness and ball-retention. Bafflement Without Didier Drogba, Frank Lampard, John Terry and Ashley Cole they needed to display the old Mourinho-esque resilience and hold their ground in the face of a United onslaught. In this they failed, in part, it should be said, because the second of United's penalties originated in that modern shadowland where referees display so much bafflement. As Danny Welbeck surged across the Chelsea area, Branislav Ivanovic extended a foot but shied away from a tackle only to find the United striker's boot catching his leg. Institutionalised confusion about what constitutes a penalty has become a huge factor in this thrilling title race. United's first penalty was less contentious, though still soft: a clumsy challenge on Patrice Evra by Daniel Sturridge. "The first one is obviously a penalty, the second one is dubious," Villas-Boas said. "I'm not sure if he [Howard Webb] is compensating for anything in the first half, but it's the wrong decision." Chelsea's young manager praised Ferguson's "attacking substitutions".