You've got to hand it to Jose Mourinho - actually you haven't.

Masking the shortcomings of his tiring team, shrinking squad and non-existent domestic youth policy by a tiresome "woe is me" routine may have reduced some media outlets to gibbering idiots.

However it'll take more than an orgy of eyebrow-arching and duplicitous waffle from Sir Bobby Robson's former interpreter to convince hardened cynics that he was engaged in anything other than some amateur sleight-of-hand trickery.

Of course he's right - at least in the pro-Old Trafford bit - but to claim a penalty for the ball that struck Carr early on in this game was grossly misleading.

And while he successfully diverts attention from the issues of his own side and his own future, he may care to reflect on the antics of his players, which hardly engender support among the neutrals.

(A pox on your "mind games" anyway - it was a rotten album, certainly not one of Lennon's best)

That's not to say that we've suddenly become disciples of Bobby Charlton - frankly we'd like them both to lose the title, if that were possible.

Today was a classic exposition of paper-hattery from the Champions - who looked like we did last week - knackered. But we took a point off them - that's all - and moved one game nearer to the end of this season.

Like the Arsenal and Man United draws, these are little victories. 

Yes, there's a measure of satisfaction in some reward for a job and it was to our credit, rather than Chelsea's detriment that we held the current Champions who had every incentive to win.

And Kieron Dyer and substitute Andy Carroll both had second half chances to claim all three points.

But, our opponents walked off the field knowing that they still have a chance of adding the title, the Champions League and the FA Cup to the League Cup in their trophy cabinet. 

Newcastle by contrast will require a freak combination of plagues, civil wars and Far Eastern betting syndicate activity if we're to feature in the Intertoto Cup. All because there have been too few performances like this.

A point for us was a start, but still little more than crumbs from the top table - and if we then revert back to type and revisit the tripe we saw at Fratton next Monday then what have we achieved?

Neither 'keeper was over-worked, with Harper less under pressure overall. Owen or Ameobi (who has stuck it to these lot here before) could have been the crucial difference - but we could have written that after Birmingham City - or Alkmaar.

Praise is deserved for some committed performances - but for every Milner, Butt and Taylor there was an Emre, getting excited but forgetting to pass the ball - or Dyer, who couldn't have grumbled if he'd been relieved of his post for the second half.

This draw saw Glenn Roeder complete an unbeaten home run this season against the current top four sides in the league - Man U, Chelsea, Liverpool & Arsenal (actually top five, but mentioning Everton hardly boosts our self-esteem....) 

The obvious question is to ask why his charges can respond to whatever motivational or tactical pep talks he gives them before these "big games", but fail to perform against more mediocre opponents.

Taking a look in the mirror - or the league table - might be a start, as we more closely resemble the Middlesbroughs and Man Citys of this world, not the Kings Road Galacticos.

It's tempting to write that those who played well today were doing so for selfish reasons - contracts, transfers, international callups, old alliances, whatever. 

Refreshingly though, it did look as if we genuinely threw ourselves into this game for no other reason than we wanted to play and succeed - a fact noted and appreciated by the home crowd, who witnessed some all too rare commitment in a black and white shirt (on and off the field).

Up the road he may be and today giving the crowd an early taste of his own spatial difficulties, but there's something glorious about seeing Titus Bramble wholeheartedly throwing himself into a collision with an opponent - the football equivalent of a demolition derby.

Today's unwilling recipient was that expensive German Chelsea bought, who in the words of Corporal Jones certainly didn't like it up him, or round his Siegfried Line - more than one wag commenting that it was nice to see Titus drop a Ballack rather than a bollock....

There looked nothing illegal about the challenge - although Jose and his pussycats would doubtless have made that the centrepiece of their moanfest had the handball line not presented itself.  

Nicky Butt's comments about the players getting together to exchange some home truths before this game were interesting in that we've now counted four instances of this group therapy in little over a month - after Alkmaar away, Charlton away, Man City at home and Pompey away.

And despite having more meetings than the Women's Institute, we still only went on to win one of the following four games (and drew two).

It would be nice to think that we could attain some consistency against Reading, Blackburn and Watford - with or without returning strikers. Not for any great reason - just to prove we could do it.

An enjoyable enough game then in comparison with much of what we've seen in 2007, but the account is still a long, long way from being settled and many of these Dandys in stripes owe us as much as the missing Owen does. It's not just the players who suffered from a post Alkmaar hangover.

As to whether this was enough to deter the malcontents from carrying out threats heard all over the region to hoy their renewals in the bin, only time will tell. 

Frankly we're not much bothered if people want to flounce off to push trolleys round Tesco's in their new home shirts instead of turning out every week. They may be the sensible ones, but we'll just stay daft thanks.  

However it would certainly be unwise at this stage to plan a grand post-Blackburn parade - there might be more turn up here to see that gravel-throated Jock than are still within sight of the SJP pitch at 5pm on Saturday week.

Biffa

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