Pressure does funny things to people, even people who don't usually do funny things. After watching his team lose to Arsenal on Sunday, Chelsea manager Luiz "Big Phil" Scolari treated the Sky TV cameras to a halting and altogether uncharacteristic tirade, climaxing with a demand that the match referee "say sorry" to him personally.
This may be species-appropriate behaviour for the average football manager. But from Big Phil it seems oddly jarring - and revealing. Global football's swaggering Gaucho cowboy, Scolari is one of a rare breed of uber-managers who surf the see-sawing international football currency markets, settling where they choose. He remains aristocratically eccentric. He turned down a £3m salary to manage England because he didn't like the way he'd been asked. As Portugal manager he punched a Serbian player in the throat during a Euro 2008 qualifier. And got away with it. This is what Big Phil is all about.
In fact, Scolari's new uncertainty is the thin end of a more troubling wedge. This is a credit crunch story. In football terms, the wobbling of Big Phil might one day prove to be up there with the collapse of Woolies and the pound as an indication that things are decisively not what they used to be. Scolari likes to say "a team is just like a company". Unfortunately his company is heading unerringly into the red.
Chelsea's billionaire owner Roman Abramovich has been hit significantly by the financial collapse. Already the cash has ceased to slosh. Chelsea scouts have been sacked. Plans to develop a Chelsea nightclub have been scrapped. There are even stories that the club might charge its cosseted stars for meals at the training ground (described by one player as "a crappy sandwich and a cup of tea").
For five years Chelsea's fossil-fuelled football juggernaut seemed unstoppable, the sporting arm of some rogue international billionaire overclass. Scolari's unhappy rant points to a new uncertainty. This is not what he signed up for in June. He has no money to spend. He feels confused and let down. He wants an apology. Welcome to Britain, Big Phil.
