Not losing top priority for Mourinho

Last updated at 07:56 14 September 2004

Jose Mourinho has admitted he will be content with a point from Chelsea's opening game of the Champions League against Paris St Germain tonight.

Chelsea have made an unbeaten start to their Premiership campaign, while PSG are yet to win after five games in the French league this season.

But Mourinho - who led Porto to the Champions League trophy last season - expects his opponents to find their form in Europe.

"If you start the group stage at home you have to win," said the Blues boss.

"If you start it away you have to get a point, that is usually crucial for the objective of getting through to the next phase, so if we can leave Paris with a point it is normally good in terms of helping to get through to the next stage.

"However, that is not how we think. We came here to play and with a victory in our minds - we didn't come here to play a defensive game.

"They might not be getting the best results in the French league but experience tells me that teams always perform better in the Champions League than in their own league and tonight they will be better than they have been in the other matches this season."

According to Mourinho, there is one basic difference between the Porto side he led to European glory and the Chelsea team with whom he is trying to repeat the feat - time spent together bonding as a unit.

One step at a time

"The main difference between my Porto and my Chelsea is that at Porto we were a group working together for many, many months," said Mourinho.

"We took it one step at a time, winning the UEFA Cup then arriving in the Champions League as a very, very solid and mature team.

"My Chelsea is a completely new team. Half of the players are new and the manager is new, and the time to train and improve the team is very limited.

"We have been together three months but really it is a month and a half because players have had international commitments, so we are not yet a final product.

"In a few weeks we could arrive at a very good level. We are a very solid, compact team, very difficult to beat, and I can imagine that over the course of the season not many teams will beat us because we are really solid.

"We have to improve but we are ready to face such a difficult Champions League group and arrive at the end of the six matches in December in the top two and go through to the next stage."

Wayne Bridge is set to return to the Chelsea team after being rested at Aston Villa on Saturday, while Damien Duff is poised for his first appearance of the season.