Euro fight beckons for gladiator Terry

So when their leader, last seen on a stretcher with his forearm draped across his agonised face, emerged from the tunnel for the end-of-season thank yous, one arm in a sling and the other cradling one of his toddler twins, the eruption of cheers seemed to signal that a decent enough period of mourning for a lost title had been served. Er, approximately 30 minutes.

"Elbow's not broken . . . I'm going to be okay," JT soothed his disciples over the microphone, and at a stroke you could feel the mood of the place finally reflecting the glorious weather.

"I know we've lost out on the League but we've got the biggest trophy of all now. We're gonna go over to Moscow and bring it home for the Chelsea fans."

A few sentences and the re-entry of their favourite gladiator; it didn't take much for the Blues to cast aside the blues. Even a smiling Avram Grant was doing the most unlikely showman's walkabout among the fans.

So it didn't matter that a couple of hundred miles north Sir Alex Ferguson, Premier League trophy clasped to his chest for an unreal 10th time, was busy reminding everyone about United's fresh psychological advantage - "We're bouncing into the final," he beamed - because Terry was already doing his best to make the domestic bauble sound as if it meant nothing next to the true big one. It was a rip-roaring exhortation which made you think just how critical the best captain in English football will once again be to the historic cause in Moscow.

For while there's an argument to suggest Terry has never been quite the same player since being knocked unconscious in last season's Carling Cup Final, there is still no one to touch him as Chelsea's greatest motivating force.

In a way, his repeated never-say-die responses to his injury woes this season reflect the courage of his team. Yesterday'sdislocated elbow was his sixth injury of the campaign, following a broken toe in pre-season, a damaged knee, a smashed cheekbone, a further knee problem which required surgery and then the broken foot which sidelined him for nearly two months mid-season.

Yet it's that seeming indestructibility which helps make him such a potent symbol for Chelsea. When after 10 minutes, he crashed heavily following an aerial collision with Petr Cech, his immediate reaction, as he banged the turf in frustration, suggested he feared his season was over.

The subsequent rumours of a broken collarbone persuaded everyone else to believe it too. Fortunately, those rumours proved as accurate as the ones started in the Shed End - twice - by fans cheering wildly about phantom Wigan goals at the JJB. "It's just a dislocation [of the left elbow]. They popped it back in the ambulance on the way to hospital. Three, four days' rest and I should be OK for Moscow," he shrugged.

That's JT. Football's answer to Monty Python's Black Knight; chop his arm off and you still wouldn't be able to persuade him he couldn't possibly be fit to do battle in the biggest footballing battle of his life.Which is why Grant was today still offering caution about his return since he can recognise a man who's sometimes too brave for his own good.

Of course, when Terry was out with his broken foot, Chelsea's season didn't collapse, firstly because Ricardo Carvalho was so superb and also because Alex proved such a good stand-in.

Yet the return of the Carvalho-Terry axis since February was the foundation of their late-season charge and without either yesterday - Carvalho was sidelined with a back injury - Chelsea became unconvincing at the back, twice nearly conceding an equaliser before a combination of the news of Ryan Giggs's decider for United at Wigan and the resultant absent-mindedness of Chelsea's defending finally let in Matt Taylor.

So add Taylor's name to those of Everton's Tim Cahill, Aston Villa's Gareth Barry, Tottenham's Robbie Keane and Wigan's Emile Heskey. This quintet were Chelsea's killers, all scoring equalisers in the last five minutes of games which should have been easily wrapped up.

Four of those games, in which eight points were squandered, were at Stamford Bridge. So the team which the previous season so often rescued points in the dying seconds had now paid the price for throwing them away in 2007-08.

Only when Andriy Shevchenko had put them ahead had it ever felt as if something insane could possibly happen, like the prospect of Roman's favourite underachiever being the one to win the title for his master - perhaps Sheva is saving that one for Moscow - but, actually, Chelsea had all afternoon resembled a team who had never quite believed in the unbelievable.

Perhaps that was because JT was out the picture for most of it. He would have believed to the end and he would have raged against that late sloppiness which prevented Chelsea from being able to make the proud boast that this United side, rated by Fergie as potentially his best ever, had still only been able to pip them to the title on goal difference.

Instead, he had to watch on the dressing room TV as United lifted the title and you could imagine him muttering to himself, just as he told everyone later: "Moscow will be different". It will have to be; Chelsea can't afford to be without their natural-born leader again.