Soccer: In his smart charcoal top-coat, crisp white shirt and tie, Claudio Ranieri looked dressed for a day in court. And as his team struggled to hold on to their hard-earned lead over the champions, the Italian enlivened the second half with a display of touchline gestures as persuasively eloquent as the words of the greatest advocate.

They had the desired result, and the judge and jury - Roman Abramovich and the 400 members of his personal nomenklatura flown in for this potentially pivotal fixture - will have gone home convinced that the new Chelsea can win the Premiership at the first time of asking.

Ranieri, of course, was making no such claims. Had this been the return fixture at Old Trafford, the penultimate league match of the season, he said, he might have been tempted. But an inability to keep possession and kill the match had convinced him that his players are not yet on the level of Manchester United or Arsenal, both of whom are looking up at Chelsea this morning.

For Abramovich, this will have been an enjoyable end to a difficult week. On Friday it was announced that Sibneft, his oil company, had postponed a planned merger with Yukos, an even bigger Russian oil producer. The deal would have created a company worth $45 billion. Thanks to the delay, shares in both companies have fallen to the extent that the merged company would now be worth only $30 billion. Abramovich's personal fortune must have taken a matching hit, at least on paper.

Those wondering why they are reading this information on the front page of the sports section rather than on the business pages should pause to consider that Chelsea are sitting on top of the table this morning only by virtue of their owner's wealth. When he arrived in west London in the summer, the effect was dazzling. But recent events in Russia, in particular the arrest of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, Yukos's former chief executive, on charges of fraud and tax evasion, suggest that an assumption of permanent stability might be dangerous. And they make it clear that, to Abramovich, yesterday's battle had about as much significance as a €5 bet on a horse to the rest of us.

But there was much to admire about Chelsea, not least the way they handled the appearance of their guests, Clive Woodward and Lawrence Dallaglio, who took a well-received lap of honour before the kick-off and were congratulated by Ranieri and his players, who lined up to shake their hands. From United's players there came not a flicker of recognition, at least in public.

Another guest, this time unannounced, was Massimo Moretti, the general manager of Internazionale, whose presence was assumed to have been in connection with the possible arrival of Christian Vieri at Stamford Bridge. The centre-forward has fallen out with the Milanese club and did not appear in Inter's 3-1 defeat of Juventus on Saturday, a result even more remarkable coming four days after they had gone down 5-1 at home to Arsenal in the Champions League - with Vieri leading the attack.

You would hardly expect Chelsea to be in need of any more forwards. But there can be little doubt Vieri's strength and directness would make him a sensation in the Premiership, whatever the cost.

As it happened, Hernan Crespo and Adrian Mutu had a relatively unspectacular time yesterday. On paper a highly complementary blend of power and mobility, they showed little sign of developing an understanding and made few openings, although Crespo's shrewd pass to Joe Cole lured Roy Keane into conceding the decisive penalty.

Where Chelsea truly impressed was in defence. John Terry and William Gallas, shielded by Claude Makelele, looked utterly determined to achieve the team's sixth clean sheet in succession, and neither Ruud van Nistelrooy nor Diego Forlan was able to expose Terry's lack of pace.

After Saturday's horrific accident at Molineux, this was one live-on-Sky match not to be preceded by the bang and whoosh of ceremonial skyrockets. And if the game itself was slow to ignite, the weight of its significance was always apparent. The hard months of the season are yet to come, but both managers will have gone home knowing that Chelsea's challenge is unlikely to fizzle out or fly off at a tangent.

Ranieri, however, will probably be keeping an unusually close eye on the Russian stock market in the coming weeks.