Jose Mourinho wouldn’t have it in the wake of Chelsea's 2-1 win at Aston Villa – but this might have been the day that he clinched his third Premier League title.

The Special One dismissed the idea that opening a seven-point gap over Manchester City made it a landmark result. And he didn’t encourage his Chelsea players to chuck shirts into the travelling fans or get involved in overexuberant celebrations.

“In another country I would say a seven-point lead is fantastic but in this country it is nothing,” said Mourinho “Every game is different, everything can happen.”

But when Branislav Ivanovic smashed home a stunning left-foot volley that killed a brave Aston Villa fightback while title rivals Manchester City were drawing at home to Hull it was hard not to see its significance.

Last time he was here Mourinho got his side to grind out their 2005 and 2006 championships. His full-backs were never encouraged to cross the halfway line.

But in this side the response after Jores Okore’s header had cancelled out Eden Hazard’s first-half goal was for Cesar Azpilicueta to work his way into the penalty area before crossing for the Serbian right-back to smash home his third Premier League goal of the season.

“Our second goal showed the ambition of my team to win a game,” said Mourinho.

“You see it when the left-back is in the box to cross and the right-back is in the box to score; when we are pressing hard all over the pitch not content to suffer a setback after they score.

“The last time I was here? When the right-back is Paulo Ferreira and the left-back is William Gallas then you don’t encourage them to do what they cannot do. You have to use the players’ qualities the best you can.”

Flying start: Hazard celebrates the opening goal (
Image:
Getty)

Mourinho certainly does that with this Chelsea side.

Villa Park holds bad memories for him – he was sacked weeks after losing there the last time he worked for Roman Abramovic. And there is little love lost between him and Villa boss Paul Lambert, so he started determined to go for the jugular.

Villa had barely got out of their own half before Hazard gave Chelsea the lead.

It began with Didier Drogba winning the ball and giving Oscar the chance to break. The Brazilian cut it inside for Willian to pick out Hazard at the far post and the Blegium winger stretched out a foot to stab home his 12th goal in all competitions this season.

And when Chelsea were stunned by conceding a goal, they simply picked themselves up with Willian twice firing inches wide before Ivanovic struck the winner.

Close-run thing: Mourinho's side managed to see off Villa (
Image:
Getty)

For Villa there were consolations – even if the defeat left them still looking down at the relegation zone.

It wasn’t just that they ended the longest goal drought in their Premier League history when Okore headed home three minutes after the break to end exactly 11 hours without a goal.

In 22-year-old Spaniard Carles Gil they look to have found a player with the magic and skill to provide some inspiration and invention that has been lacking since the likes of Ashley Young, James Milner and Stewart Downing were sold.

It was Gil who skipped brilliantly past Azpilicueta to cross to the far post where Danish defender Okore was left with the simplest of chances to score.

Lambert said: “There were a lot of good things that came out of that for us, and I was disappointed to lose it. We deserved more.

“We have a run of games now where if we play like that we will pick up more points.

“My message in the dressing room afterwards was that the players have set a standard for themselves and they have to stick to it.”

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