Team ethic key to Villas-Boas' plan at Chelsea

New Chelsea manager Andre Villas-Boas accepts comparisons with his former boss Jose Mourinho are inevitable, but has told fans his regime will be no "one-man show".

Villas-Boas worked under Mourinho during his Chelsea reign and followed the same route to Stamford Bridge by guiding Porto to both domestic and European success.

But, while Mourinho arrived at Chelsea declaring himself "The Special One", 33-year-old Villas-Boas has vowed to focus on fostering a team ethic at the club who paid a reported release fee of 13.3million for him.

"The main important thing that people have to reflect on is that I don't see the game as a one-man show, I see the game as the getting together of ideas and collective ideas and good players," he told www.chelseafc.com.

"Chelsea appointed me basically for human qualities and that is what I want to bring into this club again. The most important thing is to motivate the players to get their ambitions right, to reflect again on what the club has achieved in the last six years and we need to keep this route to success.

"We are a technical staff that focuses a lot on unlocking potential. We are a technical staff that incentivises a lot of freedom of choice because, in the end, when the players are on the pitch, they face different situations that they have to solve without the help of their manager. This is the kind of stimulus that we want the players to have, responsibility and making decisions, because in the end the game is decided by them on the pitch.

"It is a clashing together of two good organisations and in the end it is the relationship between all of our players that can lead us to success, and that is what I want to work on."

Despite his relative youth - Villas-Boas will be the youngster top-flight manager next term by four years and is the same age as both Didier Drogba and Frank Lampard - his experience at Chelsea and a CV which includes a hat-trick of trophies last season, marked him out as the standout candidate to replace Carlo Ancelotti. Nevertheless, he is well prepared for the inevitable mentions of Mourinho's name.

"Coaching was not a kind of obsession (for me) and neither did I use Jose as the way to arrive into this path, it was something that happened naturally," he said. "I think there is no way you can avoid comparison, it is something that is the interest of the media. I didn't take the Porto job nor the Chelsea job because Jose made the same steps.

"They are two of the most sought-after clubs in the world and in the end I had the opportunity and was able to make them find something in me that they thought would continue their route to success."Villas-Boas comes to the club after the departure of Ancelotti, for whom two trophies in his maiden season were not enough to save him from the axe after a barren 2010/11 campaign. As such, the new manager is aware of the expectations which will surround him in west London and is ready to meet them.

"Chelsea is a club that in the last six years has achieved so much and people are expecting us to be the same way," he said.

"There is not going to be more or less tolerance for me if I am not successful so this is the challenge I face and I feel confident that we can motivate everybody, not only the players but also the structure. I feel confident I can respond to the ambitions of the supporters and the ambitions of the owner and the administration."

Chelsea confirmed that Villas-Boas is due to begin work immediately on a three-year contract worth in the region of 4.4million a year. "Andre was the outstanding candidate for the job. He is one of the most talented young managers in football today and has already achieved much in a relatively short space of time," a club statement read.

"His ambition, drive and determination matches that of Chelsea and we are confident Andre's leadership of the team will result in greater successes in major domestic and European competitions."

On paper Villas-Boas inherits a squad that should not be too far away from mounting a strong European challenge but, beneath the glossy exterior, the plasterwork is anything but sound.

His first and most important task is to find a way of rejuvenating Fernando Torres so the Spaniard resembles the world-beating striker they thought they were getting when they paid Liverpool 50 million for him rather than the surly, out-of-sorts benchwarmer they ended up with.

Ancelotti tried everything he could think of to accommodate Torres while trying not to upset the egos of Didier Drogba and Nicolas Anelka but none of his combinations produced the sort of effective attack that such a strike force should have done.

Villas-Boas is likely to try to persuade Colombia striker Radamel Falcao to follow him from Porto after his prolific season, though his arrival could trigger the departure of either Drogba or Anelka.The tougher challenge for the new coach is to rebuild the team's midfield, or at least remodel its safety-first approach, which looked sluggish even by Premier League standards last season and was light years behind the pace and verve shown by European champions Barcelona.

Frank Lampard never really regained his best form last term after a long injury absence and the England midfielder, only a few months younger than his new boss, needs to impose himself again if he is to avoid the unthinkable of losing his place.

Michael Essien was similarly out-of-sorts and, with John Obi Mikel's limitations exposed when his senior partners stopped delivering, Porto's Joao Moutinho could be a timely addition.

Florent Malouda started last season well but faded badly while Salomon Kalou has failed to kick on into the sort of player Mourinho always promised he would be. Radical surgery is needed though if Villas-Boas is to deliver the Champions League to his new employer and have any chance of still being in the job in 2014.

Former Chelsea striker Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink has appealed for the new manager to be allowed to be his own man.

The Dutchman said: "Yes, everybody is going to look at him and say, 'You have learned it (from Mourinho]' or 'You are the same as Mourinho', and he is going to be the example.

"But I don't think that's fair on him. It is only more pressure because everybody is going to compare him to Mourinho.

"Yes, he is only 33, but I think we should look at him just as a man on his own, a different manager - yes from Portugal, but a different individual, and just give him a chance to succeed."