Chelsea's first defeat of the Champions League campaign probably won't deflect them from their path to the knock-out stages - but it may have done some serious damage to the psyche.
Luiz Felipe Scolari admitted he was a worried man after seeing the Blues ship three goals they might normally have been expected to prevent as they lost 3-1 to Roma at a sodden Stadio Olimpico.
To make matters worse, the Blues had Deco sent off late on when he picked up a ludicrous second yellow card for taking a free-kick too quickly.
It summed up a dreadful night for Chelsea, who were caught napping from a free-kick for the home side that Christian Panucci tucked away while unchallenged in the six-yard box.
And some ineffectual challenges allowed Mirko Vucinic to add two second half gaols as Roma gained revenge for a 1-0 defeat at Stamford Bridge a fortnight ago.
A late goal from John Terry did not mask a poor performance that will set a few alarm bells ringing for the boss. chelsea are simply not in the bahit of conceding so many soft goals.
"Roma have good players and when you make mistakes like we did today, they can kill you," Scolari said. "It was worrying to see the mistakes we made tonight. We'll have to think about the next game and work out why this happened.
"Maybe we need to be more relaxed in future and realise that at 1-0, the game isn't finished. We gave the ball away too easily, made the wrong passes and too many mistakes."
Scolari added; "The group is still in our hands, even if the other teams are arriving at our backs. We need to reach 10 points and if we win our next game [Bordeaux away], we are there."
