LIFE at Stamford Bridge is fun again.

Last season, I'd almost given up on press conferences because they always ran to the same pattern. Avram Grant would slink into the room and sit in front of us like a surly schoolboy with no intention of telling who smashed that window in the greenhouse.

Increasingly frustrated questions would be delivered in vain and, after five minutes of slightly deluded and begrudging rumbles later, he'd slink back out again, leaving us all with empty notepads.

Not so Luiz Felipe Scolari.

The new Brazilian boss bounds into the room like Errol Flynn, sword drawn and ready for battle.

'You must be a bit disappointed with that, Luiz?' says the first journalist up to challenge him in combat.

'Why?' asks Scolari defiantly.

'Well...erm...' stutters the poor writer, unaccustomed to having the spotlight flicked back on him.

'Well, you didn't...erm...play well.'

'Yes, we did,' argues Scolari. 'For me, we played well.'

End of discussion.

Like Roy Keane at Sunderland, Scolari doesn't do journalists. For him, they are merely distractions that have to be swatted away like wasps at a picnic.

Some managers get bamboozled, some get frustrated, but Scolari just takes them on at their own game.

'You know what I know?' he said in response to repeated questions about Robinho.

'Nothing. I know nothing. You want to know about Robinho, you ask Peter Kenyon. Peter Kenyon is the boss.'

End of discussion.

Throughout his 10 minutes on the spot, he didn't lose his temper once and played a perfect game.

Blame

He deflected blame by praising the abilities of a Tottenham side that had created just a single shot on goal, he dropped in a small, but noticable reference to the injuries that had limited his side's capabilities and he even managed to chastise his players for their over-reliance on the long-ball in the dying stages of the game.

Scolari arrived in England, apparently unable to converse in English, but he must have had quite a tutor.

Juande Ramos, who joined Tottenham almost a year ago, is still using his translator.

This, it seems, is the mark of the man.

While others duck and hide, Scolari faces challenges head-on.

End of discussion.