Manchester United Chasing Chelsea's Consistency in Bid to Be Title Contenders

Sunday at Old Trafford won't be the time for Manchester United fans to appreciate what Jose Mourinho has achieved at Chelsea this season. The rivalry is too fierce for that.

But after the final whistle, when the hatred has had time to dissipate just a little bit, there might be a quiet acceptance that Chelsea represent the level United need to reach under Louis van Gaal.

Like Van Gaal, Mourinho spent heavily in the summer. He brought Diego Costa, Cesc Fabregas and Filipe Luis to Stamford Bridge, while also choosing Thibaut Courtois to be his No. 1 at the expense of Petr Cech.

These are significant changes. But after 12 games of the new season, they've won 10, drawn two and lost none.

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They're top of the Premier League by five points having scored more goals than anyone else. They're top of their Champions League group too, and through to the fourth round of the Capital One Cup. As starts to the season go, it's been very smooth.

United's has been anything but. There's a new manager at Old Trafford and six new players at a cost of £155 million. 

Rio Ferdinand, Nemanja Vidic and Patrice Evra, three of their most experienced players, have gone. So too have Danny Welbeck, Tom Cleverley, Shinji Kagawa and Javier Hernandez.

Chelsea have been consistent and relentless. United, meanwhile, are still finding their feet, capable of brilliant attacking football and atrocious defending at the same time.

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Mourinho has, of course, had an advantage. He's already had a season with a majority of his players. 

Fabregas, one of his key summer signings, already had experience in the Premier League. It's helped Chelsea hit the ground running, despite early games at Everton, Manchester City and at home against Arsenal.

Chelsea will head to Old Trafford on Sunday as favourites, not because they've got better individual players, but because they've gelled into a team. It's something United are still aspiring to.

Van Gaal will perhaps feel he would be further on with the development of his new team if the season hadn't already been disrupted by injury and suspension.

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He spent the entire pre-season, two training sessions a day and six games, working on a 3-5-2, only to revert back to a four-man defence after four games.

It's difficult to get consistent results when you haven't got the luxury of picking the same players every week. It's late October, and he's still waiting to select a team from a fully fit squad.

It's taken Mourinho a year to turn Chelsea into genuine title challengers. They had some good results last season, especially in the big games. But they couldn't do it consistently enough to get near Manchester City and Liverpool.

This season, though, they're the team to beat. It's a level United and Van Gaal should be aiming for, although this weekend won't be the time to admit it.