Tension: how John Terry's teammates react to the scandal will shape Chelsea's season

Carlo Ancelotti has had his hair cut. Well, it's a good idea to get it done, isn't it, if you're going to be in the public eye a little more these next few days and weeks. It makes sense, if not for your own vanity, then to show that this whole John Terry affair – the aftermath that is, not the shenanigans themselves – is not causing you undue worry. In these strange and interesting times, although more strange than interesting if the truth be told, image is important. If Ancelotti had walked into the media room at Chelsea's training ground on Friday afternoon with four days stubble across his face, a vein throbbing on his temple and a pair of bloodshot eyes, it would have been inferred that he was struggling to cope with the increased focus that has been put on the club over the past seven days. But his neatly trimmed short, back and sides shows that he, at least, is getting by just fine. The seismic fall-out from the Terry scandal hasn't yet bothered the Chelsea manager.


The Italian has, though, found all this interest in his captain's private life a little perplexing. As he walks into the full-to-capacity media room, his eyebrows – both of them, not just the one over his left eye – arch upwards in recognition of the numbers present. "Why is it so busy?" he asks in feigned wonder. But there is nothing pretend about his shock at how events have unfurled these past few days. "It was a surprise for me," he says. "To see interest about the private life from the English press, to see cameras and paparazzi, helicopters flying over the training ground. In Italy, there would not be such a fuss."


He is asked why that is the case, why would Italians not be interested, and a journalist from his native land responds on his behalf: "Because the press would not publish such a story."


"What about Silvio Berlusconi?" comes the instant response from an English counterpart.


"That is politics," says the Italian journalist a little incredulously. "This is sport."


At the very same time as Ancelotti was patiently batting away question after question about his captain – insisting that so long as he did his stuff on the training ground, he had no interest in the player's private life – Terry was meeting Fabio Capello face-to-face at Wembley Stadium. Before he went in, the centre-half must have been expecting the England manager's views to mirror those of Ancelotti, and every other Italian native who has commented on the issue. Like the man from Corriere della Sera during the week who wrote: "Terry is just a footballer, not a priest." Or the attitude of Ireland's assistant coach Marco Tardelli back in 2001 when, as manager of Inter Milan, five of his players were caught out on the town with prostitutes. "They were so stupid," said Tardelli, when asked about the revelations on Italian television. "They got caught."


It must, then, have come as something of a surprise for Terry to discover in the space of 12 minutes that Capello wasn't as Italian as he thought. But you can understand the manager's action. More so than anything else, he has built his reputation as England boss on discipline. Mobile phones have been banned from the team hotel, dress codes are now strictly enforced at all times and all players must eat together in the dining room. Take away that head-masterly quality from Capello's repertoire and he would have no unique selling point as England manager. If he didn't strip Terry of the captaincy he would have had no right to scold a player for being late, or for wearing flip-flops. In a selfish way, he had no option.


So English national crisis averted – for this week anyway – now the problem is all Chelsea's. From the very start of the revelations about Terry's affair with Vanessa Perroncel, Wayne Bridge's ex-partner, the club have stood firm behind their captain. In truth, had they taken any other stance, it would have gone against the culture of the club under Roman Abramovich. Since 2003, Chelsea have been run in a morally questionable way, using money and all the power that accompanies it to attain whatever success has been achieved. It is most definitely not a football club with a conscience. If it were, it would not have tapped up Ashley Cole at Arsenal, Gael Kakuta at Lens and a whole list of others, or allow its players to escape unpunished having verbally and physically intimated match officials in full view of the watching world. A sexual liaison such as Terry's probably comes as a welcome break for Abramovich in terms of moral dilemmas. Man sleeps with women who is not his wife: you can just picture the club's Russian owner scoffing at such a non-issue.


But maybe, just maybe, Abramovich and Ancelotti are missing a trick. The recent history of the club, particularly post-Mourinho, has been an admirable example of how a group of dedicated and stubborn individuals have continued to keep Chelsea somewhere near the top of the English game without proper management. Central to this, if indeed not all of it, has been the leadership of Terry who, if you believe word that has leaked out of Stamford Bridge during the reigns of Avram Grant and Luis Felipe Scolari, compensated for the inadequacies of both men by urging those around him to work even harder for the cause, to forget about what was going wrong on the training ground during the week and instead work harder on the pitch on matchday to ensure the club remained genuine contenders.


It has represented a triumph of unity over ego, of the team over the individual. And it has only come about because of what Terry represents as captain. As a footballer, pure and simple, he is probably over-rated, a decent centre-half with many flaws. But his unique selling point is that he's a man's man, a no-nonsense player who would go through you to win a ball, sure, but afterwards he'd pick you up off the ground and make sure you were alright. After the Chelsea and Barcelona Champions League battle at Stamford Bridge last year, Terry marched into the visiting changing room after the tempestuous end-game and shook hands with each and every one of his opponents. On his way out, Barcelona's players sang his name in tribute to his character. What you see with Terry is what you get.


Well, until now. As a man's man, he would get away with most behaviour in the eyes of his teammates, you know, the kind of testosterone fuelled high-jinks that broader society would find unacceptable. But in getting involved with his friend's ex-girlfriend, Terry has breached an important code in the world of man: don't sleep with your mate's ex. Looking in from the outside, it may not seem that big an issue, certainly no more wrong than having an affair in the first place, but in a team environment Terry's actions have the potential to cause major problems. A joke doing the rounds this week tells of Ashley Cole being stopped by a policeman for speeding and asked why he was doing 100mph? "Because John Terry's car is parked outside my house," is his reply and while it is a joke, there just might be a nugget of a worry in there among Terry's teammates.


And if there is a little worry, the tiniest of doubts about his character and integrity, will his teammates be so inclined to follow his lead in future? "What we think about John, we thought about John last week," says Ancelotti. "We thought the same of him this week, the same next week. There is no change in what we think about him, for me and for his teammates." This week perhaps Ancelotti is right. In times of crisis, close teams – and Chelsea do appear a particularly tight bunch – tend to back each other up as a matter of reflex. But a few weeks or months down the line, their attitude might be different.


He will be reeling from Capello's judgement. But the judgment of his teammates has the potential to be ever more damning.


For both himself and the club.