Mourinho's side go into Sunday's opener against Birmingham at Stamford Bridge with a lengthy injury list, but the Blues manager is refusing to feel sorry for himself and wants his players to follow suit.

John Terry, Michael Ballack and Wayne Bridge are definitely out, while Didier Drogba is a major doubt and Claude Makelele, Petr Cech, Paulo Ferreira and Andriy Shevchenko are carrying knocks.

Losing so many key players before a ball has even been kicked would cripple morale at most clubs.

But such negativity doesn't even enter Mouinho's mind and he believes the situation has presented an opportunity to show Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal that nothing can halt Chelsea this season.

"In the Community Shield we played the first half without a single striker and had two kids and two keepers on the bench," Mourinho said.

"We didn't cry. We faced the situation and tried to organise the team the best we can and we played very well. So the natural tendency of things is to improve the situation.

"We have players out but that's football. It's better now than in the middle of the season or the end of the season when everything is crucial.

"The situation is better now than it was last weekend. I have two or three more players than I had for the previous weekend, the situation is better and the tendency is to improve."

Mourinho finds himself in the unusual position of being dwarfed by United and Liverpool's spending in the transfer market. The London club's 13 million pounds purchase of Lyon winger Florent Malouda was their only cash deal this close season, while their rivals splashed out more than 40 million pounds each.

Even Fulham and Portsmouth spent more than Chelsea, but Mourinho is not concerned.

"I don't like to speak about money," he said. "I wasn't speaking when Chelsea were one of the top spenders in the transfer list.

"They spent what they spent and if they did it that's because they have the money. That's not my problem."

Mourinho is confident Frank Lampard's decision to postpone contract talks until the end of the season will not be a problem, but he did hint that Arjen Robben could be on his way to Real Madrid.

The Spanish club have made several offers for the winger and will get their man if they match Chelsea's 25 million pounds asking price.

"Until the 31 August everything is possible in terms of people to come and people to go," Mourinho said. "I think the situation has a lot of speculation behind it but of course also some truth. And we have to wait a bit more to see."

Steve Bruce has given newly promoted Birmingham an injection of young blood by signing several promising talents including Fabrice Muamba, Liam Ridgewell and Daniel De Ridder.

City winger Gary McSheffrey believes the presence of so many players hungry to make their mark on the Premiership will give them a fighting chance of staying up.

"The manager made it clear when Birmingham went down two seasons ago that there were too many older players who were here for a pay day," he said.

"He then looked to sign a different player, a hungrier type of player and it paid off with us getting promotion.

"He has made good signings and a similar type of signings to before, in the sense that they are people who will work for the shirt.

"There is a good bit of banter about the squad, a good team spirit."