Liverpool take on Chelsea on Sunday and whereas the passage of time may have transformed Stamford Bridge from a rusting shack into an arena more befitting its chic surrounds off the King’s Road, Kenny Dalglish has ostensibly remained the same.

It was in this corner of west London that he captured his first trophy as Liverpool player-manager over 25 years ago, scoring the only goal to beat Chelsea at its then-far-less-salubrious home and snatch the English championship back from rival Everton.

The old adage says that time waits for no man, and many a man’s greatest fear in life is the prospect of being left behind, bewildered and stranded in a world that spins the head and the senses and makes you feel seasick – like the character Brooks Hatlen does after leaving prison in ‘The Shawshank Redemption’.

Some expected a similar effect to take hold on Dalglish, and for one so recently stepped out of the managerial deep freeze, facing up to someone such as Andre Villas-Boas should be the ultimate terror.

The Portuguese is the mark of how much the game has changed since Dalglish left Anfield for the first time in February 1991, or indeed since he was dispatched by Newcastle United in late summer 1998.

That the two are from entirely different cultures is not simply informed by nationality. As the clinching of the 1986 title so eloquently defines, there was a blur between where the player ended and the coaching mastermind began.

Dalglish is the epitome of the organic ‘Anfield Boot Room’ culture, to which Villas-Boas represents the polar opposite. He may have passed through various strata of technical responsibility at Porto, but Villas-Boas’ rise is one of study, meticulous preparation, ambition and a clear plan.

On Saturday Norwich host Arsenal which Everton and Manchester City play Wolverhampton and Newcastle. Bolton travel West Brom, Sunderland play Fulham and Wigan take on Blackburn.

Manchester United travel to Swansea in the late kick-off.