"Chelsea didn't deserve to win the Champions League, they just parked the bus."

Chances are, if you have spent any period of time in the footballing corner of Twitter, you've seen criticisms of teams parking the proverbial bus. More often than not, it was most likely about Chelsea. But with the Blues rumbling on to Premier League triumph and the Football League's tightest defences all vying for automatic promotion, why is supposedly 'negative' football so lambasted up and down the nation's virtual terraces?

The simple answer is that it stops balls from hitting the back of the net and, in the modern game, this is a problem for an increasingly youthful fanbase. In a world of endlessly-repeating Vines, GIFs and videos of goals, many fans seem to be moving towards a highlight-based game. A 0-0 draw is deemed 'not worth watching', shoved to the back end of Match of the Day and condemned to half a column in Monday morning's newspaper with the word 'drab' appearing somewhere in the topic sentence.

Don't get me wrong, there are dull games - Nigeria - Iran at the 2014 World Cup was arguably one of the most tepid encounters of any sport at international level in recent memory, its eventual goalless scoreline reflecting an utter lack of quality rather than any defensive masterclass.

However, the point remains that Iran went into the game with a plan and executed it almost to perfection. Had Charlton forward Reza Ghoochannejad finished off a smart counter-attack with a fitting finish, Carlos Queiroz' men would have pulled off one of the more remarkable smash-and-grab victories of the entire tournament. Yet they were derided and mocked - apparently, Nigeria's plan of charging forward seemingly at random was in some way superior to Iran's method of defending with discipline and composure, taking a point on the world stage against considerably more illustrious opponents.

To return to the previous example of Chelsea, their safety-first approach can seemingly do no right, whatever benefits it may reap. Whatever the white knights of the footballing world standing by their tiki-taka and end-to-end thrillers may claim, it is impossible to fluke a Champions League title. Roberto di Matteo's unpopular victors rode a Barcelona storm before striking twice on the break, drawing the second leg with little over a quarter of ball possession. Put another way, they had the ball for a third of the amount of time Barça did, and scored just as many goals. The perfect away performance.

Similarly, in the 2013/14 season, few gave José Mourinho and co. too much of a chance as Liverpool, rising the crest of a wave with the SAS in full flow, seemed destined to glide to the Premier League title as the Stevie G Farewell Tour began. But Chelsea's organisation and steadfastness at the back stopped them in their tracks, 20-year-old debutant Tomáš Kalas looking like Beckenbauer as Suárez, Sturridge and Sterling were rendered impotent by good old-fashioned hard work and grit.

But after that game, after their recent win over Manchester United, and no doubt after they win the Premier League title, fans up and down the country cry foul at Chelsea's apparently immoral tactics.

"It's not fair," they grumble. "[Defeated team] played better, but Chelsea parked the bus." 

So what does "played better" actually mean? Had more possession, but ultimately did nothing with it? Looked prettier, returned home with no points and a marginally deteriorated goal difference? Certainly, it does not seem to mean that they won the game, took a step closer to the title, and did so in an utterly legitimate way.

Perhaps, looking at the issue in purely black and white terms, the dashing young forward will always be the hero and the bruising man mountain of a centre-half his pantomime villain; paid to ruin the fun, to kill the spectacle. But the fact remains that defending is an art form in itself, even if Brendan Rodgers claimed that it is "not difficult" having been given such a comprehensive lesson by Mourinho last season.

And it is an art form which goes largely unappreciated. Álvaro Morata's simple tap-in against Borussia Dortmund has amassed 60,000 views on YouTube. Mats Hummels' elegantly deadly tackle on the Spanish forward in the same game has not yet reached 1,500. Yet anybody who has observed both is left in no doubt which is the most skillful, the most outrageous, the most beautiful.

Perhaps it is just a jealousy thing, a pained response to a defeat somehow plucked from the glorious jaws of victory. After all, if your team enjoys 90% of the possession against an impregnable defence comprised of Baresi, Beckenbauer, Maldini and Moore, it would still be understandable to point the accusatory finger at Lady Luck, conspiring against you as always.

But try and keep in mind, as one team keeps the ball at the 30 yard mark, throws hopeful balls forward into the area and fires crosses over, under and through an exasperated centre-forward, the other is doing its job perfectly. Whether it entertains you is not the issue, nor is it any of their concern.

As the timeless American football coach Bear Bryant has oft been quoted, "Offence sells tickets; Defence wins championships."