No Sepp we said it was rubbish, definitley not special

So the World Cup has drawn to a close with the trophy heading to sunny Spain for the first time. The final itself, however, followed an all too familiar pattern for big games at this tournament being as it was on the whole a completely tedious affair. Sepp Blatter’s conclusion of the tournament was that it will be remembered as “a special World Cup”. It should though be remembered dear reader that Sepp was never likely to slate this World Cup as he has made it his one ambition to take the tournament to Africa. It is with this in mind that we should treat Sepp’s conclusion with a pinch of salt and look to reach a sensible conclusion as to how the 2010 World Cup should be remembered.

Looking at the final firstly, this was a truly dreadful game played between a Spain side who got nowhere near to reaching the heights they obtained in Euro 2008 and a Netherlands side who gave a very good impression of the Wimbledon team of John Fashanu and Vinnie Jones rather than their total football fore-fathers. Spain emerged victorious after extra-time and their achievement of holding the European Championship and World Cup trophies simultaneously should be applauded. Having seen all of the games they have played, however, it was only in the semi-final against Germany that the Spanish came anywhere near to being a good watch. In fact most of their games have been downright boring, lest we forget their defeat to Switzerland and their very fortuitous victory over Paraguay. Therefore although they are probably rightly considered the best team in the world, the Spanish were certainly not the best team in this tournament. Despite of the Spanish shortcomings, the whole world outside of the Netherlands surely cheered their victory on Sunday evening. The Dutch are usually looked upon fondly by the football watching world by virtue of their great teams of the past including such luminaries as Cruyff, Gullit, Van Basten and Bergkamp. Their 2010 vintage though were a pale imitation of these teams of the past as they tried to simply kick the Spanish off the pitch rather than attempting to play any meaningful football of their own. The chief culprits were Mark van Bommel, who had been a constant fouler throughout the tournament, and his fellow defensive midfielder Nigel de Jong who tried to decapitate Xabi Alonso for which he was only booked. Upon the final whistle the Dutch had the cheek to moan incessantly at referee Howard Webb rather than accept the defeat in good grace. They should possibly remember that they were lucky to have got to half-time without having at least two players sent-off. So although it was the right result on the night, it should not be forgotten that it was a poor game that brought an end to a tournament full of poor games.

The build-up to this World Cup was lengthy and by the time the first game kicked-off the footballing world was at boiling point. This soon dissipated as the first games were on the whole tedious. We were told it would improve once teams realised they needed to win, but on the whole it did not and right throughout the football was a very poor imitation of what fans of European club football are used to seeing on a weekly basis. The notable exceptions to this were Chile, Argentina and Germany who were the only teams in the tournament who seemed to go into every game with the simple thesis of trying to score goals against the opposition – if only the likes of Portugal and the Netherlands had adopted a similar approach, we might have got the great tournament we expected. The upshot of these turgid games was that the global stars of club football failed to shine so the world did not get to see the best of Rooney, Ronaldo, Ribery and Kaka. The one stand-out game that bucked this trend was Slovakia v. Italy which was the game of the tournament by a considerable distance as it was a rare example of end-to-end drama and goals galore. Upon reflection therefore this tournament should be looked at as a poor example of the state of international football. The poor football was also played in front of stadiums that were never full which also suggests the South African public didn’t embrace the tournament to the extent that Mr. Blatter liked to think they would. All in all then I can’t help but feel short-changed from the last month and am now wondering if I will get so excited for the next World Cup in four years.

Recently Jose Mourinho argued that the Champions League final rather than the World Cup final is the biggest game in football and having seen the last World Cup, it is hard not to agree with him. Club football provides numerous talking points and at least two or three good games every week. As the season evolves club games become more and more important for all clubs and games become tense and usually dramatic to such an extent that they are remembered for years to come. When comparing Premier League and Champions League fixtures with the last months offerings from South Africa I’m afraid there is no comparison and with this in mind, you have to conclude that annoyingly once again Jose has hit the nail on the head. So enough doom and gloom, lets cheer the fact that club football returns with a vengeance in a few short weeks and we can forget the tedium of the last month.

So what can we conclude from all this dear reader in order for us not to consider the whole thing pointless. Well all I can say is that in the lead-up to the 2014 tournament, we should maybe treat all the hype with an element of caution and rather than presuming the World Cup will be a festival of good football, it should have to prove that it is first. Finally, I would like to reserve a special mention to the vuvuzelas that have dominated the sound-waves in recent times. I implore all football fans to ignore this fad at games in the coming season, as the great thing about football atmospheres is the way the crowd reacts to events which we simply didn’t get in South Africa as all we were treated to instead was the constant hum of the dreaded vuvuzela (at least Sepp seemed to like them I suppose).

Gareth Barry AKA The Disappearing Man

Well the new season is now just over six weeks away and it is with this in mind that clubs are now gearing up for another nine months on the roller-coaster. Clubs are now back in pre-season training and those with major issues to resolve are now looking to do just that. Of course in the Premier League, no-one has more outstanding issues than Liverpool Football Club. Having sacked the hapless Rafael Benitez, who guided the Reds to a dismal seventh, Liverpool are faced with trying to claw their way back up the table with a small transfer budget in the face of mega-spending from the likes of Spurs and Manchester City (more of which later). The thing Liverpool need in these changing and challenging times is a safe pair of hands and they seem to have found it in the shape of everyone’s favourite Mrs. Doubtfire lookalike, Roy Hodgson. Roy certainly seems to like a challenge having ditched the relative safety and serenity of Craven Cottage for the madness of Anfield. The first decision Hodgson will be faced with is whether to cash in on Gerrard and Torres in order to raise the funds needed to revitalise a fairly dreadful squad. Judging by their form in the World Cup it would seem pretty good business to cash in on these two for a combined £60 million. This would allow Hodgson to buy numerous players meaning Liverpool can ditch the hopeless remainder of their team – namely Kyrgiakos, Insua, Lucas, Babel and N’Gog. So don’t moan and get cross Liverpool if your golden duo are shipped out as it could eventually lead to you having a better team. Anyway in my opinion Roy is a good appointment for Liverpool especially compared to the joker that he is replacing, but he will certainly have his work cut out to reclaim a place in the top four, let alone challenge for the title.

One of the teams that Liverpool will be looking enviously at are everyone’s favourite moneybags Sheikh owned club – I talk ofcourse of silly Manchester City. As interest in the World Cup dwindles (especially after that nonsense on Sunday – more of which shortly), Manchester City are getting into full gear in terms of blowing the vast wealth of their owner. First through the Eastlands doors appears to be Spain and Valencia forward David Silva for a reputed £25 million. Silva has been a regular presence in the transfer gossip columns as he has been linked with all of the Premier League’s big guns since his very good performances at Euro 2008. In the end though, unsurprisingly, it was Manchester City who were able to stump up the cash to bring him to England. A quick word of warning to City though, Silva has hardly played for Spain at the World Cup as Torres (who has been rubbish by the way) has kept him out of the national team. City also look set to sign midfield enforcer Yaya Toure from Barcelona which certainly does look a good piece of business. This is in light of Gareth Barry’s feeble impression of a holding midfielder at the World Cup so Toure for Barry sounds like it will certainly strengthen the City midfield. By spending this money whilst the other big clubs look to tighten their belts, City should be disappointed if they don’t at least put in a good challenge for the title next season and they probably should be looking to win it.

You may have noticed dear reader that I have focused this piece on the domestic football issues and I can hear you screaming at your computer screens, enough of this, I need you to make sense of what happened at the World Cup. Well I can only apologise to you dear reader, I am still trying to comprehend how bad England were against the Germans. Before the tournament I predicted that Germany would emerge victorious and that Mesut Ozil would be a player to watch. I am pleased to say that these predictions look increasingly solid, but I thought that England would be bound to win their group and so play the Germans in the final. This didn’t happen due to two dreadful performances against Algeria and America. After a 1-0 win over the mighty Slovenia (national population of 2 million by the way) everyone seemed to paper over these cracks and looked forward to the second round match with their old foes with confidence (very misplaced confidence as it turned out). England were truly dreadful in the game and should have lost at least 8-2 as their defence made the Burnley back four look competent. Equally at fault for the numerous times the German attackers had time and space to do what they wanted with the ball was Gareth Barry who was nowhere near Ozil at any point in the game and seemed to completely disappear. Lampard and Gerrard did their usual under-performing at major tournament acts and Rooney and Defoe were handled with consummate ease by the German defence (so much for Rooney being top scorer at the tournament as numerous tipsters would have you believe before the event). I am not even going to discuss the goal that wasn’t given as that only serves to over-shadow the true incompetence of the England team. I am not going to blame Fabio Capello for this as we should remember he is Fabio Capello – one of the most successful managers in the world. Therefore if these stupid players can’t play for him, they won’t play for anyone. For England to be saved they need to ditch this hopeless generation in favour of the likes of Rodwell, Cahill, Wilshere, Agbonlahor and Hart. After all surely they can’t be any worse. Anyway in conclusion I am glad that England have been put out of their misery as their performances were just so depressing, it was effecting my enjoyment of the World Cup as a whole.

The prize for Germany (although you get the feeling that they will consider thrashing England as prize enough) is a mouth-watering tie with Argentina as the two best attacks of the tournament so far go head-to head in what should be a cracker. In any event I hope the winner of the goes on to win the tournament as these teams have played with pace and real attacking flair and skill. Spain and Brazil are the other favourites but neither have impressed me as yet, although Spain did well to beat a desperately depressing and defensive Portugal who seemed to forget that they have the world’s best attacker in their team. The other second round ties were actually a bit dull as Brazil easily overcame Chile, Paraguay bored Japan to penalties before winning, Ghana overcame America and Uruguay did for South Korea. The final quarter-finalists are the very un-Dutch Dutch who seem to have abandoned total football for functional (one could almost say rather boring) football.

Anyway I am getting my lederhosen and my Maradona mullet ready to cheer on the winners of that quarter-final all the way to victory and I recommend you do the same.

Raymond Domenech - possibly the funniest person in the world

After the tedium of the first week, I think it is safe to say that the World Cup has exploded into life as it moves from the group stages to the knock-out rounds. Teams have been faced with do or die games to get out of their groups and stay at the tournament and the result of this has been some very entertaining games – at last! Amazingly these games have seen both of the finalists from the 2006 tournament fall at the first, and both in amazing fashion. As for England they have scraped through after the tedium of Algeria they improved greatly to beat Slovenia and now face a Sunday lunch-time appointment with their old friends the Germans – the possible result of which could be a penalty shoot-out.

Without a shadow of doubt my team of the tournament has to be France who took going out in ridiculous fashion to new levels. First up they drew with Uruguay before losing comprehensively to Mexico and South Africa to end up bottom of their group. However, the games only tell half the story as their hilarious coach continued to pick bizarre teams that included the likes of Sydney Govou whilst Samir Nasri was not even deemed good enough for the squad. As the games went on it became increasingly apparent that the French players didn’t care much for their coach and in the second game Nicolas Anelka went as far to tell him so; the upshot being that France’s premier striker was sent home. This was not the nadir of the French campaign though as the remaining players suspected a mole in the coaching team had leaked Anelka’s comments to the press in order to have him removed from the squad. Patrice Evra ended up doing a very good Magnum PI impersonation and deduced that it was one of the fitness coaches who was the aforementioned mole. The left-back and captain confronted the said coach and the ensuing row led to the players refusing to train. The sight of the hapless Raymond Domenech reading a players statement explaining their position was utterly hilarious. Obviously these shenanigans didn’t provide the ideal preparation for the French’s must win game against South Africa and unsurprisingly they lost and left with the grand total of one point and one goal. This was Domenech’s swansong and I think it is fair to say that he did not go gracefully as he refused to shake hands with the South African’s coach, instead repeatedly wagging his finger and looking cross. I can’t imagine there has ever been a top team that has ever endured such a disastrous World Cup campaign and I for one think the French should be applauded for providing such endless amusement in those first days of the tournament when the football was pretty tedious. The French debacle will of course provided particular amusement to the Irish who can console themselves with the fact that in the light of Thierry Henry’s handball, the French probably now wish that they had never qualified for the World cup in the first place. A thought though should be spared for Laurent Blanc who is faced with the task of trying to pick up the pieces from the Domenech era – all I can say is bon chance Laurent.

Italy also finished bottom of their group and in doing so failed to beat any of the mighty Paraguay, New Zealand and Slovakia. This is on paper as bad as the French performance (if not worse), but the Italians lacked the comedy infighting of the French. They simply looked an ageing team that had gone one tournament too far. Four years ago when they lifted the trophy in Berlin Fabio Cannavaro was the best defender in the world, but in South Africa he was given the run-around by the world-beating strikers of Paraguay, New Zealand and Slovakia. What turned out to be Italy’s final game of this World Cup will though take some beating when it comes to deciding the game of the tournament. Going into the game Italy needed only a point to progress to the second round but soon fell behind after gifting the Slovakians a stupid goal. Fear not though there was still plenty of time left for them to equalise, but it just didn’t come and in the second-half Slovakia did the unthinkable and went 2-0 up. This prompted Italy to throw everything at it and they soon got a goal back, before gifting another goal to the Slovakians. Italy had the final say though in scoring a brilliant second to set up an amazing last two minutes which saw the Slovakians trying to desperately waste time as their goalkeeper was inflicted with what appeared to be numerous life-threatening ailments before Simone Pepe missed an amazing chance right at the death that would have saved the holders. Whenever Italy go out of a major tournament they always point to being majorly wronged by a referee and in this case they were given the opportunity to do so again as they claimed a shot had gone over the line and a goal was questionably ruled off-side. In the end though Slovakia deserved to win and can now look forward to taking their place in the knock-out stages. As for Italy they will have to find some new younger players to provide the spine of a new team as this will probably the swansong for messrs. Cannavaro, Buffon, Zambrotta and Gattuso.

Of course England managed to avoid the fate of the French and Italians by scraping past Slovenia thanks to some hilarious last-ditch defending in the second-half. However, the fact the USA also won means that England ended up second in their group and so have the small matter of facing Germany in the second-round. This is the stand-out game of the knock-out stages and on past history it is fair to say that it is not beyond the realms of possibility that it will be decided by the dreaded penalty shoot-out. If this is the case England can take hope from the fact that the Germans have already missed a spot-kick in this tournament, but we all know that if this is how the game finishes, then the Germans will end up winning. Whatever happens I get the feeling that Sunday will provide one of those epic World Cup games that are talked about for years such as the semi-final in 1990 the Argentina games in 1986 and 1998 and the Portugal game four years ago – let’s just hope that the result is better this time as surely England are due an epic victory rather than a glorious defeat.

So onward dear reader unto the breach and I shall return next week to dissect the dramas of the weekend (and hopefully look forward to England v. Argentina in the quarter-finals). Before I go though I would like to give my award to performance of the week to Honda from Japan (not the car) who was brilliant in their defeat of Denmark and will no doubt be top of clubs wish-list this summer – expect to see him in a ground near you soon. So aurevoir and get practicing those penalties.

A football fan finds the excitement of Portugal v Ivory Coast just too much

Welcome to the first of my weekly reports on the World Cup. I should though begin with a couple of confessions, firstly, I am not in South Africa as no-one seemed willing to send me there to write this, instead I am in a flat in central Leeds (how glamorous), and secondly, I have not been able to watch all the games so sorry I can provide no enlightenment on Algeria v. Slovenia and Serbia v. Ghana. Judging by the vast majority of games that I have seen, however, I am going to take an educated guess and say that these were not the most exciting of games.

In the lead up to the tournament I predicted a tournament victory for the Germans, but I did not expect them to play by far the best football of the tournament. That is right dear reader from the games I have seen in the first week it is the Germans that look by far the best football team in South Africa. The Germans played Australia on Sunday night and provided a footballing master-class that was every bit as good as anything that can be expected to come from the much vaunted Spanish and Brazilians. Instrumental to their demolition of the Aussies was Mesut Ozil of Werder Bremen. Ozil has been the star of the show in the first week and his performance have put Ronaldo, Kaka and Rooney in the shade to such an extent that we can expect t his name to be across the gossip column for weeks and months to come until he moves to one of Europe’s largest clubs. The Germans look destined to go on and win their group and if they can keep up this attacking stylish football up, they may take some stopping to go and win the whole thing.
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Nelson prepares to give the World Cup to the Germans and the world rejoices

Anyone who has watched a commercial television channel in recent days can’t have failed to notice that the vast majority of adverts now involve the great sport of football. This has become so prevalent that the greatest sport of them all now features in adverts for sofa sales (that always seem to end on Sunday at 5pm) and in an even stranger advertising strategy, in the adverts for an online car purchasing company. Even on the Beeb, Sue Barker can be seen looking cross at Queens as she realises that her precious Wimbledon will be playing second fiddle this year to the greatest show on earth. That is rights dear reader the World Cup starts on Friday and all other television programmes can forget it as there will only be one thing worth watching for the next month – and guess what Sue it isn’t tennis.
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Ian Holloway - coming to a Premier League ground near you

The football season may be in its last breaths before the World Cup roars into being, but the old dog has shown in the last week that it still has plenty of life in it yet. This week has seen a brilliant Championship play-off final at a boiling Wembley, a rather tedious Champions League final, a worrying England game and yet more wild rumours about the imminent movements of players and a certain manager alike.

There is though only one place to start this week and that is in the rather decrepit (and I think that is being kind) northern seaside town of Blackpool. This town has a football club made up of a collection of lower league journeymen, a comedy manager, a three sided ground and a home kit of lurid tangerine. Back in August Blackpool were bracketed with the mighty Scunthorpe in being joint favourites to finish rock bottom of the Championship but by some minor miracle they will be playing at a Premier League ground near you from August. The promotion of the Seasiders shows that most clubs in the football league can dream of reaching the promised land as they have done it not with a billionaire sugar daddy and backed by a large home support, instead they have spent next to nothing and with an average attendance of less than ten thousand. The game that clinched their promotion was nothing short of exhilarating as they shared five goals with Cardiff in a breathless first-half played in soaring temperatures. The game showed that Blackpool approach games in a refreshing manner as they did not look to start in a defensive manner as would have been perfectly understandable for a game of such magnitude. Instead they attacked throughout and scored three goals for their rewards, but their defence was anything other than watertight. This should be some warning for possible future misery for plucky old Blackpool as Premier League teams are rather adept of punishing cavalier promoted teams with fairly devastating consequences (just ask those poor people from Burnley and Barnsley). Anyway now is not the time for worrying about the future as Blackpool should enjoy their summer and the sheer novelty of it all and look forward to the new stand, new training ground and new players that they intend to buy with their £90million. As for Cardiff they now face an uncertain financial future that Leeds fans will be able to advise them on having also had experience of Peter Ridsdale’s chairmanship, so expect fire sales rather than purchases of shiny new footballers with lovely Sky money in the capital of Wales. So good luck Blackpool, and all of football should applaud their arrival in the Premier League, but no doubt Fergie, Arsene and Rafa will moan about the poor conditions of the ground (especially if they return from Bloomfield Road pointless) next season.
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Fabregas .. kissing good-bye to Arsenal?

So here we are in the middle of May in that strange period between the end of the season and the start of the World Cup. Fear not though dear reader as there is still plenty going on as the FA Cup and Europa League finals have taken place, the drama of the play-offs is in full swing and Cesc Fabregas has filled the Ronaldo role of “transfer saga to Spain” that will no doubt last all blinking summer.

The first final in these days of relative calm in between the clamour for league points and a certain event in South Africa was the Europa League final between our own Fulham and Atletico Madrid. The romantics were sure that Fulham would win this as their run to the final had been so improbable and unexpected, but Atletico with their rather useful strike-force of Aguero and Forlan (who is a different player to the one who used to run around Old Trafford missing every chance that came his way) would certainly be no push-over. In the end Fulham were rather disappointing and the only surprise was that it took Atletico extra-time to finally complete a fully deserved victory. The goals of course came from that man Forlan and the hopes of the romantics were dashed as a consequence. This game was shown on Channel Five who went to town as this was their first opportunity to show a major final involving an English club. Five responded to this pressure by showing two hours of build-up involving Colin Murray, Stan Collymore and Pat Nevin and with the exception of the erudite Mr. Nevin this was tedious in the extreme. Note to Five thirty minutes is more than enough build up!
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Champions Chelsea ... no final day dramas

So that is that then, the end of league football in England and Scotland and all in all the overriding feeling about the final weekend was that it was on the whole tension free. This is in great contrast to the season finales of recent years which have been characterised by unbearable tension and an ever changing picture of who will emerge triumphant and who will fall through the trap-door (who can forget the monumental “Survival Sunday” when West Brom managed to move from last place to fourth from bottom on the final day). This year saw a relegation battle decided weeks ago and the battle for the final Champions League place decided the previous week so all eyes were on who would emerge from this final day as champions. In the end Chelsea crushed hapless Wigan 8-0 meaning that the destiny of the title was in no doubt whatsoever.

In the lead up to this finale I endeavoured to predict the outcome of the various races that were ongoing in the Premier League and upon the final whistle of the season I have been able to reflect on the wisdom (or lack of it) of these predictions. In the race for the title I made the slightly bold prediction that Arsenal would emerge victorious. My reasoning for this being that they had by far the easiest run-in compared to their rivals and they had given glimpses of a new-found steel by winning away games at traditionally tricky venues such as at the Britannia Stadium. I hold my hands up that I put too much faith in the Gunners and they did their usual trick of buckling in extremely meek fashion. The inherent problems with Arsenal were encapsulated perfectly in their recent game at Wigan when they managed to turn a 2-0 lead into a 3-2 defeat.
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A Grimsby fan yesterday ... looking forward to invading the pitch in celebration on Saturday

Well here we are dear reader facing the end of league football in England this weekend as the Premier League, Leagues One and Two are all set to follow the Championship in coming to an end leaving the majority of fans with no live footy to watch until August (fear not though we have the brilliance of the play-offs and then the small matter of the World Cup to come). However, before we get over the finish line there are a number of issues to be resolved, none more so than the League Title, the destiny of the final Champions League place, promotion from League One and relegation from the Football League itself. This means that there will be numerous games up and down the country where fans will have one eye on their team’s match and an ear stuck to a transistor radio desperately hoping that the other result goes their way. We have already seen the brilliance of the final weekend by virtue of the Championship finishing in the weekend just gone. This saw Blackpool and Swansea fans glued to their radios and mobile phones just as much as they were watching their own team play. In the end the hilarious Ian Holloway triumphed so that Blackpool now have a real chance of making it into the Premier League provided they can come through the always dramatic and brilliant play-offs (I bet Arsene can’t wait for a trip to Bloomfield Road on a Tuesday night in November). At the bottom of the Championship fans of Sheffield Wednesday and Crystal Palace didn’t have to divert their attention to the other’s match in the battle against relegation as due to the brilliance of the fixture computer they were paired together in a winner takes all game at Hillsbrough. In the end it ended in a highly entertaining 2-2 draw in the sort of game that can only be played at this time of the season as Sheffield Wednesday spent the last few minutes permanently in the Palace box desperately searching for the goal that would guarantee safety. In the end though Palace held out after some brilliant last-ditch defending and so stay in the Championship while Wednesday have trips to Rochdale and Bournemouth to look forward to – such are the fine lines between success and failure in the month of May.
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Samba ... From the Congo and a fan of Um-Bongo (probably)

The season must be nearly over as for the first time we have seen that classic spring sight of Premier League fans sobbing and looking glumly at an empty pitch. This weekend saw this fate befall the home fans in attendance at the KC Stadium and Turf Moor. The Burnley and Hull fans were finally put out of their misery by virtue of their own team’s incompetence and by the rare sight of a West Ham win. From personal experience until that point when it is mathematically impossible to catch the teams above fans of the teams below the dreaded dotted line will have been thinking we can win those last games to climb out, in so doing ignoring the fact that they have only won twice in the last twenty games, I therefore bet there are some Hull fans who believe it is not impossible for them to overturn the huge goal difference to catch West Ham. Sorry Hull fans that won’t be happening and you have trips to Scunthorpe, Barnsley and Doncaster to look forward to next year and by the sounds of it maybe with the added hindrance of a ten point penalty for going into administration – good luck with that then. Burnley should fare better in the league of the damned as they seemed to expect to go straight back down by pocketing the majority of their Sky millions and keeping it under lock and key (unlike Hull who seem to have given most of theirs to Jimmy Bullard’s knee surgeon). I therefore can see the Clarets returning in a year in the mould of their fellow yo-yoers West Bromwich Albion. Personally, the relegation of the bottom three is good for the quality of grounds in the Premier League as Fratton Park and Turf Moor are grotty little places and can’t compare to the size and comfort of the returning St. James’s Park.

With the relegation battle now resolved (cue a 10-0 Hull win and a 10-0 West Ham defeat next week to ridicule this statement), the Premiership has two weeks left to go with the title and the destiny of the final Champions League place still very much up in the air. It seems certain that the title will be decided this weekend as both Chelsea and Manchester United have easy games on the final day therefore I propose that if Chelsea end the week above that delightful club from Manchester they will be champions. I don’t like Chelsea but if they have to win the title then so be it as a fourth straight United triumph will just feel completely depressing. The race for fourth is also up in the air as it could still go to any of four clubs. We can therefore expect that final Sunday Sky madness of tables constantly changing and Chinese whispers whipping round stadiums that end up being hilarious for the onlooker when they turn out to be erroneous. So Man City, Spurs, Villa and Liverpool get those radios and mobile phones ready for a weekend of constant score checking. I for one can’t wait!
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