Sunday 16 March 2008
Now we have a title race. For the first time in a couple of years we have a really exciting run in to the end of the season, with 3 teams who can very reasonably be expected to win it. As it currently stands Man United and Arsenal are drawn top, with arsenal having played a game more. Chelsea have played a game less and find themselves 3 points behind, if they win that game at hand they will be drawn top with the other two.
As it currently stands the odds makers have arsenal as 3rd favorites, with united top and chelsea second favorites to win. This is incredibly impressive when you consider how far behind chelsea were earlier in the season, as well as all the horrible luck, injury crises, african cup of nations, bad ref calls, once in a lifetime player blunders and off the pitch turmoil (see my article last week) that has gripped the club this season. That they are still up there very much in contention just shows how impressive a team they really have.
That being said, I feel that giving Chelsea such strong odds to win the league is a bit premature, and coming from a Chelsea fan that says a lot. Look at the upcoming fixtures and you will see that chelsea have by far the hardest run in, with away games at tottenham, everton, newcastle and man city, as well as big games against man united and arsenal. Considering avram has had such an awful record against the big teams I find it hard to be optimistic about those fixtures. If we win every game left this season (9 games) we will win the league, but quite frankly 6 out of those 9 i would not be surprised to see us not win. Mind you the fact that we're in this race at all just shows how laughable some of the hacks and amateurs were who claimed chelsea would struggle to get a champions league place this season! To be honest we haven't looked like winning it since the first couple of weeks this season, but youd have to have next to zero knowledge of football, and have not seen chelsea play at all this season to really think that they would finish so low :S As usual I am a pessimistic and self hating chelsea fan, but for once I actually feel heartened by recent results, and bordering on optimistic for the first time in a long time.
