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Please please please, let us get who we want

Congratulations to a worthy set of champions for 2008. Despite the drama of the last couple of weeks, the title was always in United’s hands – at the risk of invoking old ghosts, I’m sure José would have approved – and they finished it off in fine style.

The trouble with Didier

I’m sure you all remember the days when you could shrug off the effects of a hangover by 11, leaving you clear-eyed and bushy-tailed when your elders and betters were still groaning into their coffee. Nights spent curled up in the architectural equivalent of Skinner’s box, with your head hanging over the edge of someone’s sofa, meant nothing to your lithe physique. Blessed with the springy, elastic frame of youth, the mild discomfort of a contorted night’s sleep soon gave way to the promise of a new day. But no longer.

Thank you Frank, thank you Avram

Seldom have I taken such pleasure in being wrong. And , in all honesty, that is the last time I will doubt the commitment, quality and character of Frank Lampard.

In the interests of a quiet life

I see that, as always, the Anfield contingent has been out in force in the build-up to this game.

Grant can ease nervous disorder

After the fireworks of the previous manager’s departure, Chelsea’s season has been characterised by a succession of nervous disorders. There was the borderline hysteria of the sacking, resignation, mutual hate-in; the mind-numbing catatonia of some of the more leaden games; the occasional bout of paranoia as key players like Didier Drogba and Frank Lampard edged ever closer to the exit; and finally the resentment — shaded with psychotic loathing — that surrounds an impending two-legged cup-tie with Liverpool. You could have blinked and missed the moments of ecstasy and yet, here we are, still in contention for as many trophies as this season’s outstanding team, Manchester United.

Recycling Garbage?

Joe Lovejoy, of The Sunday Times, ran an article today that you can read here. In it, He takes the Avram Grant comments from a recent press conference and runs with them. Boy, does he run with them.

Episode 3 - The Search For A Watchable Game

I wonder… do Liverpool fans view the upcoming pair of fixtures against Chelsea with the same sense of impending tedium as I do? Probably not. Victory, as any modern Chelsea fan will tell you, goes a long way to relieving the spirit-crushing boredom of a soulless game. 

It Was Better Back Then

I’m 32. I have to remind myself of this quite often, because I carry around an image of myself in my head, and in it I have the pristine body that someone lent me for a few weeks around my 19th birthday, healthily coloured skin and eyes unfaded by years of cynical underachievement. It’s not that I think things used to be better. I know it like I know that I could have done a job for Leyton Orient if that knee twang hadn’t done for my fledgling career. It’s not up for debate.

Game theory

When you wake up to discover that the boiler is out and the hot shower you were expecting has turned into an Arctic trickle, then arrive in the office to find that your workload has got together with someone else’s overnight to produce lots and lots of bouncing baby workloads, all sat smiling and gurgling in your in-tray, then the coffee machine stops working and your new pair of Oliver Sweeney loafers get splashed with something unmentionable by a passing tramp… perhaps you start to get an inkling that it isn’t going to be your day.

In Continent

To manage “on the continent” is to be beset by uncertainty, one eye ever to windward, awaiting the moment when the mute with the bowstring calls time on your career. So much are we told by the columnists. We icy Albion islanders are not of this breed. We have learned the true lesson of our race, as a wise man once said: to put away all emotion and entrap the alien at the proper time. And then, presumably, give him a kicking for looking a bit different. 

Who's Untouchable now?

They pull a knife, you pull a gun. They send off Lampard, you pull a Ballack. That’s the Premier League way.

Thoroughly second-best

You’d think that a good 24-hour period of reflection would be needed after losing to Spurs in a competitive final but, in truth, no Chelsea fan with even an iota of self-respect can do other than hold their hands up today and acknowledge that the better team won on the day.

2008: a footballing democracy

High on the seas of the interactive bunfight that we call the Internet, you’ll find a project called A Swarm of Angels. In as small a nutshell as I can fit it, it’s an attempt to wrest control of the film-making process from the traditional fiefdoms of studio and marketing man.

Will Avram have the last laugh?

It’s official. Avram Grant is now as good as José Mourinho. 

Star quality

As recent transfer rumblings have taught us, playing like a complete no-mark can have a surprising effect on your marketability and price in the English market.

Who are you talking to?

Didier Drogba would like to leave Chelsea. This in itself is nothing unusual: history is littered with similar instances.

Bloodied and Beaten

New manager, new ways. Sadly, the new way involved losing at the Emirates but, in keeping with the less confrontational style of Avram and his new 4-year deal, it seems important to this particular correspondent to be magnanimous in defeat. So our hats off to Arsenal, who played a good game in front of a surprisingly noisy crowd, and came through winners thanks to a header from – who else – William bloody Gallas, and a shocking flap from – who’da thunk it – the world’s best keeper. Nice timing, Mr Cech.

West Ham bring lasers but no fireworks

In some ways, you can see a little microcosm of England over at Upton Park. Marvellous history. Statues and memories. Done sod-all for years and years and years.

Barton and the Eye of the Beholder

They say history is written by the winners. Perhaps they should update the old saw: these days, history can be bashed out by just about anyone with a laptop and Wi-Fi.

I could have been angry

Damn you, Chelsea. Damn you to hell. Why couldn't you just have the good grace to do what everyone was expecting you to do – collapse – and save me any more emotional investment in this season?

Happy birthday, Roman

And so the revolution continues apace. Despite the innate conservatism of the Mourinho years, Chelsea have rediscovered their roots. Inferior opposition – and without the injured Kevin Kuranyi, inferior seems almost too mild a term for toothless Schalke – are being put to the sword with comfortable disdain. Faced with a stiffer challenge, such as the cauldron of fervour that is the Mestalla, the team rises to the challenge. Can Avram Grant really be the man to marry style with substance? 

Short-term answers hide Chelsea's real problems

Since taking over the reins from the most successful manager in Chelsea's history, Avram Grant has presided over a lame capitulation to Manchester United, a comfortable spanking of Championship strugglers Hull, and this disjointed scoreless draw against Fulham. Surely, it's time for him to pack his suitcase and be off?

Look, everyone... a balloon

As a little disclaimer before this rant-ette begins, would readers please be advised that the writer is aware a) of the minimal likelihood of anything "true" surfacing through a football gossip site calling itself Soccerthing or FootballForever, and b) the utter impossibility of Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich reading this. Still, I live in hope.

I expected more

The word that has been preying on my mind in recent days: mediocre. Well, it’s not the only word, but the others are just synonyms thereof. Bland. Unimaginative. One-dimensional. Dull.

Farewell to the Special Coat

So farewell, José, soi-disant Special One and the man who will always be remembered for his efforts to bring a little southern European style to the dour English game.

A Ronaldinho-shaped hole

After a longer-than-usual weekend, I figured that I’d ease myself back into the fray relatively easy this morning. For those of you who have an honest-to-goodness job, this probably doesn’t sound very convincing. I am, however, one of those fortunate people who has a reasonable amount of control over when and how I do my work. It’s partly because my output is supposed to be “creative”, which gives me a bit of latitude with deadlines, and partly because I’m a misanthropic sod and I suspect that a fair few colleagues are a little scared of me. I hope so, anyway: I’ve been working on a scary persona for years. 

Flagrant Injustice

Before I begin today’s rant, I’d like to make it clear that I am neither related to, friends with, a supporter of, or in any way influenced by the work of Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson. I hold no great love for our cousins from Merseyside, but I certainly don’t think of them as hysterical self-obsessed grief monkeys. As Boris might have said.

Abnormal service resumed

 Why do we fall for it every year, eh? The ludicrous overblown Sky billing. The new away kits (ours is, frankly, is a crime not only against fashion but possibly people with a reaction to bright light and strobe effects). The proclamation from the captain / tub-thumper that we'll "be in the hunt for it this season, for sure". Yes, I'm looking at you, Messrs Gerrard and Carragher.

Chelsea fans have enjoyed some pretty stultifying days out at the start of the season, José's first year with us brought a one-nil victory against Suurralexferguson that was notable for a shin-in off Eidur Gudjohnsen, and not much else. So who'da thunk a 5-goal thriller against plucky old Birmingham this time round?

Don’t be fooled. José is toying with you. If you see anything like the comedy that characterised much of this Sunday’s defending when we make the trip to Anfield, then I’m a wantaway Dutchman with an outspoken agent for a father and a balance problem. In all honesty, Mourinho must have choked on his red wine when he thought back to the ease with which Olivier Kapo breezed past Glen Johnson to equalise at 2-2. Yes, Glen has returned, bringing with him everything that he’s learned at the Harry Redknapp Defensive Finishing School for Boys. Perhaps the syllabus needs looking at.

Having said that, I enjoyed this game. In fact, I enjoyed a lot of the games last season when we were missing the captain and the goalkeeper. It reminded me a little of Chelsea under Vialli… there was no lead against humdrum opposition that we couldn’t throw away with half an hour of organisational suicide. I’m not accusing Birmingham of mediocrity here – there were moments of effervescent attacking play, with Kapo at the heart of much of it – but I’ll now always have a place in my heart for 2005 Mourinho Chelsea: the Chelsea that walked onto the pitch and performed the footballing equivalent of grabbing the opposition by the throat, thumping them several times against the nearest wall, then standing ten yards away from the mewling mess on the floor and donning a Kevlar three-piece. Untouchable. Alright, so everyone else was bored, but I rather liked it. Now, someone seems to have come in and done this iniquitous taste job on the squad. Importing a winger with skill, effectiveness AND an eye to play in a team-mate now and then? After Robben, I didn’t think that was the Chelsea way, but Malouda seems to be going out of his way not just to jink into the area, but then to try and find the best way to score a goal. Even if it means passing. And with Essien finding goalscoring form, the things that I hold to be self-evident… well, they’re a-changing. What next? José in a tracksuit?