Firstly – an apology for the hiatus in the ramblings of this column, caused by preparing for the Chelsea Supporters Trust Christmas Party, Christmas itself and flu, in that order. Well, not really that order. The flu manifested itself just before Christmas, set in on Christmas Eve and left me with an attack of the horrors on Christmas Night. By Boxing Day I could barely stand up and, as a…
Ah, glorious August, when football fans up and down the country are filled with what usually turns out to be misplaced optimism about the fate of their teams over the coming nine months. And speaking of misplaced optimism, TheChels.Net has asked their resident Old Crone to look into her crystal ball and see what might lie ahead. Please note that these predictions may contain a hefty dose of bias and/or…
If ever there has been a decisive moment under AVB’s reign then this surely is it. We sit a massive 12 points behind the Manchester clubs and 7 points behind Tottenham. There are rumours that Mourinho is seeking a return to the Chelsea managerial post. Fernando Torres is being written off after a 1000 minutes without a goal. John Terry is once again being treated incredibly poorly by the FA…
It’s not often that a score line so blatantly refutes the events of the game, but the 3-0 sore line at half-time did just that, and even though Fernando Torres scored early in the second half and we had chances to reduce the deficit it was not to be, as Chelsea’s unbeaten start to the season came to end on a crazy day at Old Trafford. All of Manchester United’s…
A little departure from the normal Harding Perspective today, taking a firm look at what went wrong in the first leg and how we can rectify these issues for the return leg on Tuesday. Firstly, we should not kid ourselves at the difficulty of the job at hand. Given the level of the performance required against United on Tuesday, the warm-up against Wigan hardly served as perfect preparation. An outing…
Chelsea continued their impressive home-record against Manchester United, as a David Luiz strike and Frank Lampard penalty completed the comeback after Wayne Rooney had given them the lead early on. It was the fifth anniversary of the death of Peter Osgood and Carlo Ancelotti’s men paid a great tribute to the ‘King of Stamford Bridge’ with a thumping victory. Carlo Ancelotti made only one change from the team that started…
This game, without question, is pivotal for both sides. For United it gives them a chance to hammer home their title credentials; for Chelsea it is a chance to not only creep back into the top four but signal their intent for the remainder of an underwhelming season. With Chelsea’s switch to a flat 442 last week, Ferguson will have a few more questions to answer before he sets his…