Well it makes a change to be writing on the back of good
news for Chelsea. We beat Wigan 4-1
yesterday afternoon and a few minutes ago Nigeria won the African Cup of
Nations 2013 beating Burkina Faso 1-0.
Chelsea’s Victor Moses and John Mikel Obi were voted Fair Player of the
Competition and Man of the Match respectively.
I feel like I should stop now and end on a high but I’ve just started!
Going back to yesterday afternoon at a cold and wet Stamford
Bridge, it was imperative for Chelsea to win against Wigan as Tottenham had won
the early kick off against Newcastle and had overtaken us in the League by two
points. Gareth Bale, who AVB likened to
Ronaldo and Messi (I think he is being a little optimistic and premature in his
flattering evaluation of his star player), just missed out on a hat trick.
Even though Wigan has been down in the relegation zone most
of the season, our recent form against the bottom clubs has been less than convincing. Also Roberto Martinez seems to energise his team
around two thirds of the way into the season and they somehow claw their way
out of the bottom three with unexpected wins against the top clubs. So nothing was to be taken for granted.
On the plus side, David Luiz was back from injury and Eden
Hazard back from being punished for the ‘ball boy’ incident. Although Demba Ba was available (having been
to Italy to have a bespoke mask made to protect his healing nose), Rafa started
with Torres. Benitez played Luiz in
midfield alongside Lampard (my favoured position for Luiz) and moved Ramires up
into the right wing (where he excelled last season – the arrival of Oscar and
Hazard this season alongside Mata has seen Ramires regularly replaced in that position by
one of the three amigos). 
The 4-1 score line is not a fair depiction of the match...
in the words of Alan Shearer “Four flatters them!” We were quite slow off the mark and even
though Ramires scored from a great Torres lay off in the first half and Eden
Hazard doubled the score in the 56th minute, two minutes later Shaun
Maloney halved the Wigan deficit. Chelsea
supporters everywhere found themselves back in the ‘Ground Hog Day’ wondering
how long it would take before we gave away our advantage. My anxiety grew with every passing minute,
until my 'Frank in shining armour', Lampard, stepped forward in the 86th
minute and smashed the ball through all my worries and straight past Ali
Al-Habsi, into the back of the net, taking our score up to 3-1 (blues goal no 198 and
counting!). A newly substituted Marko Marin
headed the fourth and final goal off a rebound from a swerving Azpilicueta shot
in the dying minutes. Congratulations to
Marin for scoring his first Chelsea goal, he has not had an easy transition
into the team. Also congratulations to
Azpilicueta, who had just returned from his Debut for the Spanish National
team, where he impressed during the entire 90 minutes. He continued his great form on Saturday
afternoon against Wigan playing great defensive and attacking football as well
as assisting Eden Hazard’s goal. 
Now to the Saints Marching in.... The late kick off of Saturday
was Southampton v Manchester City. City needed to close the 9 point gap to
their United neighbours if they were to stand any chance at challenging for the
Premiership title. Watching this match
was really good therapy for me (and free therapy if you exclude the Sky Sports
channel subscription). Here was a team
which cost even more than Chelsea and managed to make us look good on one of
our bad days! Commiserations to Joe Hart
and Gareth Barry whose mistakes were sadly instrumental in Southampton’s 3-1
victory: Joe Hart spilled the ball from an easy save giving away the second
goal and Gareth Barry scored the third himself so convincingly it made me
wonder if the match fixing scandal was closer to home than I imagined. Some commentators may want to give credit to
Southampton’s new manager, Mauricio Pochettino, for their scalping of Man
City. Without taking away from the Saint’s
(who played well) I personally think Roberto Mancini and his team deserve most
of the credit for their own demise! Bring back Balotelli – surely things can’t
get any worse.
Or can they? Manchester United won their
match against Everton this afternoon. I’d
like to say they deserved the win but genuinely feel Everton gave the game away
– The last minute warm up injury sustained by the usually solid and dependable
centre back Sylvain Distin ruling him out of the game left the Everton defence
shaky and vulnerable. You have probably
noticed I may be a little biased towards any team who is playing Manchester United
– I have previously apologised for my irrational distaste for the successes of the
above mentioned. Anyway Alex Ferguson’s
team winning AGAIN extended their lead to twelve points and I really think
there is no coming back from this unless there is a miracle – Manchester United
are on their way to their twentieth League title. Writing that statistic, I
find myself ashamed not to be willing them on but as I said it is irrational
and as a woman that’s my prerogative...isn’t it?!
Talking of irrational.....
Dear Jose Mourinho, the Premiership is a lost cause now but
you are the man who stands between Manchester United and Champion’s League
success. I am relying on you not to let
me down. Please and Thank you in advance and Good Luck on Wednesday evening!
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