50,000 – That’s the number of hits BlueChampions crossed today. Quite a milestone for a blog that was started by one Chelsea fan from Asia, only about 8 months back. I thank you all for for your respect and support you’ve shown for this blog. I live with my family and also have a busy day job due to which many times I wasn’t able to spend enough time on the blog but you guys made it very lively with your firebrand discussions. Thank you for reading whatever I write and more so for returning to the blog and being a regular visitor. I think the next 50,000 should not take another 8 months.

Good news first. Captain John kicked off the week of weddings, who was soon followed by Gary Neville, Carrick and Gerrard. Terry married his girlfriend of 9 years. The wedding was more important for Chelsea as such because Roman was there and he had his first social gathering with the players for a long time. It’s a pity that Jose could not be there as he was on his holiday. Roman’s visit also hints that Terry could be signing his new contract very soon.

No major Chelsea news at all except Terry’s wedding and Tal signing. The news room has been so empty for Chelsea that the official website has no updates for more than 24 hours. I’m more relieved than happy about our signing of Tal. He is a good quality defender, good in the air, can even outmuscle someone like Tevez. When Pizarro signed, it was believed that Khalid would go the other way. While that has not happened yet, he can still be offloaded. In any case, I hope we sign one more defender, preferably Alex. We should not end up finding ourselves short of a defender at any point of time. Now, we have Terry, Carvalho, Khalid and Tal for the central defender role, with Essien as the back-up. On the right, we have Paulo, Diarra and once again Essien as the back-up with Glen Johnson returning from his loan to Portsmouth. With only Bridge and Cole on the left, if at all we are going to punished by the devil, it could be on this side.

The 2007-08 fixtures for Premiership have been announced. I don’t how much of these would remain unchanged through the course of the season. The sponsors and the TV channels would anyway juggle around the fixtures list for their convenience. At least one thing may not change. Chelsea play Birmingham at Stamford Bridge in their first Premiership match of the season. Remember, if we don’t lose this match, we would break Liverpool’s record of unbeaten home league run, which was achieved many seasons back. Nowadays, Liverpool only talks of their history while we are busy making it.

I can’t wait to see the new electric yellow away kit in action on the pitch. Last season Liverpool fans were sure that what caused their downfall this time was not their unmotivated players or crap game or inconsistency or Rafa’s incompetency but only their yellow away kit. I dont believe in the kits being lucky or unlucky, when you can’t connect a 5-yard pass.

Let’s answer the big question of what can happen to us during the African Nations Cup. The ACN (because it is aka African Cup of Nations) begins on 20-Jan and goes on until 10-Feb, that is if any of our players get to the final, which in fact is highly possible. And the players we miss would be Essien, Drogba, Mikel, Kalou and Geremi. I would expect that the participating players would leave for Ghana atleast a week before the start of the tournament and might need a rest of one week after the tournament. This would roughly mean that we would have to miss them for about 4 Premiership matches which includes a crucial home encounter against Liverpool. As of now, I feel it is perfectly manageable but I’m not sure if half of our squad would have broken their foot, shoulder and metatarsal etc by Jan 2008.

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Now if you see what impact this Cup would have on Man Utd, Liverpool and Arsenal – nothing much. Of these three, Arsenal could be hit, but it’s not that they’re going to challenge for the title anyways. In fact, I strongly feel that Newcastle could give Arsenal a run for their money for the Champions League spot, oh yes, there’s Spurs, Everton and Bolton too.

Away from England, we get to the grand finale of the Spanish Primera Division. It can’t get closer than this when you realise that any of the three – Real Madrid, Barcelona, Sevilla – could be Spanish champions tomorrow night. If Bechkham-inspired Real Madrid win their match against Mallorca, they win the title, irrespective of what happens in the other matches. If Madrid drop points and Barca win, title goes to Camp Nou. If they all end up on same points (that is if Madrid & Barca draw and Sevilla win), title is Bernabeu bound, due to their superior head-to-head record of the mini league.

The interesting thing is if Barca realise that Madrid is drawing and Sevilla is winning, they can very well concede goals to lose the match so that Sevilla would win the title as they have a better head-to-head record with Madrid. Already, Barca is in contention only because of that disgraceful left-handed goal. If they are to concede goals with the sole intention of denying Real the title, this will go down as the worst piece of sportsmanship in modern football. It’s going to be ‘Real’ fun tomorrow night. Be glued to your TV set. Whoever wins the title, it’s going to be a historic one for its fantastic chase and drama.

Transfer market is going to be fun once La Liga gets over tomorrow. Henry to Barca and Eto’o to Milan and certainly not Sheva to Milan. Sometimes, my predictions come true. Let’s see. Gotta go now. Bye.