12pts clear - hold firm lads ...
Last updated : 20 March 2006 By Paul Lagan
Chelsea are 12 points clear in the Premiership title race.
With Manchester United having a game in hand, the difference will most likely be nine.
Chelsea still have to face United in the league - it could be six.
To win the title six points clear will still be an amazing achievement.
However, as Alex Ferguson once famously said - "It's squeaky bottom time."
Thing is, it's squeaky bottom time not for Chelsea but for chasers United and Liverpool.
They have to keep winning and hope Chelsea lose three more games.
It's possible, of course, but following defeat yesterday at Fulham - highly unlikely.
After the FA Cup tie on Wednesday, It's home to Manchester City on Saturday.
Defeat here, and Chelsea will deserve to be criticised.
Our remaining league games are away to relegation-haunted Birmingham, home to West Ham, away to Bolton, home to Everton, away to Blackburn, home to Man Utd and then finally away to Newcastle United.
If Chelsea reach the FA Cup semi-final, the Blackburn Rovers match will be re-scheduled for after the Newcastle game.
That would mean two tricky away games.
However by then, the league should be ours again.
Jose Mourinho said he will be at Chelsea next season - I believe him.
Why on earth would he want to go to Inter Milan?
No disrespect to the Italian side, but Jose is a career-minded soul and going to that club now is a backward step.
I also suspect that there is an undercurrent of political shenanigans going on.
Jose was extremely frustrated that Peter Kenyon failed to bring in the players Jose wanted for this season.
There is a power struggle between Kenyon and Jose for the heart and mind/support of Roman Abramovich.
Both men need Roman in their corner to achieve their respective goals.
Neither goals are running in tandem.
Had Kenyon signed the players Jose wanted, it's fair to assume Chelsea would have dispatched Barcelona and probably odds-on favourites to lift the Champions league.
Kenyon has failed to raise the club to the required playing level.
Jose, to his credit, has been forced to play players he knows are not good enough to achieve the league title and the Champions league in the same season.
He also knows that a repeat of last summer's failure to secure the likes of Adriano will result in failure in next season's Champions league.
It was Chelsea inability to win their group which brought them head-to-head with the ill-fated tie Barcelona.
It was their inability to score the crucial goals which has haunted Jose.
Kenyon's inability to pay the so-called "over the odds" means they have kept their cheque book locked up and lost this season's Champions league.
Roman has to be convinced that Kenyon's strategy was wrong in this instance.
They should have paid what was needed to win the Champions league.
Once that was won, it would be easier to lure players to the Bridge without paying over the odds again.
Kenyon misjudged this season's significance, Jose has done remarkably well with second-string resources.
The political power game will continue from now until Roman makes his intentions clear to both his senior management.
For our sakes, he must come down on the side of Jose.
Chief executives are ten a penny, Jose is unique.
