Jose Feels the Heat

Will Jose Mourinho be at Chelsea during the next season? That's the million dollar question right now. After a string of draws with some unfancied teams, there's a lot of speculation that things aren't well between Jose and Abromovich and his board. The loss at Anfield highlighted Chelsea's poor defence and with Terry still injured, the Chelsea board isn't willing to grant Jose's request for a defender and a striker.

Moreover, Shevchenko still appears to the bone of contention, with his close friendship with Abromovich viewed with jealousy by other players and his struggle to adapt to the pace of the Premiership not winning the confidence of his manager.

Jose has been the architect of his own downfall this season by not playing the formation he used in his 2 previous successful Premiership-winning seasons. Ballack looks woefully out of sorts in the Chelsea midfield and playing without the wingers, Chelsea has been looking out of shape for quite a while now.

Gallas was one of the most important players for Chelsea over the last 2 seasons, if not the most important. But his departure to Arsenal in the summer and the arrival of Cashley Cole has weakened the defence significantly. In fact, the Terry-Gallas partnership was much better than the present Terry-Carvalho partnership.

Apparently, Jose and Abromovich haven't been looking eye-to-eye for a few months now and this is bad news for Chelsea. If Jose leaves this summer, it would be a big loss for the club and whoever else comes in place of him, be it Hiddink or Ancelotti, would find it extremely difficult to fill the boots of Mourinho.

Meanwhile, ManUtd were unlucky not to claim a point at the Emirates. Liverpool did a favor for ManUtd by beating Chelsea but Arsenal has now made a favor for Chelsea by beating ManUtd. And it does make the title-run-in much more exciting this season.

Christmas Presents

It's that time of the year where we give out presents to managers and players. Last year, Wenger got a pair of binoculars, Essien got a new pair of spiked football shoes. This time, these would be the appropriate presents for these people...

Shevchenko - a return ticket to Italy

Alan Pardew - a flag of Argentina

Fegie - already got an early Christmas present by drawing Lille in the next round of CL

Mourinho - a video archive of great, entertaining football

Wenger - a couple of promising 10 year old kids from Angola - Onwaquachi and Muawawahaha

What people should give away as presents...

Mourinho - the young guys who spend more time warming the bench than ruffling the referee on the pitch

Beckham - his retirement announcement

Fergie - releasing Silvestre who can help out Cannavaro at Real

Merry Christmas everyone and a Happy New Year!

Ruud and Ronnie to the Rescue

In the La Liga, Ruud scored 4 goals in Real's away win over Osasuna, while Ronaldinho scored 2 and set up another in Barca's 3-1 home win over Zaragoza. It's good to see my favorite players leading the race for the 'pichichi' with 8 goals, although I am not too happy Real is getting too much for a bargain price of 10 million pounds. But, with the galacticos era over at Real Madrid and that fool of a president Perez out, my antagonism towards Real has diminished to a certain extent. And, Ronnie was at his inpirational best yet again, rescuing his team from a goal down to a morale-boosting victory.

Now, it brings us to the question....who is the world' s best striker/forward at present?

Shevchenko
Ruud Van Nistelrooy
Henry


For me, it has to be Ruud simply because he has proven time and again that he can go to any club and score at will. Unlike Shevchenko, who seems to struggle at Chelsea, not something expected from someone regarded as the best striker in the world by many pundits not long ago. Henry has been terrific for Arsenal over many seasons but then we would never know if he can be the same prolific striker if he was at a different club. What do you think?