Chelsea: The Champions of World Football Challenge!

There’s the first of many trophies that I hope Chelsea win this season. We are the champions of the 2009 World Football Challenge. It’s a great name for running around on a football pitch against just four teams in a foreign country primarily for marketing reasons.

World Football Challenge makes you feel like you’re the ultimate champion of a knock-out tournament containing 512 club teams from all over the world. That’s how the Americans like it. They put the "world" in front of everything (no political pun intended).

Let’s not take anything away from Chelsea. They were super-fit, took these games seriously, they played very good football and they won four out of four. Very deservedly the champions of the World Football Challenge!

The best thing about the match against Club America was the fact that Di Santo and Malouda scored. I have a soft corner for both and with the arrival of Sturridge and Zhirkov, they need to show their worth to fight, compete and win their places.

Malouda is just continuing from where he left last season. He was already growing in confidence and his new contract would certainly unleash the real Malouda that won the player of the season in Lique 1.

I’ve been waiting for a Di Santo goal for many months now. It was a very well taken goal. I was most certainly reminded of Hernan Crespo. I’m sure Di Santo will play more this season and will be a surprise package this season. I’ve gone on record to say that Di Santo has better off the ball movement than Anelka. I still stand by it.

Di Santo moves intelligently and also is always busy in the zone. While Anelka can finish the chances created by others for him Franco can create chances by his movement and runs. For the second goal, it was a nice piece of skill and a superb assist by the Argentine. Kalou must be warned.

I also read that Franco is set on a loan deal with Blackburn Rovers. On one side, I don’t want us to loan him because I want to see him play more often for Chelsea and for some reason I see that happening in this season. On the other side, I might be reluctantly okay for a half-season loan because we all would see more of Di Santo and he can come back with rich experience when Drogba is away on national duty.

In the last couple of days, so much have been written about John Terry in the press—from how he is still Mr. Chelsea to how he had to be persuaded by Roman Abramovich. JT has spoken to Chelsea TV after issuing his PR-advised statement. Read his short interview on the Man City offer and on the pre-season and preparations. Do read it as he elaborates further into what he had said in the statement. As far as I’m concerned, I’m standing by my pragmatic view.

Short post today. That’s it for now. Cheers!