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CHELSEA vs Man City Preview: Let Battle Commence!

Venue: Stamford Bridge

Date: Saturday, 27 February 2010

Kick-off: 1245 GMT

It’s the game everyone’s been waiting for, for all the wrong reasons. Chelsea take on Man City – or Wayne Bridge takes on John Terry if we look at it from the media perspective because that’s what the focus of this game comes down to isn’t it? I mean, sod the fact a win could see us go four points clear at the top again or defeat could see United hold onto the ground they gained mid-week because the press ain’t interested in that. And so what if City are intent on a top four place since their 34 year wait for a trophy continues, when the camera’s will be more focused on ‘Team Bridge’s’ attempts to kick lumps out the Chelsea captain.

MANAGERS’ VIEWS

Amid all the hype, Carlo Ancelotti insists our players will be unaffected, stating “John Terry is a professional. He doesn’t have a problem to look forward, to stay focused on the match. He has a very good mentality. He has had a fantastic season and he will do the same until the end of the season. I’m sure tomorrow will be Manchester City against Chelsea (rather than Terry v Bridge) so we have to pay attention, we have to stay in focus. Manchester City is a very good team. They have a lot of good players with strong quality, we have to think about this. No way will it distract the team. I don’t know how many people are interested in this. For sure not the players. We also want to go four points clear of Manchester United. We know it will be a difficult game because the last game against Manchester City we lost.”

Roberto Mancini also preferred to steer clear of the whole JT v Bridge debate, choosing to focus on his opposing manager instead. Ahead of this game the City manager says “Carlo’s a good friend of mine, we played together for the national team many times. I played against him in Italy for 15 years as well. He’s a good man, a good manager and he certainly has a strong team to look after. We didn’t think about the future back when we played, but he knows a great deal about football. Like me he played at the top level for many years, and he won many medals in Italy. With that and all the times he played for the national side, he picked up plenty of good experience that he is using now as a manager. When we were in the Italian squad, we both talked and thought a lot about the game before we played. It will be another tough game, they are a top team and we need to concentrate like we did against Liverpool. If we play like we did at times against Stoke as well, then we have a chance but we must take our chances to score when they happen. We must be positive.”

SQUAD NEWS

Chelsea will be without Bosingwa, Deco, Essien (all knee), Ashley Cole (ankle), Yuri Zhirkov (calf) and Petr Cech (calf). Paulo Ferreira who was ineligible for the game against Inter could make a return, as could Belletti who made the bench mid-week.

For City, Johnson, Petrov (both knee) and Kompany (groin) are out, with Toure and Santa Cruz (both knee) said to be doubtful. Carlos Tevez is available again.

TEAMS

CHELSEA (from): Hilario, Ivanovic, Carvalho, Terry, Lampard, Mikel, Ballack, Malouda, Drogba, Kalou, Anelka, J Cole, Sturridge, Alex, Belletti, Ferreira, Bruma, Borini, Turnbull.

MAN CITY (from): Given, Taylor, Richards, Zabaleta, Onuoha, Toure, Lescott, Boyata, Garrido, Sylvinho, Bridge, Johnson, Wright-Phillips, Ireland, Vieira, Barry, De Jong, Ibrahim, Tevez, Bellamy.

LAST MEETING

Man City 2-1 Chelsea (5 December 2009)

PREDICTION

Ok, so I could go on about how City have won just 3 from 13 away games in the league this season whilst we’ve taken 37 points from 39 available at home. Or I could talk about how City have failed to score in their last 7 games at Stamford Bridge and we’ve kept 13 clean sheets in the league so far – albeit with Petr Cech between the sticks. Or, I could even balance that with a warning that Tevez has scored in his last 3 starts against us in the league but whether any of that will have any bearing on what will probably be a pretty unpredictable encounter, is anyone’s guess. In fact, the only thing we can say for sure about this one is the ref will probably have the hardest game.

REFEREE

Mike Dean

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