Surely not? Not again? Whisper it very quietly, but Chelsea have a really good chance of winning the Club World Cup this summer after the latest round of results!
Chelsea’s route to the advanced stages already looked favourable, but now it’s looking even more favourable.
Al-Hilal knocked Manchester City out of the Club World Cup overnight in a 4-3 win which was a massive shock. And this came after a Thiago Silva led Fluminense knocked Inter Milan out (a moment of silence for our Jai).
Chelsea now face Palmeiras in the quarter finals on Saturday, and then IF they manage to win that one, they will play the winner of Al-Hilal and Fluminense in the semi-finals. Quite incredible really!
Of course, it’s important to not get complacent as well and also realise that there are no bad teams left in the competition and any of these fixtures can be real banana skins. The Brazilian sides literally turn up with heart and give everything they’ve got, they will not go down without a fight, if they even go down at all. So we still have some very tough games coming up. However, you’d surely rather be facing any of our potential opponents in the next rounds than Manchester City or Inter, right?
I don’t even think Palmeiras is going to be easy and in fact, will be far from it. But we should be beating them and in all honesty, we have the quality and should be moving right into the final now looking at these games.
Work to do, we have to be on it, but if our players turn up and show the form they have been showing, then we should be on to a winner here.
No expectations from me of course, I’ll take it game by game, but it’s certainly a favourable outlook for us!