A blog of two halves

Champions League preview

Chelsea and Manchester City battle it out on Saturday week to be crowned kings of Europe.

19 May 2021
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The current European Champion Clubs' Cup, awarded to the winner of the UEFA Champions League final on 29 May. PICTURE: GETTY IMAGES

With thousands of fans expected to jet to Portugal to watch Chelsea and Manchester City battle it out on Saturday week to be crowned kings of Europe, it's too close a match to call.

A few days ago, when Chelsea heads dropped after losing to Leicester in the FA Cup final at Wembley, it seemed that City would start the clear favourites.

Then City lost to Brighton and the Blues beat the Foxes in early-week Premier League games, and suddenly it looks an open contest once again.

Crucial to Chelsea's hopes is the form of creative talent Mason Mount, just named as the club's Player of the Year – the first graduate of the academy to lift the glass trophy since John Terry.

And it's JT that Chelsea come up against on the final day of the league season on Sunday, when the Blues travel to Villa Park hopeful of getting a result that keeps them ahead of Liverpool and Leicester in the war for Champions League slots next year.

If nippy forward Timo Werner can somehow manage to stay onside, and if the Blues show the passion and intensity that was on display when they held off Leicester for a 2-1 win on Tuesday, they should be fine.

It felt so different to be witnessing football in front of fans once again, although with only Blues supporters in the stadium there was an eerie silence when the Foxes clawed a goal back for a tense final quarter of an hour at Stamford Bridge.

With Jorginho comfortably beating Casper Schmeichel from the penalty spot, after Tony Rudiger netted the first, off his thigh, at the start of the second half.

On paper, comparing players, Premier champions Manchester City may have the edge ahead of the Champions League final, but Thomas Tuchel is as wily a tactician as Pep Guardiola, and anything can happen in 90 minutes.

The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and unless specifically stated are not necessarily those of Hammersmith & Fulham Council.

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Tim Harrison

Tim is our Chelsea FC blogger.

He also writes our Shepherds Bush Cricket Club match reports during the football close season.

Tim has been writing Chelsea match reports since the late 1980s for newspapers and, more recently, websites.

When he first reported on the Blues, the press box was a metal cage suspended over the lip of the old west stand - and you reached it via a precarious walkway over the heads of the fans.

But he has been a Chelsea fan since his father took an excited seven-year-old to watch Chelsea v Manchester United in the mid 1960s... and covered his ears every time the chanting got too ripe.

In July 2005 he wrote The Rough Guide to Chelsea, published by Penguin, which sold 15,000 copies.

His favourite player of all time is Charlie Cooke, the mazy winger who lit up Chelsea's left wing in the 60s and 70s.

When he isn't watching the Blues, Tim acts, paints, writes and researches local history.

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