"Move over, Rover, and let Chelsea take over"

"And gentlemen in England now a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap while any speaks
That fought with us at Stamford Bridge on Wednesday night."

Apologies to Mr Shakespeare, but that really sums it up. Any self-respecting Chelsea fans who missed this game must be kicking themselves.

There was an added buzz of anticipation before the game, as the press had been hyping it up all week as a "Clash of the Pretenders". We'd been a little more realistic than usual in the pub before the game, and nobody was forecasting anything more than a win by the odd goal - most of us knew that Villa are a good side and deserve some respect for the way they've been playing this season, but we were confident that Chelsea could beat them. As it turned out, we absolutely killed Villa in one of the most convincing displays of dominance that I've ever seen from a Chelsea side. How the score didn't end up 6-1 I'll never know.

The game, as usual, started off at a searing pace, with tackles flying in all over the place, which you'd expect from two sides with such a lot at stake. Villa looked strong defensively, and are without doubt superbly organised - everybody knows exactly what they're supposed to do, and they don't deviate from the script. Their forwards (Joachim and Dublin) are fast and mobile, and cause big problems for central defenders.

Frank Leboeuf had been given the job of marking Joachim, and you could tell that he had his hands full on the rare occasions when Villa mounted any sort of attack. Most of the time they were penned back into their own half, and Joachim found himself largely unemployed, but when Villa did break out Beefy was generally there to prevent Joachim from getting to the ball. There was, however, an occasion during the second half when they were standing on the half way line as the ball was punted upfield. We all held our breath as Joachim set off like a greyhound with a banger up its arse, with Beefy puffing along behind. Over the first fifteen yards Joachim was on his own, but Beefy gradually came back at him and ended up doing his trademark sliding tackle to rob the ball from Joachim as he was about to shoot. That says a lot about Beefy's character, and even more about the spirit of the team - at least two players took the trouble to jog 30 or 40 yards to give him a pat on the back.

That was later in the game, when Leboeuf had had a chance to get Joachim's measure, but early in the first half Joachim comprehensively roasted him but shot wide with only the keeper to beat. Chelsea attacked strongly, with Babayaro, Le Saux and Di Matteo all featuring strongly in midfield, while Zola and Vialli were scaring the shit out of Southgate and co. Vialli in particular was up to all his usual tricks, and looked more like a twenty-year-old than an old timer. Every time I see him play I'm amazed at his vision and commitment as well as his sheer technical ability. I've said it before, and people usually laugh, but I really believe that there's no centre forward in the Premiership to beat him when he's playing like he is this season.

After about half an hour the pressure paid off, with Southgate upending Di Matteo on the edge of the box. The excitement was intense: we all knew who would take the free kick, but so did Villa. Two defenders were obviously preparing to charge the kick down, but Zola spotted them and cleverly dummmied them into rushing him before the kick was taken. The ref was now on their case, so they didn't dare do it again, and Zola had time to pick his spot, bending the ball round the wall into the top corner of the goal. The celebrations were even sweeter than usual, with the crowd taking savage delight in going 1-0 up against the leaders of the Premiership.

Unfortunately we only had 90 seconds to celebrate before Villa scored what I'm told was a brilliant equaliser through the excellent Colin Hendrie. Equally unfortunately I can't confirm or deny this, because I was in the bog at the time, having gambled that not much could possibly happen so soon after going into the lead...

I can tell you that Villa's goal was completely against the run of play, although if the goal was as good as they said it was, fair play to them. Chelsea ran the show, and the only thing that stopped us being 3-1 up at the break was Oakes the Magnificent. He saved one certain goal from Babayaro with his arse, we couldn't believe it..

The second half was even more one-sided. Joachim and Dublin were stuffing their ands down their shorts to stay warm most of the time, and soon Dublin left Joachim on his own to help out the increasingly battered Villa defence. Their goal was besieged from the first minute, and we spent almost the entire half holding our heads in our hands, then looking at each other in disbelief, wondering how the ball hadn't gone in. It was that sort of game.

The dull moments of the half, which were few and far between, were enlivened by a display of simian brutishness from the appalling Collymore, who wasn't even on the park ! He was warming up down the touchline in front of us, and was a natural target for the Chelsea section of the crowd. Chants of "Ulrika, Ulrika" should have gone ignored, but Mr. Collymore decided to argue the toss with some lucky fans, culminating in a superb comedy routine where a pissed bloke in a suit took off his jacket and started shadow boxing as if to challenge Collymore, who responded by inviting the bloke to come over and fight him. The crowd were predictably enraged, and started yelling even more insults. The best of these were "You can't fight him, Collymore, his tits aren't big enough", and "Come over here and fight me like a woman, Stan". How we laughed, in between screaming abuse at the idiot.

Things nearly got out of hand when the ball went out of play near where the wanker was warming up. Vialli went to take a quick throw, only to be body-checked by Collymore. That must be the closest anybody's come to being sent off without even being on the park. The crowd were absolutely beside themselves, but the ref chose to try to calm things down by ignoring Collymore's blatant obstruction. If you ask me the fucker has got a screw lose somewhere. All substitutes get a bit of abuse, but most either ignore it or have a bit of a laugh with the abusers, which usually leads to at least a bit of grudging applause, if nothing else. Unfortunately, Collymore has got about as much grace as a 1949 Ford Popular, and loses it even when insulted by a few drunks. Given his psychopathic nature, we shouldn't be surprised when we read of his shameful exploits in the tabloids. He's no better on the pitch, either, as the ever-increasing list of injured players who've been subjected to his "tackling" will tell you.

The last 20 minutes of the game were almost unbelievably frustrating, with a welter of shots at the Villa goal either being tipped over the bar by Oakes, or rebounding off the uprights or being cleared off the line by the increasingly stretched defenders. Flo had come on for Zola, and Poyet for Babayaro, who'd had a fatastic game. Just when we thought that Villa had got away with it, in the fourth and last minute of extra time, Chelsea forced a corner, which was flicked on at the near post for Flo to head powerfully into the net. Cue absolute pandemonium, only equalled when we scored the first goal in the Cup Final last year. It was completely mental, with total strangers hugging and kissing each other in an unseemly display of pure joy. You wouldn't have wanted to be anywhere else that night, it's as simple as that. I looked up at one point to see the superb sight of at least five Villa players sinking to their knees in disbelief...

The final treat was to see John Gregory leaping off the bench to hurl abuse at Collymore, who'd come on with a couple of minutes to go, because he'd uselessly headed the ball out of play. How we chortled. AND the maniac managed to get booked in the short time he was on the pitch...

Fortunately we only had a minute to wait for the final whistle, and when it came we all ment mental again. We stuck around to sing the amusing, if crude: "Fuck all, you're gonna win fuck all" to the disgruntled Villa fans as they shuffled out. It was our evening, and it was glorious. Third place in the league, with a two point gap and a game in hand. The performance by the team was simply superb. It's hard to argue with the people who're tipping us for the championship after a display like that...

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