FOOTBALL CLUB WORLD

With 3 weeks of the season to go, the title race is back on! Arsenal's 1-0 win over Manchester United leaves Chelsea 3 points behind the leaders with the pair facing off next Sunday. It would be truly incredible if Chelsea come back to win it from where they were just a few weeks ago, but they have the momentum right now.

They also had a fair bit of luck against Spurs on Saturday. Ancelotti's men did dominate the majority of the game, and Gomes has to go after another clanger, but we could all see that the first goal wasn't over the line and the second goal was offside. Chelsea probably should've had a penalty, so perhaps a draw would've been a fair result, but life isn't always fair.

Wins for Man City & a much improved Liverpool yesterday means they now look set for 4th & 5th respectively, and although I'm extremely sad about us missing out on a Champions League place, I'll be glad if we can avoid the Europa Cup and concentrate on our league campaign next season.

At the bottom, it's still extremely tight - every team from Newcastle in 12th downwards are still in trouble, but realistically I think three from the current bottom four will be relegated; Blackpool, Wigan, Wolves & West Ham. Blackburn have pulled themselves away for now with a vital win over Bolton & Birmingham are a point further ahead, but like the title race there's still time for some more twists & turns!

As for the fantasy week, it was quite a low scoring. I managed 89 points (thanks mainly to Reina, Silva, Pennant, Larsson & Suarez), but it could've been 100+ had I gone with Kuyt over the hugely disappointing Adam. Despite this mediocre total I moved up from 120th to 84th overall & back within 30 points of the Top 50, so I'm not giving up on that hope just yet!

On the barndoor I packed my team with next week's DGers, Man City & Spurs:

Hart, Kolarov, Gallas, Bale, De Jong, Sandro, Silva, Van Der Vaart, Suarez, Dzeko, Balotelli

I'm won't keep it like this as I don't want De Jong & Sandro. Paying 10 for Kolarov, 17 for Bale & 19 for VDV is killing my team, so one of them will have to go to balance things. I don't think I want both Dzeko & Balotelli either - if only we knew which Spurs striker would start then it would make life easier, but at the moment it's a lottery between Pav, Defoe & Crouch. I may go for a SG striker instead.

Anyway, I'll leave it there! Please let me know how you did in Week 35. What's your strategy for next week? Player Picks will be here on Wednesday.

Cheers,
AM