The scene is the grand hall of St. Chelsea of Stamford Bridge School for Bi-Polar Excellence, somewhere in a leafy suburb in South West London Town. The uniformed students in varying degrees of piety and wretchedness stand in front of the main stage area, smirking and generally joshing as young men do. Some are mere scruffy haired urchins, others the model of senior pupil sartorial elegance. The Master of Ceremonies bangs the gavel three times onto the raised dais and in a slow but calm booming voice calls out the assembled throng.

“Please be standing for your Headmaster, the Right Reverend Dr. Anthony Jockstrap Blueheart-Glover.”

Silence descends upon the sniggering hordes and expressions change from boyish grins into respectful... nay fearful... frowns. Their moment is near. The Headmaster stands at the dais, peers over his funky designer vari-focal glasses, his authority visible through the glowering eyes and furrowed brow. The mortar board is tilted slightly as if just ever so slightly being positioned for a launching across the sea of faces at the first person to snigger, cough or twitch. No smile shows on his face. He merely exhibits a blank tableau of emotionless coldness. This is the moment of truth for the everyone in the school, from pupils to teachers and patrons alike.

“Gentlemen, you may sit... quietly.”

He gathers his thoughts through a moment’s pause, allowing...

This was a momentous week in the lives of all those who love Chelsea Football Club, which by any standards is an experience like few others in how to experience such extremes of despair and joy. After two years of a trophy room starting to smell a bit musty due to nobody having any reason to open it, two years of Champions League heartbreak, two years of missed Premier League opportunities, two years which saw us lose to the detestable Spurs in full public view at Wembley, the rot was finally stopped by a superb and well deserved win over fellow Blues Everton at Wembley.

Much has been said over the last few years about the tarnished image of the FA Cup, about its faded romance and its dimming light under the full on glare of allegedly greater competitions. When I say greater I actually mean richer and more financially lucrative. The All Conquering Sky Premier League and The Megabucks Behemoth that is The Champions League have certainly done their utmost to relegate the season’s showpiece finale to that of nothing more than an amusing folly. The influx of foreign coaches has further encouraged this view as well, steeped as they are in footballing cultures where the idea of a knockout competition is an anathema to a season’s toil of strategy and skill. For the likes of the triumvirate of evil, Tubby Benitez and Arsehole Wenger,...

The Diary of a Dorset Dairy (well a holiday near a dairy farm actually)

The Rural Idyll

My soul enervated by the stresses and disappointments of our Champions League campaign, I was driven to seek solace and spiritual rejuvenation in the Deep South.

Yes, a week in the bucolic loveliness that is the county of Dorset. What better tonic for the flagging spirits than the mythical Wessex of Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), one of England’s great men of letters.

Hardy always considered himself a poet first and foremost. Indeed following the hostile reception from a conservative middle England to his last two great novels, Tess of the D’Urbervilles and Jude the Obscure, he concentrated on his poetry which, while considered decent enough and championed by some, never reached the heights of his best prose.

Surely, there is something instructive here for those who would react to the hostility that greeted two fine, compelling League titles, by hankering for recognition through the very different form of the Champions League?

How best to summarise the work of Thomas Hardy? The Oxford Companion to English Literature is a good place to start.

“The underlying theme of many of the novels, the short poems, and the epic drama The Dynasts is, in Binyon’s words, ‘the implanted crookedness of things’; the struggle of man against the indifferent...

Updated Monday, 1 June 09, 10:15 AM

Match reports

The Observer, Paul Wilson: "This is the first trophy Chelsea have won since Jose Mourinho signed off his silverware account with victory against Manchester United here two years ago, and as the outstanding Florent Malouda was unlucky to be denied a third goal with a shot that bounced down from the crossbar and over the line, there was no case for arguing that they were not worthy winners."

Independent on Sunday, Steve Tongue: "Yellow was the colour at a brilliantly sunny Wembley yesterday as Chelsea, in their second strip, deservedly won the FA Cup after the shock of conceding the fastest goal in the 137-year history of the final. Louis Saha's stunning effort after 25 seconds was the high point of the afternoon for Everton by a long way, one that they rarely threatened to approach. Chelsea were level within 20 minutes through Didier Drogba's header, and Frank Lampard, second only to Florent Malouda as their leading performer, won an enjoyable game that...

Are we sitting comfortably folks, or are we crossed legged with the sheer excitement of Saturday’s Big Cup Final? Or is it because you’re all still pissing yourselves with laughter at Manchester Village FC’s humbling at the feet of Flamenco Footballing Kings, Barcelona in last night’s Irrelevant Cup Final? Anyway sit back and enjoy another edition of now re-named Bi-Polar Express. Many thanks to Clive, one of our regular readers living with a beautiful doctor called Mrs Clive somewhere in the wilds of the untamed West Country, who came up with that most apt of names for a sort of regular Chelsea FC rant/whinge/rumour/scandal sheet.

Why Bi-Polar Express. Well, for the uninitiated it came to light recently that the mighty Danny Baker, broadcasting through the ether on the British Broadcasting Corporation's generally excellent (except during Wimbledon fortnight) Radio 5 Live had drawn the conclusion that his most hated of teams, Chelsea, had the most bi-polar set of fans known to footballdom. We either proclaim our utter superiority and start predicting domination of England and Europe the like of which hasn’t been seen since some Italians decided to have a jolly boys outing a couple of millennia ago. Failing that we want everyone out at the club or else we’re doomed to be the real new Leeds, free-falling to a point so low they’d have to re-open the old 4th Division...