SOCCER: Chelsea are waiting anxiously on the results of a scan that Arjen Robben is due to have today to determine the extent of an ankle injury he sustained at Blackburn on Wednesday.
The winger was forced off early at Ewood Park by an Aaron Mokoena challenge, having scored what proved to be the winning goal, and has been waiting for the swelling to go down.
Chelsea's manager Jose Mourinho immediately ruled him out of Sunday's game at home to Manchester City and should now learn whether the Dutchman will miss the Champions League tie in Barcelona on February 23rd or the League Cup final against Liverpool four days later.
Robben seems certain to sit out Holland's friendly against England next Wednesday.
Mourinho yesterday, however, enjoyed the luxury of looking down on the scrap for second place in the Premiership - and insisted he is no longer concerned about Chelsea's two closest rivals.
Chelsea have stretched the gap to 11 points over Manchester United and 12 over Arsenal - and Mourinho believes the main competition is now focused on the runners-up spot.
Mourinho said: "Manchester United are second now, a few days ago it was Arsenal but it's not our problem because at the moment they have a big fight for second place. They have to fight each other to see who can be more comfortable there.
"We need to win nine matches and draw one to be sure of winning the league and I don't care about Manchester United, I don't care about Arsenal, I just care about us.
"We are just concentrating on what we have to do. I watched the match on Tuesday, it was a great game between two sides who both wanted to win and although I would have preferred a draw it was better for us that Manchester United won because Arsenal were closer to us."
Chelsea were made to fight every inch of the way in the 1-0 win at Blackburn on Wednesday night but Mourinho claims his players have shown that they will not be intimidated by dirty tricks.
He added: "I am very, very confident that we can cope with whatever we face. If we go to another stadium and the same thing happens we can cope. If we go to Bolton or Everton and they have also watered the pitch to make it very heavy we have shown we can cope with that too.
"We are showing we are ready for everything - we can play football and we can fight."
Chelsea were indebted to goalkeeper Petr Cech for saving a Paul Dickov penalty - and in doing so surpassing the record of his "greatest idol" Peter Schmeichel.
Cech has now gone 781 minutes without conceding a goal and has moved past 694 minutes set by Schmeichel for Manchester United in 1997.
Meanwhile, the battle lines have been drawn as Merseyside's big two fight it out over their respective 13 remaining matches for the £20 million pot of gold which comes from Champions League qualification.
Everton and Liverpool, now fourth and fifth in the Premiership, face a nerve-shredding run-in to the end of the season.
Everton, on 47 points after Wednesday night's 1-0 win over Norwich, hold a seven-point lead over Liverpool and are 10 points clear of the rest with what seems a certain UEFA Cup place as their reward after a remarkable campaign.
While Everton might say otherwise, the pressure is all on them. Twice this week they will have played 24 hours after a Liverpool fixture. Liverpool cut that lead to four points by winning at Charlton on Tuesday evening but David Moyes' side responded by restoring it to seven the next night against the Canaries.
On Saturday Liverpool are again in action first, at home to Fulham, with Everton facing a tough trip to Southampton on Sunday.
Liverpool look to have the slightly easier run-in, with only one match - away to Arsenal - against teams in the top three. Everton must play Chelsea and Manchester United at home and travel to Highbury to face the champions.
But it could all end up depending on the Merseyside derby at Anfield on March 20th, a game Liverpool may have to win to have any chance of cutting Everton's lead.
Manchester United last night received planning permission to complete the expansion of Old Trafford. Trafford Borough Council agreed to United's proposals to fill in the north west and north east corners of the ground, a move which will raise the capacity of the stadium to 76,000. The additional 7,900 seats could net the club £5 million per season.
Work will commence before the end of the current campaign with the new seats set to be installed prior to the 2006-07 season.
The increased capacity will mean Old Trafford will be second only in size to the new Wembley among football stadia in Britain.
EVERTON'S RUN-IN - Feb 2nd: Southampton (a); Feb 12th: Chelsea (h); Feb 26th: Aston Villa (a); Mar 6th: Blackburn (h); Mar 20th: Liverpool (a); Apr 2nd: West Brom (a); Apr 10th: Crystal Palace (h); Apr 16th: Arsenal (a); Apr 20th: Manchester Utd (h); Apr 23rd: Birmingham (h); April 30th: Fulham (a); May 7th: Newcastle (h); May 14th: Bolton (a).
LIVERPOOL'S RUN-IN - Feb 5th: Fulham (h); Feb 12th: Birmingham (a); Mar 5th: Newcastle (a); Mar 20th: Everton (h); Apr 2nd: Bolton (h); Apr 9th: Manchester City (a); Apr 16th: Tottenham (h); Apr 19th: Portsmouth (a); Apr 23th: Crystal Palace (a); Apr 30th: Middlesbrough (h); May 7th: Arsenal (a); May 14th: Aston Villa (h); TBA: Blackburn (h).
