No, it has nothing to do with Alison Bender…
…well, maybe a little. I mean, she may not be a Bundchen sister, but I wouldn’t kick her out of bed for eating celery.
But the real reason I’m rooting for Chelsea is this:
The top four teams in the Premiership qualify for the UEFA Champions League, the top European football competition. The 5th-place finisher, the FA Cup winner and the Carling Cup winner all qualify for UEFA Cup, the 2nd-level European competition. The 6th-place finisher qualifies for Intertoto Cup, a summer competition that feeds into the UEFA Cup.
Chelsea, however, won the Carling Cup, and since that club is a lock to qualify for next year’s Champions League, that UEFA Cup spot goes to the sixth-place team, and the Intertoto spot goes to the 7th-place finisher.
Unlike the Carling Cup, though, if the FA Cup winner qualifies for the Champions League, the runner-up gets the UEFA Cup spot. But what if both the winner and runner-up qualify for Champions League?
Manchester United won its FA Cup semifinal against Watford on Saturday. If Chelsea beats Blackburn in the other semifinal, then the top two teams in the Prem will play for the Cup. So a Chelsea win means that UEFA Cup spot will go to the next team on the Prem table — the 7th-place team — and the Intertoto spot goes to the 8th-place team.
Right now, Reading is in 8th place, thanks to their win over Fulham on Saturday. The Royals are a point behind Portsmouth and just barely ahead of Tottenham Hotspur on goal differential. A Chelsea win means Reading puts in the Intertoto spot. (For now, anyway. Tottenham plays Wigan tomorrow and is expected to jump above both Reading and Portsmouth.)
So if you’re a fan of Reading, Portsmouth, Spurs, or even Everton, which is in 6th place but only two points ahead of Portsmouth, you want Chelsea to win on Sunday, because that increases your team’s chances of qualifying for Europe. Blackburn has stumbled down the table, and its only hope for UEFA Cup qualification is beating Chelsea.
I just like the idea of Reading qualifying for Europe after toiling away in the lower leagues for its entire existence. Of course, I’ve watched Hoosiers five times and became a basketball fan for life when NC State won it all in 1983. That ought to tell you something…
