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CHELSEA FC: GRANT: THE IMPORTANT PART OF THE SEASON

/noticias.info/ When Chelsea entertained Manchester City at home back in late October, we were in seventh place in the league table, four places behind our opponents that day and seven points off top spot.

The emphatic 6-0 win that day loudly announced an intention to climb towards top spot and Avram Grant's side head up to Eastlands this weekend 22 points ahead of Man City.

With leaders Manchester United playing on Sunday, the chance is there to close the gap to just two points ahead of their kick-off at Middlesbrough.

'We need first to do our job,' Grant warned before anyone gets too carried away with breathing down the neck of the Old Trafford outfit.

'When I first took over, we were chasing five clubs, then four, then three, then two and Man United are now ahead of us. They have tough games and so do we also. We need to do our business and then maybe put a little pressure on them.

'We come now to the important part of the season and after we won so many games and won against Arsenal, we need to do everything to maybe pass one more team.'

There was some promising news as the end game begins over the fitness of Petr Cech, out for the last month with an ankle injury.

'He has been improving a lot,' Grant reported, rating the chance of the keeper being fit to join the squad for tomorrow's game as more than 50-50. 'We need to see after training how fit he is, but he is near the end of his recovery - maybe today, maybe tomorrow.

'He is almost ready but if not, we have other goalkepers who did a good job this year.'

The Chelsea manager agrees that six wins out of six maybe needed to overhaul the leaders but insists that no margin for error is nothing new for his players.

'Because we were chasing after all those other clubs, we have always said we have to win all the games. Now we are six games to the end, if we want to face Man United at Stamford Bridge in a good position, of course we have to win the game tomorrow.

'Maybe for the first time Man United are big fans of Man City,' he smiled.

Grant believes the tight title race means there is no chance the unfinished business against Fenerbahçe will prove a distraction - but he will be working on problems with focus on the pitch after Wednesday's Champions League defeat.

'I has happened to us two or three times that we have lost leads when we played well.

'It happened against Tottenham in one of our best performances; it happened against Fenerbahçe in one of our best performances this year.

'Maybe it is human nature. You feel that everything is going good and you don't need to be careful. This is the reason why people like football and this is the reason why I didn't like the game on Wednesday.

'First we need to continue to play good football like in those games but secondly we need to concentrate all the game.'

Before he began the journey to the north-west, Grant turned his thoughts away from first team matters to the youth team's FA Youth Cup final first leg. He watched Thursday evening's 1-1 draw in person.

'I enjoyed the game very much. I think the youth team played good yesterday and they deserved to win.

'It was a very good goal by Gaël Kakuta. He has a very good left-foot, is a good technical player, quick, good thinking, one of our biggest talents. There were very good players there and we are taking care also about the future of the club.'

Tomorrow's game can be seen live at Stamford Bridge, as we are able to offer a beamback service from the Blues Bar. Kick-off is at 3pm, and entry is £10. Tickets can be purchased from the Megastore only.

Bookmakers Paddy Power list Chelsea at 9/5 to be winning at both half time and full time tomorrow. notas_de_prensa_archivo