"It's a lot better to hope than not to"

I can't remember the last time I looked forward to a game so much as I'm now looking forward to Chelsea v Forest on Sunday. Strange, really, when my head tells me we'll be lucky if Chelsea keep it down to an English opening bat score.

But my heart tells me different stories. My heart watched Chelsea struggle against Wycombe. My heart saw them not turn up at Anfield. My heart has us hanging on desperately for a draw and to nick it deep into injury time.

I've no idea what any of my other organs feel about the subject.

But Chelsea weren't always the money-rich, steamroller of English football. Oh no.

Back in 1988, I was living in South East London and stuck for something to do on a Saturday, three of us decided to travel with local Charlton fans to their do or die last match of the season showdown with fellow relegation strugglers Chelsea. Whoever lost went down, a draw and Chelsea would be unlucky.

As the three of us travelled by tube to the game, we became aware that one of us wasn't saying much, the scouser of the trio had chosen, probably wisely, to keep his accent to himself in a tube train full of Londoners. Us other two could pull off the lazy English language murdering drawl of the capital, so talked away at length about subjects we knew the Mickey felt strongly about, but couldn't comment. Shame.

Into the away end for added protection, it became very clear how big a s**t hole the old Stamford Bridge was. Lumps of concrete flying in both directions pulled directly from under the feet of the spectators.

The match itself was awful, the ball only touched the floor twice, and both times it was the ball coming off the back of the net. I can't remember who scored first, but I can remember Chelsea scoring. A mass of celebrating arms waved around directly in front of us, a bit strange as we had deliberately chosen the away end for the protection of Metropolitan's Police finest. Nicely placed in the middle of the away end were roughly 100 Chelsea fans intent on beating the c**p out of anything with a pulse. Great, I thought, I'm going to get (at that time) my second slapping at football, and it's not even supporting my own team.

The game finished 1:1 so Chelsea were relegated. Unimaginable at the moment but give it another couple of years and it could be Chelsea "living the dream" in the bottom three of the Championship.

My heart tells me their demise starts on Sunday.