UFO Info Week-End

Gianluca Festa shoulder is definitely out but two of Boro’s suspended midfielders Robbie Mustoe and Paul Gascoigne have completed their

Gianluca Festa (shoulder) is definitely out but two of Boro’s suspended midfielders, Robbie Mustoe and Paul Gascoigne, have completed their bans.The Gunners could again be without Dennis Bergkamp, Tony Adams, Patrick Vieira and Emmanuel Petit.. Chelsea 1

Zola 27
Sheffield Wednesday 1Booth 67Half-time: 1-0 Attendance: 34,451IT WAS Tango’s 36th birthday yesterday. Tango, for anyone who doesn’t know or doesn’t support Sheffield Wednesday, is the Owls’ number one fan who bravely bares his tubby midriff to the elements on terraces up and down the country without ever seeming to feel the effects.But he couldn’t have imagined, given Chelsea’s recent form, that he would be celebrating his latest excursion to the capital with a point on a ground where no one had managed a draw since Arsenal in early September. The fact that Wednesday managed to secure that point said much for the battling qualities of the Yorkshiremen who beat Manchester United on their last outing and are clearly improving.Chelsea, it has to be said, were below their best although, apart from the first 15 minutes when Andy Booth should have scored for the visitors, they had enough chances to have had the game won by half-time.It was during this period of domination that Chelsea scored, the evergreen Gianfranco Zola finishing off Celestine Babayaro’s superb run and cross with a rare header at the far post. It was the Italian’s seventh goal in 12 starts of a remarkable renaissance.Pavel Srnicek kept Wednesday in the game with three smart saves as Chelsea went for the jugular. But there was no further addition to the first-half score as the sun set gloriously over west London in contrast to the rest of a grey afternoon.Wednesday’s small but noisy throng of supporters gave their team a ticker- tape welcome at the start of the second period although there was no sign of the colourful travelling band which, sadly, no longer appears to be permitted at most away grounds.Booth missed an even better chance than his first-half effort, missing the target when clean through.

But he made no mistake with his third opportunity, sliding the ball home after a misunderstanding in the Chelsea defence.Both sides thereafter had chances to win the game and the Wednesday manager Danny Wilson swore his team should have had a penalty when Marcel Desailly appeared to handle just after the equaliser. “It was hand ball, there is no doubt about that,” Wilson said. “There would have been a hell of a roar if it had been at the other end.”Despite failing to further close the gap at the top of the table, Chelsea stretched their unbeaten run to 19 games and Wilson said they looked certain championship material. “They have got to be serious contenders with the amount of talent they’ve got.

You’d be naive to discount them.”The Chelsea manager Gianluca Vialli conceded that there were bound to be hiccups somewhere along the line. “I always like my team to be perfect and this is not always possible,” said the Italian who continues to give the air of being thoroughly relaxed. “We didn’t kill them off but last year we could even have lost this game They are a good team. Every time they play a side stronger than them on paper they give a good performance.”. Nottingham Forest 2

Bart-Williams 32, Freedman 44
Aston Villa 2Joachim 58, 63Half-time: 2-0 Attendance: 25,753IN HIS programme notes the Forest captain, Steve Chettle, expressed the hope that Dion Dublin’s form could be made to dip to the point where he would manage only a goal a game.Chettle and his defence did a rather better job on Dublin than that, denying him even the remotest sniff of a goal until injury time. Unfortunately, they were not as parsimonious with Julian Joachim.Joachim, displaced by Dublin and only recalled to the starting line-up because a virus denied Stan Collymore a sentimental return to the City ground, twice capitalised on defensive uncertainties within five minutes of the second half.Before that the league leaders, still smarting from their four goal beating by Liverpool last week, were being out-played and on their way to a second Premiership defeat.