The title is between Arsenal and Rooney

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Date	Time	C	Opponent	F	A	R	S
20 Mar	5:45 PM	P	West Ham United (H)	2	0	Win

I absolutely love this time of year. The days are warmer and longer, the air is fresher, and the football is getting serious.

It's only now that the Champions League starts to mean anything. The group stages are, more often than not, a tedious and boring formality with predictable results that aren't at all memorable or important in the long run.

It's around this time every year that we are essentially watching history unfold; the best teams and players are going to play in games that their fans will never forget.

Chelsea and Real Madrid won't be among them, though. Real's recent history in this competition is really baffling. I really had the feeling this year that they would go all the way, or at least knock out an English club or two.

Chelsea's decline, though, makes sense. It feels like they've been living on borrowed time since Mourinho left. Hiddink is the best manager they've had since the special one, adding a bit of spark into the team, but he's gone and yet another manager has inherited what is still almost entirely Mourinho's team.

When they beat us at the Emirates I praised their recent stability; despite their spending power, they've kept the same group of players together for about four years, and some of them longer, in stark contrast to our non-stop revolving door at Arsenal. At that point they looked like the team to beat, but they've actually looked pretty ordinary in every game since. They need fresh faces and fresh ideas. They can't carry on being Mourinho's team without Mourinho.

As for the teams remaining in Europe, you'd have to say we're up there with the favourites. I said about a month ago that we could win it if we avoid Chelsea and United, so it's convenient that at least one of them is out of the way. As good as Barca and Inter look right now, I don't fear them nearly as much, but perhaps that's just because it's less humiliating than losing to another English team, rather than them being at all inferior?

Back home it's hotting up too - eight games left and at the moment it looks like a fight between Chelsea, Arsenal and Wayne Rooney for the title. At this point in time, I feel like Chelsea really could end up finishing third.

I wrote United off earlier in the season, and in many ways they've been a one-man team, but that one man is on fire at the moment, and as long as that continues, Arsenal will need about three key players to match up to Rooney's influence.

Obviously Vermaelen is key, and Campbell's form as long as Gallas is out, but I've said all season long that our defence isn't our strong point, so for me the three key men are Fabregas, Arshavin and Bendtner to simply help us out-score our opponents. Fabregas just has to keep doing what he's been doing all season, Arshavin needs to raise his all-round game and effectiveness, and Bendtner has to keep having Stoke and Hull moments, scoring headers and tap-ins at crucial points in difficult games.

I said yesterday that we've done well enough to get to where we are now, considering where we were in November, to call this season something of an achievement, but obviously that doesn't stop me obssessing over how this could finally be our year, and I hope that continues for as long as possible.

I'd certainly expect us to still be in the race after one of our easier-looking games in the run-in on Saturday. If we do slip up, it would be a real shame to do it against West Ham at home. We're better than that.

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