Russia

This is something I have been working on for a few months now, when I had the idea of writing an ebook or something similar on my experiences following Chelsea from the arrival of Jose Mourinho in 2004 to the present day. Let me know what you think.

I will never forget the night of April 30th 2008. Chelsea 3-2 Liverpool, 4-3 on aggregate. It meant we were going to Moscow and the first Champions League final in our history. The atmosphere at the Bridge that night was unlike anything I have ever heard, then or since. It was incredible and made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. The Matthew Harding Stand was literally shaking and my vocal chords took one almighty pounding.

After the pain of the semi final defeat in 2007 and the five-hour coach journey back from Anfield this was sweet revenge. If you had said to my Dad 20 years ago that he would have the chance to see his team in a Champions League final he would have thrown his head back and laughed. But in 2008 it became sweet reality.

Sarah Wilson gives us some exciting insights into her life abroad!

Troublemaker website Gawker.com has shamed magazine publisher Conde Nast by crowd-sourcing what it calls a "public service" Russian translation of a GQ piece on the bombing of blocks of flats in Russia ahead of Putin's first election in 1999.

Conde Nast prevented its own piece, entitled "Vladimir Putin's Dark Rise to Power", from appearing anywhere online or in US copies of GQ which were sent to Russia.

Over the last several years, the tensions between Europe and Russia have been increasing on topics ranging from trade to direct military confrontation.

It is well known, that a major part of gas and fossil energy used in Europe, originates from Russia and its controlled areas. It is also well known, that US has been planning to build a missile-defense shield all over the world - including areas bordering Russia. Russia has been complaining about the unjust situation that would follow such decisions.

Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya was killed two years ago this month, and today the trial of the three men accused of her murder begins in a Moscow military court. I was fortunate enough to interview this fearless, understated woman for Press Gazette a couple of years before she died (you can read it here). She recounted "stories so horrific that one’s hand refused to jot them down” of the appalling treatment that she witnessed of civilians in Chechnya by the Russian military - treatment of which she had first hand experience.