After a bleak week, the cup final is a welcome ray of sunshine

It's been a bad week. Two important 1-0 leads turned into 1-1 draws is enough to get any supporter down, but the actual results have been blown away by a pair of highly unsavoury, one -- the more important, obviously -- bringing shame upon the club and one upon match referee Martin Atkinson. A racism scandal and a refereeing debacle, combined with two awful results? Yes, a bad week indeed.

The inclination is to let everything that's happened since last Tuesday fester. There's an unsettling mix of disappointment, anger and embarrassment floating around the Chelsea fanscape at present, and while we would do well not to forget what's happened, we also can't let it define our season. We're in the Capital One Cup final, five points clear at the top of the Premier League table, and in good shape to advance to the quarterfinals of the Champions League. A bad week, but an excellent season.

The focus cannot be on Aktinson's refereeing on Saturday, the FA's handling of Nemanja Matic's red card, or endless replays of what happened in the Richelieu Drouot metro station. On Sunday, six days from now, we have probably our biggest match of the season, a chance to lift silverware for the first time in more than 18 months, and an opportunity for revenge from the 5-3 humiliation we suffered at White Hart Lane on January 1st.

It's easy to lose track of where we are in the season, and easy to dismiss the League Cup as a second-rate competition, but why stick with the frankly exhausting negatives when we have a chance to be happy. Sunday means a trip to Wembley, a match we should have every hope of winning, and we'd all be in much better psychic shape if we celebrated that rather than focused endlessly on the trials and tribulations of the week we've just had.

The team needs the supporters at their best, both for Sunday and for the rest of the season. Our next match is something to get exited about, so we might as well take the opportunity to smile while we can.