Time for Turnips on Your with Andrew – those Swedes are making quite the impact over in Spain…

Hello again and welcome back to Turnips on Tour where we continue to dream big and aim to make an all-star Swedish cast take its place at the top of European football. Last time out we started our second season by bolstering the squad, and whilst undefeated in the League Real Madrid are becoming a serious pain in the arse as they build a formidable squad around Alfonso. That said we are one trophy to the good with the Super Copa Espanola in the bag; one down five to go. Pep and the B-Boys are into the 3^rd round of the Cup Winners Cup, they’re not Swedish, but we’re cheering them on all the way. Here’s a reminder of the table.

We return(ip) to European competition as we travel to Estonia. We have a struggle of a first half until we are rescued by St Niclas Svensson, although Patrick Larsson does his best to screw things up. We top the group with a six-point lead and two games to go.

The immediate fixtures look nothing like a trip to Ikea for meatballs and hotdogs, anything but. Bloody Real Madrid.

Hierro to Zierro in just 12 minutes. A perfect start. Redondo hates his vegetables and throws a wobbler. Contreras played superbly to keep several chances out, 4-0 does not do this justice. Now we need to repeat it in 11 days’ time.

Alfonso is out injured and Real Madrid have barely anything to offer without him. Karlsson is the hero and we remain in the Copa del Ray, get in sson!

Celta are brushed aside, and we return to Champions League action at home to Steaua Bucharest. We are cruising at 4-0 when 3 minutes of madness see’s us sweating like turnips in a soup. It’s enough, we’re into the quarter finals.

Mmm-bop! Another classic instrumental from Mansson and Zaragoza are disposed of and our lead is extended to 6 points at the top of the table. This time Pochettino doesn’t lose his bottle and stays on the pitch to enjoy the defeat.

Next up it’s an opportunity to bag trophy number two of the season as we take on Nacional in the World Club Cup final. Whilst it’s a small squad, it contains a very special Uruguayan international…

Live from Tokyo in the worlds grandest club competition…a relatively flat game is won by the Swedish Santa Claus St Niclas Svensson! For some reason however, Ernstsson is now banned from European Competition for a game despite this booking coming in a non-European competition. Harsh.

We follow it up with a lame performance away to Sevilla in La Liga, a 1-1 draw against a 14^th placed side on poor form. The board agrees. Next up is a formality to wrap up our Champions League group stage against Benfica. Apparently, our 3-0 away victory is a “shock result”…meanwhile, the quarter final draw, similar to last year, is very unkind to us…

Back to La Liga, and a dynamic Danish duo are a thorn in our Turnip behinds. An abysmal 25 minutes see’s us looking into the abyss. We look like we are about to turn it round and win until a second yellow (oh no sson!) kills the game off. Luckily, Real Madrid lose and we keep our lead.

Our Copa del Ray quarter-final arrives and we put on a poor show against lowly Tenerife with a 2-2 draw in the home leg. It’s still winnable, but we are doing things the hard way this season.

Meanwhile, unconvincing wins at Sporting Mustard and Zaragoza keep us in top spot with Real Madrid and Real Betis in hot pursuit. Our struggles to dispatch poorer opposition do not bode well for the European Super Cup against Betis in January.

The first leg arrives, and we make a magnificent start, only to be pegged back right from the kick-off. The rest of the game is end-to-end and at the close Karlsson had the chance to grab a 4^th and 5^th but skied them into the atmosphere. That said, I’ll take that for a first leg. Better than Dortmund last season!

A herculean effort sees us beat Hercules 4-0, but the Real bus just keeps on winning too. The Turnips are into the semi-final of the Copa del Ray and for once, the draw appears to have been kind to us as we get second division Merida over two legs to reach the final.

We pay the piper as Racing are torn a new one. The only downside being an atrocious game in the sticks for Asper. Worrying to concede so many against 10 men occupying a spot in the bottom 4.

We move on to some pleasant winter sson in Mallorca, until our left back Larsson gets himself knacked for 3 weeks and will miss the 2^nd leg of the European Super Cup along with Prytz.

The return leg opens up and we have Betis on the ropes. St Nic, just back to full fitness from a recent layoff gets destroyed by Finidi. We absolutely batter the Betis goal with 30 shots, Ernstsson (on for Svensson) has two goals disallowed and our iron Ljung also sees the lino chalk one off.

Cup number three is in the bag! And with that we leave you with the turnips turnin’ it up. We’ve bagged Super Copa Espanola, World Club Cup and the European Super Cup. We’ve got Segunda side Merida in the Copa del Ray semi’s (likely another Betis match in the final), sit top of La Liga by 6 points…

…and play host to Juventus in the quarter finals of our Champions League journey, all to come in the final third of the season. Meanwhile the B-Boys have their Cup Winners Cup semi-final at Lazio coming up and remain top of the Segunda. See you next time to find out if our flat pack squad need a trip to Ikea for a bigger trophy cabinet!

You can follow Andrew on Twitter @kingoftherooks