Bonjola and welcome to February 2004. Sporting Gijon have been reeling Real Madrid in, and the once 10 point gap is down to 4. More importantly, the dream of the Bees winning the Copa Del Rey is alive and well, can they make it happen and take us one season closer to world domination?

A routine win over Valladolid gets us off and running towards the finish line. Sibi is low-key the most important player at the club. A top performer.

Freund sees off Real Sociedad, the type of opponent we often struggle with. But not tonight!

This sort of thing has happened often this season. The Valencia keeper making 14 saves is mammoth, it’s more points dropped though.

And yet more here, though from 1-0 down we maybe should be thankful for the point.

The Champions League clash with Espanyol lets us get back to winning ways.

Back to domestic action and another draw. That league title is slipping away.

Celta are brushed aside to get us back on the straight and narrow.

Oh, hello. A ray of light.

Into the semis of the Champions League. Sibbers again the man for the big occasion.

It’s a repeat of last year’s (one sided) final. The other semi final was not on my bingo card.

Depor are beaten by the F squad.

That sets us up nicely for the falling giants of Barcelona, who have been midtable fodder all season and we treat them as such in a mighty 5-1 win.

Real Madrid lose at Espanyol, so the gap is back to 4 points.

The good news week continues with the first leg win over Juve. Yep, look at the second scorer…

He also gets us motoring in our Copa del Rey semi final. I don’t necessarily need to win, it’s all about the Bees, but a 4-0 first leg lead gives us every chance of at least being in control.

The Bees suffer a narrow defeat. I’m sure they can turn it around in a fortnight.

The Bank are hard to break down but eventually Chad Sexington manages. We needed that.

Even more so when Real Madrid can’t break down 10 men for 82 minutes.

The tension is creeping in. This win at Zaragoza might prove to be crucial one way or the other.

Real Madrid have lost the plot.

Whereas we’ve lost our keeper.

That’s a pickle. So now my options are to risk second choice Bengt Andersson or promote the Schmeichel regen, but I’ll need to give him back before the Bees play their second leg 2 days later.

Schmeichel Junior gets the call and despite an early setback, it’s job done.

Ah yes of course, Boro in the final.

Our 3rd high profile game in 5 days (playing Monday, Wednesday, Friday is absurd) sees us able to rotate the squad enormously, as we have a 4-0 first leg lead.

It’s not without issue but safely through.

What’s more important is the Bees. I’ve lent them Fournier (Blanc) to try and get this done.

THEY DID IT!

Drink it in.

We’ve got every chance now. Levante feel the wrath of our momentum.

It’s a bad time for our first league defeat since September.

The game in hand should help but we’re away to Real Madrid in a couple of games.

Freund sees off Bilbao to tee up the biggest game of the season.

A draw would do really. But being 2-0 down inside 8 minutes is not great for us however it seems to stoke Sibi’s fires and he plunders a hat-trick. Everybody else joins in. I think we’re going to win the league again, lads.

Ours to lose.

Las Palmas are about to be relegated and we do little to assist them.

This win over Oviedo seals the deal. Championnneesss

Some turnaround really but it was Real Madrid’s implosion rather than our brilliance.

Boro in the Champions League final then and this is their team. It’s not what you’d expect.

They are tough to break down but a solitary Bakayoko goal is enough.

The most average of nights from most players.

The league season is rounded off with a draw. Nobody cares.

10 points ahead in the end, 90 points seems to be the magic number for us but I didn’t expect it to be so easy in the end.

Final time and let me be clear. I do not want to win. Thankfully, Luccin doesn’t either and Cudicini’s surprise selection in goal eventually bares fruit as we lose to the Bees.

It’s great news. It means next season, the Bees will be in the Cup Winners Cup. So we just need them to win that and us to win the Champions League and then we’ll be the most dominant club in the world, ever ever. Probably.

Here’s the lads, the top, top lads.

Bakayoko is a dream.

Just the 55 goal involvements, as the kids would say.

Money is an issue though so I’ve accepted this £15m for the Ian Rush regen. It’ll clear their £4m of debt and also set us up to be able to replace him and more.

With Euro 2004 going on around us, I’m going to end in there. Primarily because it’s 11:55pm and I’ll be awoken in 6 hours but also because you’ve just read about a huge number of matches. The Bees are in Europe. We’ve won the double. It couldn’t have gone better. Can the Bees win the Cup Winners Cup? Let’s go round again…next Sunday. Bye for now.