They will finish fifth whether they win, lose or draw against Derby County at Stamford Bridge on Sunday.

It will signal the end of the league career's of several players, some of whom will be sorry to leave, others relieved.

If selected Roberto Di Matteo will make his exit relieved that his personal nightmare of the past two seasons will be over.

Di Matteo had a major falling out with Blues' boss Gianluca Vialli and the two single-minded Italians have not spoken properly for many months.

Di Matteo has returned to the side of late, and after a couple of poor matches, is beginning to return to the form that saw him sparkle in the last FA Cup triumph in 1997.

His goal after 24 seconds, the quickest Wembley final goal, has already ensured his place in the Chelsea Hall of fame.

It's now open season in terms of transfer speculation following the announcement by Vialli that he will be lowering the average age of his squad.

With the first team squad averaging over 31 years of age, it's no surprise that the team ran out of steam at the later and most crucial stages of the season.

However it was a strategy that Vialli, Ken Bates and Colin Hutchinson entered into quite happily. They thought that seasoned winners with vast experience behind them would see them win a major trophy every year.

If Chelsea do not win the FA Cup on May 20 against Aston Villa, Chelsea will have gone two seasons without winning a trophy.

It will call into question the wisdom of the strategy.

Vialli's insistence of bringing in youth is an acknowledgement of that failure.

It will have hurt Vialli deeply that his vision for success has failed. He is a deeply proud man, but he has shown himself to be inexperienced at the highest level and made terrible errors of judgements.

The signing of Chris Sutton, the most obvious and expensive. Sutton was signed as a last minute face-saver, when Delvechio and Nistelrooy were not signed.

With Pierluigi Casiraghi out for the season, Vialli fell into the trap of knee-jerk reaction and bought Sutton without knowing how to use him.

Other question marks over Vialli this season has been his inability to make tough and quick decisions to change the nature of a game.

He is meticulous in pre-planning matches, but points are not won on the drawing board. Time and again, Vialli has ignored Graham Rix's on-the-spot advice and Chelsea have suffered.

The biggest plus from the past two seasons, is that Vialli is astute enough to know where he went wrong.

His choice of new players will be critical. If they are not successful next season, it could well be his last at Stamford Bridge.

With that in mind, Vialli may make an emotional return to playing action on Sunday.

The result is immaterial and Vialli will use the occasion to rest some of his FA Cup final team. He will not want to risk them getting any injuries or exacerbating niggling ones they have been playing on with.

To that extent, I believe that Vialli will rest Leboeuf, Des-champs, Desailly, Petrescu, Ferrer, Poyet, Weah and Flo.

He might well play up along side Sutton, with Zola sitting in behind the front two.

The midfield will comprise of Wise, Morris, Di Matteo and Harley. Melchiot, Lambourde, Thome and Babayaro will make up the rest.

It would be great to see Dalla Bona, Pecassi and the exciting youngster Leon Knight make an appearance and they could all well figure at some point from the bench.

Derby are safe from relegation worries and will come to the Bridge relaxed. It should be an exciting and open match.

Everybody's thoughts at Stamford Bridge are geared towards the cup final.

Have you heard the Cup Final song? I have and while I'm not a music critic, even I know it's..........well, listen out for it at the megastore and judge for yourself.

You might even get Marcel Desailly to sign a copy if you pop into the store between 5pm and 6pm today (Friday) The Rock will be making a personal appearance.

Celestine Babayaro will be available for the cup final after a friendly for Nigeria against Qatar on May 21 was can-celled. Nigeria had called up the left back under the three-day rule and he would have missed the Wembley date.