Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP/Getty ImagesChelsea's Ashley Cole practices in Yokohama ahead of Thursday's match against Monterrey

The last 15 years have been a great time to be a Chelsea fan. An existence that previously had been shaped by mediocrity interspersed with momentary highs and sickening lows has been replaced by an almost constant upward trajectory towards national, continental and global recognition.

The latest step on this adventure takes the club into uncharted territory as it arrives in Japan to contest the FIFA Club World Cup and earn the right to be called world champions. The road travelled from the lower reaches of Division Two that Chelsea frequented when my father first took me to Stamford Bridge in the early 1980s could barely be any longer.

- Oscar: Chelsea must win

Back then the thought of sitting at the top table of world and European football was so fanciful it was not even a consideration. Realistic sights were instead set on a successful bid for promotion or a Cup upset enhanced by the rare glimpse of the Blues on The Big Match or Match of the Day.

In contrast, Liverpool bestrode European football like the colossus they were. By far the best team in England, it felt as if they won the Football League every single year often adding a League Cup or a European Cup into the trophy cabinet for good measure.

As strange as it might seem now, it was Liverpool I watched (though certainly did not support, unlike the majority of those in my primary school playground in West London, or at least those who didn't support QPR – that's how far Chelsea have come) to experience the glamour of the very pinnacle of club football.

Having won 'the cup with the big ears' against Roma in 1984, Liverpool won the right to compete in the forerunner of the FIFA World Club Cup, the Inter-Continental Cup, which pitched the champions of Europe against their counterparts from South America.

Although the match was played in Tokyo and broadcast back to England at some ungodly hour, the lure of a match that appeared to me to drip with prestige was too hard to resist and my dad and I watched Liverpool lose 1-0 to Independiente of Argentina in a dour game. But the entertainment on offer was less important to me at that age than what it signified.

As a boy, those titanic clashes always captivated me. I can remember them all with varying degrees of clarity including Sir Alex Ferguson's Aberdeen dispatching the mighty Real Madrid in the 1983 UEFA Cup Winners Cup Final. The distant crackling commentary of the era that gave the coverage of those far-flung matches a distinctive feel that almost seemed to deliberately emphasise to an 8-year-old boy just how removed Chelsea were from competing on such a stage.

But almost three decades on, that unreality will come tantalisingly within touching distance when Petr Cech leads the team out in Yokohama Thursday against Monterrey of Mexico, though any presumptions over the result should be avoided.

In the intervening years football and the very competition has changed remarkably. The sport's broadening global appeal means that the title of world's best is not simply a contest between the game's traditional powerhouses. The FIFA Club World Cup - that began life in 2000 when Manchester United incurred the wrath of English football by attending the inaugural tournament in Brazil and forsaking the FA Cup as a consequence - has sought to become more inclusive and has invited the champions of each continent to take their rightful place.

With Europe and South America representatives kept apart and only entering the tournament as it reaches the last four, the final has largely been the preserve of the two favourites. Except for one year.

In 2010, TP Mazembe of the Democratic Republic of Congo broke the duopoly by stunning Brazilian club Internacional in the semifinal. Although they lost to Rafael Benitez's Inter Milan in the next round, a warning shot was fired across the bows of the fancied clubs: the rest of the world was catching up.

Thus far, Europe's record of making the final remains unblemished but there is always a first time for everything. While I confess to knowing next to nothing about domestic Mexican football (any experts please share your knowledge in the comments sections), the Mexico national team is almost always very impressive when they compete in major tournaments and I hope to see not one ounce of complacency when Chelsea take the field against Monterrey.

If that considerable hurdle can be overcome, then perhaps another childhood dream can be realised in the final on Sunday. And this time there won't be a Scouser in sight.

Follow Phil Lythell on Twitter @PhilLythell

• Recommend0
• Tweet0
• Email