An interesting Christmas for Cardiff City both on and off the pitch - as always.  No-one could say that following the Bluebirds is completely dull.

So what does 2010 hold for the promotion chasing Championship Club -as always the only certain thing is uncertainty - ie. who can say.

They welcome Blackpool to the Cardiff City Stadium in another must win match.  The on-field disappointments of losing to then bottom placed Plymouth and then to surrender a 4-0 half time lead to draw 4-4 with the replacement bottom club Peterborough was very poor form indeed.

Then the frozen match with Leicester and  the cup match with Bristol will now be squeezed in - all issues Dave Jones could do without.  Cardiff must find some consistency - beat the lower placed sides and draw or beat the promotion chasing sides - we need a run of matches like Nottingham Forest!

Well, on field is enough of a worry but the off-field seems a saga as well.  The News of the World article (I haven't seen it) yesterday was apparantly suggesting the club was in a parlous state - well, it has been since the later stages of the Sam Hamman era.  But I'm backing the comments of Peter Ridsdale.  He has delivered everything else he has committed to and the finances will probably be the same.

He does support risky creative schemes however.  Leeds back-fired on him when player contracts were not owned by the club and his inspired advance season ticket scheme could go either way.  The alleged £3m raised by those signing up for next year season tickets and getting a refund if Cardiff are in the Premiership next season is a brilliant way to raise January transfer funds.  The problem is if the money is spent and the team fail to go up - a big chunk of next year's budget has been spent...yikes.  That will make a hard cashflow summer and a really challenging season in the Championship.

The issue is that Cardiff may well go one stage further than last year and make the play-offs but that is not promotion.  There may or may not still be win bonuses but that will hurt if there are as many will fall at the beginning of the Summer and if promotion is not achieved....yikes again. 

So for now - fingers crossed thgat the finances are stable and Dave Jones manages to strengthen his squad to push on to the promised land.  It could be nail-biting stuff.

Do you think Cardiff are inspired and creative with their season ticket scheme or taking a club threatening risk?  Plus do you think Cardiff will be playing Premiership football next season?  sadly, I don't.  I think they will miss out after losing in the play-offs...yikes number three.