BENNI DREAMING OF CHAMPIONS LEAGUE

McCarthy - Champions League dream.

Benni McCarthy claims he and Roque Santa Cruz can fire Blackburn into the Champions League next year.

And South Africa's record goalscorer reckons the pair could even have done it this season had he not allowed speculation linking him with Chelsea to affect his game.

McCarthy admitted last summer he would have been interested in moving to Stamford Bridge to rejoin Jose Mourinho, the coach under whom he won the 2004 Champions League with Porto.

Those comments came after a fine first season with Rovers in which he had finished as the club's top scorer with 24 goals.

McCarthy has lost that mantle to Santa Cruz after a more indifferent second term but he committed his future to Blackburn by signing a new three-year contract last week and is plotting a glorious future.

The 30-year-old said: "Now I have got everything behind my back so I can just fully concentrate on Blackburn, no distractions here and there or rumours.

"It is very unsettling for any player, especially if you have done so well and then it is rumoured or a strong possibility that you could go there.

"It can disturb a player, especially if it is coming from a club that is playing Champions League or fighting for honours.

"As a player, you feel flattered and you think if it is a step up for you, you might want to go.

"You then start creating a bit of tension between your team-mates and your bosses because you have got it in your head and that seems to unsettle players.

"Hopefully, next season, now everything is out of the way - I have pledged my future to the club - we can just all concentrate on just trying to get maybe a Champions League place.

"I think it is very ambitious but it is a chance we have got, we have great players."

When asked if he wished he had done anything differently last summer, he added: "I probably had that thought of me joining Chelsea at that stage.

"I would have just changed that and fully concentrated on Blackburn and then I think, between me and Roque, we would probably now been now fighting for the Champions League places.

"When Mourinho was the coach - everyone knows we have a really good relationship - I was always talking to him and, obviously, the idea of you probably joining him...

"I would probably have changed that and just hoped we had a strictly good relationship, a friendship, but not the fact he wants to take me there."

McCarthy, who has scored 11 times this season, is doubtful with a hamstring injury for tomorrow's Barclays Premier League match against basement side Derby.

Rovers need to win to keep alive their slender hopes of qualifying for Europe via the Intertoto Cup, while they also need Aston Villa to drop points against Wigan.