Take a Christmas card setting of cute snow-covered houses lit from within by a cosy orange glow. Now plonk down a non-League football ground in the middle and you have the scene which met Chelsea when they arrived yesterday, 200 miles inside the Arctic Circle.

Gianfranco Zola, tasting the sub-zero air, was asked if he would be taking anything out with him to keep warm during the game. "Yes," came the reply. "My car, with the heater turned on."

The diminutive Italian was also slightly concerned that over a foot of snow has fallen here in the past three days. "Any more and I will need a periscope," he said.

Tromso, a small fishing town of 55,000 inwardly warm souls, is the seasonal home not only of lots of snow but the midnight sun followed by long polar nights. And as Ruud Gullit inspected the tiny one-stand football ground under a sky prematurely pitch black, he found a playing surface beneath his feet still pitch white.

The club moved quickly to reassure the Chelsea coach that once the plastic sheeting was lifted then all would be well, but Gullit remained concerned that the combination of sweating and under soil heating might have left the pitch too muddy. A UEFA representative will decide this morning if the tie goes ahead.

If it does then Chelsea should have no trouble winning. Even if the pitch does resemble a ploughed field and even against a side whose coach Haaken Sandberg admits: "We are very physical and run about a lot."

Apart from warding off the cold, the tactic does not seem to have worked. Tromso have lost five and drawn two of their last seven league games including last weekend's 4-0 defeat by already relegated Lyn in Oslo which leaves them facing a relegation play-off on Sunday. Survival in the top division is more important for this part-time side than risking injuries against a team they know realistically they have no chance of beating. So Chelsea's progress is almost guaranteed.

A capacity crowd of 6,438 will huddle into the Alshelm Stadium tonight more in wonder at seeing Chelsea in the flesh than in expectation of victory. As Gullit led his players in an indoor training session yesterday his main thoughts centred on which team to pick to meet the curiously unique circumstances that face him. As for the players, their main thoughts were on whether to wear gloves or tights.