Chelsea
- Location: Fulham, London, England
- Stadium: Stamford Bridge
- Coach: Graham Potter
- Premier League Titles: 5
Current Squad / Roster
- Kepa Arrizabalaga
- Marcus Bettinelli
- Édouard Mendy
- Thiago Silva
- Trevoh Chalobah
- Ben Chilwell
- Reece James
- Kalidou Koulibaly
- César Azpilicueta
- Marc Cucurella
- Wesley Fofana
- Jorginho
- N’Golo Kanté
- Mateo Kovacic
- Christian Pulisic
- Ruben Loftus-Cheek
- Mason Mount
- Denis Zakaria
- Hakim Ziyech
- Conor Gallagher
- Kai Havertz
- Carney Chukwuemeka
- Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang
- Raheem Sterling
- Armando Broja
Championships:
Champions League Winners: 2011-12, 2020-21.
Premier League Winners: 2012-13, 2018-19.
UEFA Cup winners’ cup: 1970-71, 1997-98.
UEFA Super Cup: 1998, 2021.
FIFA Club World Cup: 2021.
First Division/Premier League titles: 1954-55, 2004-05, 2005-06, 2009-10, 2014-15, 2016-17.
Second Division titles: 1983-84, 1988-89.
FA Cup Wins: 1969-70, 1996-97, 1999-2000, 2006-07, 2008-09, 2009-10, 2011-12, 2017-18.
EFL Cup Wins: 1964-65, 1997-98, 2004-05, 2006-07, 2014-15.
FA Charity/Community Shields: 1955, 2000, 2005, 2009.
Full Members Cup: 1985-86, 1989-90.
Team History
The club was founded in 1905 when Fulham F.C. turned down an offer to play at Stamford Bridge athletics stadium. So owner Gus Mears founded his own club and named it after the borough of Chelsea.
The team was elected to the Football League and began to play in the Second Division. They earned a promotion to the First Division in their second season and went back and forth between the two.
They had the best attendance in all of English football in 1907-08 and again four more times before World War I.
Third Position
After the war, Chelsea finished third in 1920, their best finish in the First Division to that point. They dropped back into the Second Division and didn’t return until the 1930s. They stayed middle of the Premier League standings both before and after World War II.
Ted Drake was hired as manager in 1952 and he helped modernize the club with new training and a better youth setup. It paid off as Chelsea won their first-ever title with a Football League championship in 1954-55.
Drake stayed at Stamford Bridge until 1961 but didn’t win another trophy. Tommy Docherty took over and he won his first trophy in 1964-65 with the League Cup.
FA Cup Finals
After losing in a pair of FA Cup finals, Chelsea finally lifted the FA Cup in 1970 under manager Dave Sexton.
They followed that with a win over Real Madrid in the UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup, their first continental title.
But that’s where success ended in the 1970s as Chelsea ended u relegated to the Second Division on two occasions.
They had their worst season ever in 1982-83, finishing in 18th place in the Second Division and barely avoiding relegation. They were also purchased for £1.
Second Division
They quickly bounced back and won the Second Division in 1983-84. Despite a pair of top-six finishes in the First Division, Chelsea was relegated again in 1988.
The club nearly lost the stadium in the late 1980s but they came back to the First Division again to start the 1990s and reworked the deal to own the stadium.
Player-manager Ruud Gullit took over in 1996 and helped bring the first trophy in 25 years with a FA Cup win. Gianluca Vialli managed Chelsea next, winning the League Cup, UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup and UEFA Super Cup in 1998.
Chelsea in the 2000s
Chelsea started the 2000s with a FA Cup win in 2000. They also played in the Champions League for the first time in 1999-2000.
The 2003-04 season brought new ownership with Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich buying the team for £60 million and assuming the team debt.
The new owner immediately began spending money on new players and a new manager, Jose Mourinho. The Portuguese manager won the Premier League title in 2004-05, Chelsea’s first in 50 years.
They repeated in 2005-06 to become just the fifth English team to repeat since World War II.
Mourinho’s squads added an FA Cup title in 2007 plus League Cups in 2005 and 2007. They made deep runs in the Champions League but didn’t reach a final until after Mourinho was replaced by Avram Grant in 2008.
Chelsea lost that Champions League Final in Moscow, falling in penalty kicks to rivals Manchester United.
Carlo Ancelotti was the first Chelsea manager to win a FA Cup/Premier League double, accomplishing the feat in 2009-10.
That squad also scored more than 100 goals, a first for any English top-flight team in nearly 50 years.
Chelsea finally won the Champions League in 2012 under manager Roberto Di Matteo. They added an FA Cup title that year and then won the UEFA Europa League in 2012-13.
Mourinho returned to lead Chelsea to the 2015 League Cup and Premier League double. Another Premier League title followed in 2017 under Antonio Conte.
Chelsea changed managers nearly every 18 months and Maurizio Sarri won the Europa League in 2018 before giving way to ex-Chelsea star Frank Lampard. He got the Blues back to the Champions League and to an FA Cup Final but was fired in January 2021.
Thomas Tuchel led Chelsea back up the standings in 2021 while also reaching the FA Cup Final. A loss there was quickly forgotten a week later when Chelsea upset Manchester City for an improbable Champions League title.
Tuchel followed with a 2021 UEFA Super Cup win in penalties and the FIFA Club World Cup. When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, the UK government froze Abramovich’s assets, including Chelsea, He subsequently sold the team in May to an American consortium led by Todd Boehly.
Chelsea Records
Looking at the Chelsea stats and Premier League stats, no one has played in more Chelsea games than Ron Harris.
A long-time captain, Harris played in 795 games between 1961 and 1080. Peter Bonetti is next on the list with 729 games while John Terry played in 717 games.
On the Chelsea stats, Frank Lampard has the most goals in club history. he scored 211 goals between 2001 and 2014. Lampard broke the record of 202 goals set by Bobby Tambling in 2013.
Overall, 10 players have scored at least 100 goals in competitive games for Chelsea. Of those, three have come in the 21st century with Lampard, Didier Drogba, and Eden Hazard.
Jimmy Greaves scored a single-season record of 43 goals in one season. His accomplishment came in 1960-61 and at one point Greaves was the youngest player in English football with 100 career goals.
Chelsea holds the English record for the fewest goals allowed in a season (15) and the highest number of clean sheets in a season (25). Both records were set in 2004-05.
Looking at the Chelsea stats for transfers, the most money they have paid for a player was £97.5 million for Romelu Lukaku in 2021.
That surpassed the £71.6 million they paid for Kepa Arrizabalaga in 2018 and the £71 million for Kai Havertz in 2020.
The most money they have received for a player was £97.5 million from Real Madrid for Eden Hazard in 2019. They also got £60 million for Oscar in 2017 and £58 million in 2019 for Alvaro Morata.
What are the Chelsea 2022-23 Transfers?
So far, heading into the 2022-23 Premier League season, Chelsea have made a handful of moves. The biggest move they spent £47.5 million to bring in Raheem Sterling from Manchester City.
Sterling should challenge to be Chelsea’s leading goalscorer in 2022-23.
On the defensive side of things, they spent £33 million to add Kalidou Koulibaly from Napoli. They have also been linked to additional players as the season begins
They allowed defenders Antonio Rudiger and Andreas Christensen to leave on free transfers. Rudiger, a long-time player for Chelsea, went to Real Madrid while Christensen went to Barcelona. They are also loaning striker Romelu Lukaku to Inter Milan for £7 million
Who are the Chelsea Best Coaches?
The longest-tenured manager in team history was David Calderhead from 1907 to 1933. With 966 games managed, he has more than twice as many as the next manager, Ted Drake.
Calderhead won 385 games while Drake won 156 from 1952-61. Drake won Chelsea their first top-flight title in 1955.
David Sexton (164) and Tommy Docherty (142) also have more than 100 wins as Chelsea managers. Docherty won a League Cup while Sexton won an FA Cup and UEFA Cup Winners’ CUP.
Jose Mourinho won 64% of his games, a Chelsea record for any manager with at least 40 games. He won 204 matches, drew 69 and lost just 48 times in charge of the Blues.
Mourinho led Chelsea to three Premier League Titles, a FA Cup, three Football league Cups and one Community Shield
