Introduction
Chelsea Football Club was founded in 1905, in a pub called The Rising Sun, and played its first game at Stockport Country, in the Second Division, a game lost with 1-0. It didn’t took a long time to promote to the First Division, but the early years didn’t brought any trophies, reaching the FA Cup final once in 1915. Despite the lack of success, the club attracted huge crowds and had increasing popularity.
History
In 1952, they hired Ted Drake as coach, who removed the image of a Chelsea pensioner from the game programme and renounced the nickname. In 1955 they won the First Division title. Even though they were only 12th in November, they won the trophy with the help of the two wins against eventual runner up Wolverhampton and playing the best football Chelsea could play, with a ten game streak of unbeaten matches. They finished with 52 points, a record for fewest points achieved by a champion that stands even to this day. Also, another unique performance was made, an incredible quadruple, with the reserve, ”A” and junior teams winning their respective leagues. However, they have not managed to build on that success and finished in the mid table in the following seasons. In 1962, Chelsea football fans were forced to endure the clubs relegation and return to the Second Division. Coach Ted Drake was replaced with Tommy Docherty, who promoted the team in the first year.
Features
The sixties brought a very charismatic and classy Chelsea football team that eventually failed to bring big success to the club. The only notable performance was the winning of the League Cup in 1965 and the FA Cup final in 1967 that was lost to Tottenham Hotspur. In the early seventies, Chelsea had a nice team that won the FA Cup in 1970 against Leeds at Old Trafford and the UEFA Cup Winners Cup in the following year. The rest of the decade brought no trophies for Chelsea football fans. As the squad started to have discipline problems, an over ambitious plan to redevelop the stadium threatened the club’s financial stability. The same period, a group of supporters gained a fearsome reputation for violence and so, the club started to fell apart not only on the court, but off the court as well. Despite that, they still managed to maintain and grow their already widespread base of hard core supporters. This was very helpful in the difficult years of the seventies and eighties, years that brought two relegations to the Second Division.
Tips and comments
The nineties represented a rejuvenating period for all Chelsea football fans, returning to the First Division that eventually became the Premier League. After a few seasons of finishing in the top half, Chelsea won their first trophy after 26 years, the FA Cup, in a final against Middlesbrough played at Wembley. Today, the club is considered to be one of the richest in the world. This status was gained since they were bought by Russian billionaire Roman Abramovic in 2003.
