Chelsea F.C.

Chelsea Football Club is an English football club that plays in the Premier League. Their home stadium is Stamford Bridge in Fulham, London.

Chelsea
Full nameChelsea Football Club
Nickname(s)The Blues, The Pensioners[1]
Short nameCFC, CHE
Founded10 March 1905; 119 years ago (1905-03-10)[2]
GroundStamford Bridge
(capacity: 40,834[3])
OwnerClearlake Capital
ChairmanTodd Boehly
Head coachMauricio Pochettino
LeaguePremier League
2019–20Premier League, 4th of 20
WebsiteClub home page
Home colours
Away colours
Third colours
Current season

Chelsea is considered to be one of the most successful clubs in England, having won many trophies, including 6 Premier League, 2 UEFA Champions League, 2 UEFA Europa League, 5 League Cup, 8 FA Cup, 1 UEFA Super Cup and 2 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup titles. Their all-time highest goalscorer is Frank Lampard and their most successful goalkeeper (on the basis of clean sheets and titles statistics) is Petr Čech. Chelsea is owned by the American businessmans Todd Boehly, Mark Walter and Swiss businessman Hansjörg Wyss.

There was a supposed breakaway European Super League that Chelsea were apart of but this quickly collapsed as many English teams pulled out due to fan disagreement. Chelsea were the first of the English teams to pull out after Chelsea fans protested outside of the stadium before their match against Brighton.

History

Chelsea started in 1905 and played the second division of the league. They won their first trophy in 1955, when they became Champions of the First Division. They won the FA Cup in 1970, 1997, 2000 and 2007. They won the League Cup in 1965, 1998, 2005 and 2007. In 1970s Chelsea failed to maintain their position of the first division, due to the financial difficulties. In 1990s they challenged the title of Premier League. They came close but did not win it until 2005 and 2006.

In 2003 the Russian billionaire, Roman Abramovich, purchased Chelsea and invested lots of capital to employ new football players. He also hired Luiz Felipe Scolari as the manager of the club. Abramovich also employed Peter Kenyon as the chief executive to be responsible for the commercial strategies of the club. This made Chelsea stronger, and they won the Premier League in consecutive years. A third straight FA Premier League title slipped through Chelsea's fingertips after their failure to defeat Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium, meaning that Manchester United had won their ninth league title in fifteen tries.

On September 20, 2007, the very successful manager José Mourinho left the club by "mutual consent". This exit came just days after a shockingly poor performance which saw them barely scrape out a 1-1 draw in a Champions League tie against Norwegian side Rosenborg B.K.. Following Mourinho's exit, Chelsea made Director of Football Avram Grant, the former manager of Israel from 2002 to 2006, the new manager of the club, until May 2008. Grant took over with Chelsea trailing in the Premier League "title race" behind Manchester United and Arsenal, and managed to keep Chelsea in the hunt for the league until the last game of the season. He got Chelsea into the Champions League Final for the first time as well as the Carling Cup Final, but he was sacked at the end of the season, along with assistant Henk ten Cate. Grant was sacked from the job after he lost in the final in a 5-6 penalty shootout loss to Manchester United and replaced by Luiz Felipe Scolari, the then-Portugal coach, in August. However, after a poor run of results Scolari was sacked on February 9, 2009. Guus Hiddink took over the club until the rest of the season. In early June they played in the FA Cup final against Everton,[4] where Chelsea won 2-1, after Frank Lampard and Didier Drogba scored goals. In that final, Louis Saha of Everton scored the fastest goal in FA Cup history, in 25 seconds. A week later, the former Milan manager Carlo Ancelotti was named as the new manager of Chelsea. Antonio Conte was their manager until July 2018 and helped them win the 2016/17 league title. Frank Lampard, former Chelsea player, became Chelsea F.C.'s successor manager. He was sacked in mid-season of 2020/21 following series of poor performances.[5] Thomas Tuchel replaced him,[6] and successfully took Chelsea to the finals of UEFA Champions League 2020/21, played against Manchester City, held in Istanbul, Turkey. Chelsea won the final 1-0, with the winning goal scored by Kai Havertz.[7]

On May 7 2022, Roman Abramovich sold the club to consortium led by Todd Boehly, Clearlake Capital, Mark Walter and Hansjörg Wyss.

League position

Season League Position
2000–01 Premier League 6th
2001–02 Premier League 6th
2002–03 Premier League 4th
2003–04 Premier League 2nd
2004–05 Premier League Champions
2005–06 Premier League Champions
2006–07 Premier League 2nd
2007–08 Premier League 2nd
2008–09 Premier League 3rd
2009–10 Premier League Champions
2010–11 Premier League 2nd
2011–12 Premier League 6th
2012–13 Premier League 3rd
2013–14 Premier League 3rd
2014–15 Premier League Champions
2015–16 Premier League 10th
2016–17 Premier League Champions
2017–18 Premier League 5th
2018–19 Premier League 3rd
2019–20 Premier League 4th
2020–21 Premier League 4th
2021–22 Premier League 3rd
2022–23 Premier League 12th

Former position

Players

First-team squad

As of 31 August 2024[8]
No. Position Player
1   GK Robert Sánchez
2   DF Axel Disasi
3   DF Marc Cucurella
4   DF Tosin Adarabioyo
5   DF Benoît Badiashile
6   DF Levi Colwill
7   FW Pedro Neto
8   MF Enzo Fernández (vice-captain)
10   FW Mykhailo Mudryk
11   FW Noni Madueke
12   GK Filip Jörgensen
13   GK Marcus Bettinelli
14   FW João Félix
15   FW Nicolas Jackson
17   MF Carney Chukwuemeka
No. Position Player
18   FW Christopher Nkunku
19   FW Jadon Sancho (on loan from Manchester United)
20   MF Cole Palmer
21   DF Ben Chilwell
22   MF Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall
24   DF Reece James (captain)
25   MF Moisés Caicedo
27   DF Malo Gusto
29   DF Wesley Fofana
31   MF Cesare Casadei
37   MF Omari Kellyman
38   FW Marc Guiu

Template:Fs Player

45   MF Roméo Lavia
47   GK Lucas Bergström

Out on loan

As of 31 August 2024[9]
No. Position Player
  GK Kepa Arrizabalaga (at AFC Bournemouth until 30 June 2025)
  GK Eddie Beach (at Crawley Town until 30 June 2025)
  GK Luke Campbell (at Hendon until 30 June 2025)
  GK Ted Curd (at Hampton & Richmond Borough until 30 June 2025)
  GK Đorđe Petrović (at Strasbourg until 30 June 2025)
  GK Teddy Sharman-Lowe (at Doncaster Rovers until 30 June 2025)
  GK Gabriel Slonina (at Barnsley until 30 June 2025)
  DF Aaron Anselmino (at Boca Juniors until 30 June 2025)
  DF Trevoh Chalobah (at Crystal Palace until 30 June 2025)
  DF Alfie Gilchrist (at Sheffield United until 30 June 2025)
No. Position Player
  DF Bashir Humphreys (at Burnley until 30 June 2025)
  DF Caleb Wiley (at Strasbourg until 30 June 2025)
  DF Dylan Williams (at Burton Albion until 30 June 2025)
  MF Leo Castledine (at Shrewsbury Town until 30 June 2025)
  MF Andrey Santos (at Strasbourg until 30 June 2025)
  MF Lesley Ugochukwu (at Southampton until 30 June 2025)
  FW Armando Broja (at Everton until 30 June 2025)
  FW Raheem Sterling (at Arsenal until 30 June 2025)
  FW Ronnie Stutter (at Burton Albion until 30 June 2025)

Other players under contract

As of 30 August 2024
No. Position Player
  FW David Datro Fofana

Development Squad and Academy

  • Players to have at least one first-team appearance for Chelsea.
As of 29 August 2024
No. Position Player
32   FW Tyrique George
36   FW Deivid Washington
  DF Josh Acheampong
No. Position Player
  MF Jimi Tauriainen
  MF Alex Matos
  MF Harvey Vale

Notable players

Chelsea F.C. Media

References

  1. "Chelsea's first cup final – a century ago". Chelsea FC. 23 April 2015. Archived from the original on 26 August 2016. Retrieved 25 July 2016.
  2. "Team History – Introduction". chelseafc.com. Chelsea FC. Archived from the original on 27 May 2011. Retrieved 11 May 2011.
  3. "Premier League Handbook 2020/21" (PDF). Premier League. p. 12. Archived (PDF) from the original on 25 September 2020. Retrieved 25 September 2020.
  4. "Sky Sports | Football | News | Scolari sacked by Chelsea". Archived from the original on 2009-02-10. Retrieved 2009-02-12.
  5. (in en-GB) Frank Lampard sacked as Chelsea manager - CBBC Newsround. https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/55796929. Retrieved 2021-06-02. 
  6. "Chelsea appoint Tuchel as manager" (in en-GB). BBC Sport. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/55801917. Retrieved 2021-06-02. 
  7. "Chelsea beat Man City to win Champions League" (in en-GB). BBC Sport. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/57268064. Retrieved 2021-06-01. 
  8. "Men: Senior". Chelsea F.C. Archived from the original on 16 January 2023. Retrieved 18 July 2023.
  9. "Men: On Loan". Chelsea F.C. Archived from the original on 7 August 2022. Retrieved 2 August 2024.