Tales From Baltimore, Bolton, London And Stockholm

Posted on May 18, 2023 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Nottingham Forest : 13 May 2023.

…this one is going to resemble a mazy Pat Nevin dribble, drifting from place to place, hopefully entertaining, and with a few dummies thrown in for good measure.

In the build up to our home game with Nottingham Forest, I had read that there would be a couple of banners appearing before kick-off in The Shed and the Matthew Harding to celebrate the impact that Thiago Silva has had during his relatively short period of time at Stamford Bridge. And quite right too.

Everybody loves Thiago Silva.

The man is a defensive colossus. He is calmness personified. He oozes class. In a season that has stumbled along with many a setback along the way he has stood out like a beacon of professionalism. How I wish that all of our players showed the same skill set and the same work ethic as Thiago Silva. Ah, I had best add N’Golo Kante here.

We need a banner for him too.

On the evening before the game, by chance, I caught a comment by an acquaintance on Facebook that Thiago Silva was looking to return to Brazil, to his childhood team Fluminense – for whom he played seventy-odd games – after he eventually leaves Chelsea. I loved this idea, of legends returning home, and of course I immediately thought of Gianfranco Zola returning to Cagliari for a couple of seasons after leaving us. I just hoped that we could tease another season or two out of our veteran Brazilian.

I then checked on Thiago Silva’s playing career and I was reminded that he had played for Milan, after his spell with Fluminense, from 2009 to 2012. And that made me think. I was lucky enough to see Chelsea play Milan in Baltimore in the summer of 2009, just ahead of our wonderful double-winning campaign under Carlo Ancelotti. I did a little research and soon realised that Thiago Silva had indeed played in that game. My heart skipped a little. I then checked a few photographs, as is my wont, and I spotted an image that made me smile. In the first-half of the game, which Chelsea would win 2-1, I had taken a photo, focussed on Frank Lampard, that also featured a veritable “Who’s Who” of top-ranking footballers from that era.

Ronaldinho, Didier Drogba, Alessandro Nesta, Jon Obi Mikel, our man Frank, Andrea Pirlo and – there he was – Thiago Silva.

So, here indeed was proof that this was the very first time that I had seen Thiago Silva play. It’s very likely that this was the first time that Frank had seen Thiago Silva play too, though his view was certainly different than mine.

Almost fourteen years later, the two of them are at the same club, although of course it was Frank who signed the cherished Brazilian during our interim manager’s first spell at the helm at the start of the COVID-ravaged season of 2020/21.

I then decided to flick through a few photos from that very enjoyable stay in Baltimore. I took plenty of the game of course – probably the highest quality match of the seventeen that I have seen us play in the US – but just as many of our fellow supporters too. One photo again made me smile. It featured my good friend Burger on the right of a group of random, blue-jerseyed, American fans who must have been drinking with us, or near to us, at the time. But I immediately spotted two other people that I recognised; Kristin and Andrew from Columbus in Ohio. I had not noticed their faces in this particular photo before. As luck would have it, those very same two people – friends of mine for a few years now – were going to meet us in the pub on the Saturday morning before the game with Forest.

As I continually say, Chelsea World is a very small world indeed.

We were all up in London at the usual time. I was parked up at around 10am. With PD still convalescing at home, his seat in my car and his seat in the stadium was taken by Glenn, my match-going friend from Frome since as long ago as 1983.

1983. You know where this is going, right?

The next match to feature in my look back at the 1982/83 season is the iconic and famous encounter against fellow strugglers Bolton Wanderers at their Burnden Park ground on Saturday 7 May 1983. In the years that have passed since this game was played, many of our supporters have bestowed upon it the title of “the most important match in Chelsea’s history” and it is easy to see why. Going in to the game we were fourth from bottom, one point below our opponents. Chelsea had been financially at risk for many a season, and the thought of dropping into the Third Division was not only depressing enough from a supporters’ perspective – the pain, the ridicule, the struggle to recover – it would also cause an extreme strain on the immediate future of the club with reduced revenues hitting hard, despite the tightening of strings inaugurated by Ken Bates over the previous twelve months.

Although my mind was full of worry about my upcoming “A Levels” in Geography, Mathematics and Technical Drawing, this was nothing compared to my concern for my beloved Chelsea Football Club.

My diary on the day tells that when I heard on the radio of Clive Walker’s low drive in the second-half giving us a 1-0 lead, I was not too elated because all of the other protagonists at the basement were also winning. However, after all the results came through, I was overjoyed. We had risen unbelievably, to fourteenth place.

I called it “quite a wonderful day.”

With emphasis on “won” no doubt.

How many Chelsea went to the game? The gate at Bolton was 8,687. The general consensus was that we took thousands. In the following week’s home programme, Ken Bates praised the “almost three-thousand” who were there. I have to say that a photograph of the away section of the ground on that rainy day in Bolton, with Chelsea playing in the all lemon kit despite no obvious colour clash, suggests that only around 1,500 were standing in a small section of terrace. However, at the time it was always a predilection for London clubs, especially, to invade the home seats at away games, so I am in no position to suggest that we did indeed not have around 3,000 up there. I know that some Chelsea were in the seats at the other end of the ground. There is another photo of the scenes at the final whistle and a good number of Chelsea fans are seen celebrating in the upper tier above a deserted home terrace along the side of the ground. The number in this section does in fact look like 1,500. So, around 1,500 on the terrace and around 1,500 in the seats. Let’s go with 3,000.

I always remember that on my first ever trip to Bolton’s new Reebok Stadium in 2004, I picked my long-time Chelsea mate Alan up en route and he told me a few stories about the game at Burnden Park in 1983. He, it goes without saying, was one of the three-thousand. I always remember how he told the story of how Breda Lee, loved by so many, was bedecked with good luck charms as she made her way up to Bolton on the Chelsea Special. Breda had lost her son Gary after a horrific incident at Preston in 1981, and would always travel on the Chelsea Special with John Bumstead’s mother Mary, and was seen by many Chelsea fans as their “Chelsea Mother.” On this day, Alan said that she was wearing a lucky four-leafed clover trinket, a lucky horseshoe, a sprig of lucky heather and was clutching a rabbit’s foot too.

It all worked.

The victorious Chelsea team that day was as follows –

Steve Francis.
Joey Jones.
Chris Hutchings.
Gary Chivers.
Micky Droy.
Colin Pates.
Mike Fillery.
John Bumstead.
Colin Lee.
Paul Canoville.
Clive Walker.

The non-playing substitute – hard to believe in this day and age – was Peter Rhoades-Brown. I love it that four players from this line-up (Chivers, Pates, Bumstead, Canoville) still take part in the match-day experience at Stamford Bridge forty years later as corporate hospitality hosts.

I salute them all. And I salute the 3,000 too.

Forty years on, the day was starting to take shape. I dropped Glenn and Parky off outside “The Eight Bells” and then met up with Ollie at Stamford Bridge once more, this time with his cousin Julien, both from Normandy. I often write about the gathering of the clans on match days and this was no exception. By the time I reached the pub at 11.30am, a gaggle of friends – old and new – were well into a session. Sitting alongside Glenn, Parky, Ollie and Julien were Kristin and Andrew, fresh from a few days in Edinburgh, and with some fellow Ohio Blues, Steve and Jake who I met on their visit in 2019, plus Jeromy and Neil, who were attending their first game at Stamford Bridge. We all got along famously. It was also superb to meet up again with Jesus, from California, who we last saw at Watford last season, and who was another chap that Parky took under our wing while he was living in London many years ago. Completing the scene was Russ, originally from Frome, who now lives in Reading and was attending his first home game for quite a while.

Everyone together, everyone happy.

Up on the platform at Putney Bridge tube, a few Forest fans were engaging in some light-hearted chat. The well-rounded vowels of their East Midlands accents made a change on match day in SW6.

“Bit of a free hit for us, this game, not expecting much but you never know.”

To be honest, we hadn’t thought too much about the actual match – probably with good reason – and Glenn admitted that he wasn’t expecting much from the game either. In our current predicament, the day was all about seeing friends and enjoying each other’s company.

Elsewhere in London, over twenty thousand Notts County fans were in town for the National League Play-Off Final against Chesterfield. One of them, Craig, a friend from college in Stoke, sent me a message to say he hoped that we were victorious against Forest. He hates Forest, does Craig.

I said to the Forest supporter “the only person worried the outcome of this game is a Notts County fan.”

This of course wasn’t strictly true, but it raised a laugh at least.

The front cover of the programme marked the exact twenty-fifth anniversary of our European Cup Winners’ Cup triumph in Stockholm against VfB Stuttgart.

A few personal memories…

A group of us went with the club to Stockholm, flying out from Gatwick on the day before the game, and flying back right after. It seems really expensive now, and it was then; £450 not including a match ticket. With inflation, that equates to just over £1,000 in today’s money. I drove up from Frome with Glenn and met up with Daryl, Andy, Mick, The Youth, Neil and Tony, three of whom still go to all the home games and many away games to this day. I always remember that on the coach in to the city from the airport, it became apparent that Chelsea had managed to split the hotels of a father and his teenage son. Tremendous. Thankfully, that faux pas was soon resolved.

We all stayed in a hotel a mile or so to the north of the city centre and that first night was as pleasurable as it gets. We went off for an Italian meal in a restaurant called “Pele” which was named after the Brazilian star’s 1958 World Cup debut in the city. We drank Spendrups lager and ate Italian as couples danced to the tango. It was a very surreal visit. Later, we found ourselves in a bar owned by the former Arsenal and Everton players Anders Limpar – the bar had the worst name ever, “The Limp Bar” – and he was serving that night. I remember a “sing-off” between Chelsea fans and an all-girl German choir. Another surreal moment.

On the day of the game, we bought some cans and soaked up the sun in a central park – I remember seeing Ruth Harding nearby – and then made our way to a crowded bar where Johnny Vaughan was spotted.

Then, back to the hotel and a nervous wait for the coach to the game. Once aboard, The Youth lead the community singing. Outside the Rasunda Stadium in Solna there were Chelsea everywhere. The gate for this game was 30,216 and we greatly outnumbered the Stuttgart fans. We must have had 25,000 there and I think everyone who travelled to Sweden got in. With road travel from the UK being highly expensive and time consuming, virtually everyone went by plane. At the time, it was the biggest single airlift out of the UK since World War Two.

Growing up as a Chelsea supporter, the twin cup triumphs of 1970 and 1971 were etched on our soul and in our psyche. For a while, the two stars on our chests celebrated those two wins. And here we were, twenty-six years on from Athens, with a chance to equal that celebrated feat.

This was a magnificent time to be a Chelsea supporter; some might argue the best of all. Glenn Hoddle had raised the profile of the club by reaching Europe in 1994, and then the signings came…Ruud Gullit, Mark Hughes, Gianluca Vialli, Gianfranco Zola. We were truly blessed. The 1997 FA Cup win under Gullit was followed by the League Cup under Vialli in 1998.

We all travelled to Sweden in May 1998 with a sense of being very capable of repeating that win in Athens.

Stuttgart were managed by Joachim Low and their star man was the striker Freddie Bobic. Their ‘keeper was Franz Wohlfahrt who had been on the receiving end of Spenny’s run in Vienna in 1994. The former German international Thomas Berthold played for them too.

Our team?

De Goey

Clarke – Leboeuf – Duberry – Granville

Petrescu – Poyet – Wise – Di Matteo

Flo – Vialli

Shades of Ryan Bertrand in Munich; Danny Granville at left-back. Vialli played Mark Hughes in the League Cup Final but he wasn’t missing out on this one.

At the game, I wore a Chelsea 1970 replica shirt and the scarf that my mother bought me after my first game in 1974.

In truth, the game wasn’t a classic, but the Chelsea fans were at our best that night in Sweden. The game hinged on a substitution. On seventy-one minutes, Gianfranco Zola replaced Tore Andre Flo. Within twenty-five seconds, Dennis Wise floated a ball through and the ball held up. Zola caught it sweetly on the half-volley and it rose all the way into the goal at our end. I was almost behind the flight of the ball.

Absolute fucking delirium.

I caught Glenn and Andy right after our goal.

In the last five minutes, Dan Petrescu was sent off but we were in control, the Germans were a spent force.

“Dambusters” rang out in Solna.

What a night. What a team. What a club.

Athens 1971. Stockholm 1998.

We had done it.

The euphoria was real. I have rarely been as happy at a Chelsea game. And yet most who were in Stockholm probably thought that it would not get any better than this. We were a cup team, no more, and the equalling of the 1970 and 1971 wins were seen as our “glass ceiling”. We knew we would never win the league…

We walked out into the Solna streets so happy. Famously, a local girl flashed her assets from a balcony as thousands of Chelsea fans walked past. We eventually found our coach.

Back at the airport, it was mayhem. There was coach after coach after coach in a massive line. In the terminal, we saw Ron Harris and Peter Osgood. Johnny Vaughan commented “it’s like the last chopper out of Saigon.”

The call went out that anyone on a Monarch flight should make their way to the departure gate. We sprinted. It was a matter of getting bodies on flights. We were lucky; we left at around 3am, on the same flight as actor Clive Mantle who I had photographed earlier outside the stadium.

Stockholm 1998 was one of the very best nights.

I’d rank the European wins that I have seen like this :

Munich.
Stockholm.
Porto.
Baku.
Amsterdam.

Incidentally, the club’s photographs from that night were taken by Mark Sandom, who sits a few rows in front of me, and I sent away for a set when I returned home. I still need to frame one or two enlargements from that game and find space for one of them in my Blue Room.

…Solna 1998 gave way to Fulham 2023.

Unfortunately, Alan was unable to make it to this game, so I sat with Clive and Glenn in The Sleepy Hollow. There were more than a few mutterings of discontent at Frank Lampard’s starting eleven, but there was pleasure in seeing Lewis Hall at left back. In came Edouard Mendy between the sticks while Mateo Kovacic, Raheem Sterling and Joao Felix started too.

Mendy

Chalobah – Silva – Badiashile – Hall

Gallagher – Enzo – Kovacic

Madueke – Felix – Sterling

The two Thiago Silva flags appeared at both ends of the stadium just before the teams entered the pitch. The one in The Shed was particularly striking. I loved it. I also loved the words of the match day announcer as he ran through the team.

“Number six, your captain, Thiago Silva.”

Despite our struggles this season, there appeared to be a near full-house at Stamford Bridge. The three-thousand Forest fans were already singing about “mist rolling in from the Trent” and their players looked smart in their plain red / white / red, a combination – the simplest of all kits – that rarely gets seen at Stamford Bridge these days.

While we huffed and puffed in the opening section of the game, The Sleepy Hollow claimed a victim, with Glenn quietly nodding off after some alcoholic fumes rolled in from the Thames. After an unlucky thirteen minutes had passed, a Forest cross from their left from Renan Lodi was bravely met by the leap of Taiwo Awoniyi, impressive in the away game on New Year’s Day, and the combined forces of Mendy, Badiashile and Silva were found lacking. The away team, in their first real attack, had struck.

The Forest fans erupted, the scorer did his best “Christ The Redeemer” and Forest players swarmed around him down below me.

Fackinell Forest.

I sent a photo of a dormant Glenn to Alan with the caption “one down.”

Our reaction was hardly immediate, and our attacks lacked precision and incision. Noni Madueke, looking so good at Bournemouth, tended to frustrate both himself and us. On one occasion, his turn was sweet but he then fell over himself. It summed up his luck. There was a shot on seventeen minutes, our first, saved, from Sterling and an effort from Hall was then blocked. Our best effort took a whole thirty minutes to arrive; a Hall cross, a Felix header, but too close to Keylor Navas in the Forest goal.

This was a really poor first-half.

Clive helped to alleviate the pain by buying us a hot chocolate apiece.

Just before the whistle, Mateo Kovacic – who has dipped in form quite shockingly of late – was replaced by Ruben Loftus-Cheek, the perennial squad player.

I was surprised that there were so few boos at the break.

Soon into the second-half, Glenn resurfaced and Russ came over to sit by us for the duration of the game. The Sleepy Hollow had undergone a significant reshuffle. We were now back to a four. Clive, who had been near suicidal during the first-half needed cheering up.

“We’ll win this 2-1 mate.”

He smiled. Or was it a grimace?

Forest, though, began the brighter and almost doubled their lead through Moussa Niakhate but his volley was blasted wide.

On fifty-one minutes, there was a nice interchange between Madueke and Trevoh Chalobah down our right and the ball was pulled back from the goal-line by Chalobah into the feet of Sterling, whose goal bound effort took a deflection before hitting the net.

Yes.

The crowd roared as Sterling briefly celebrated.

“C’MON CHELS.”

Immediately after, Forest retaliated with a tantalisingly deep cross that just evaded the nod of a red-shirted attacker.

The crowd rallied.

“CAM ON CHOWLSEA. CAM ON CHOWLSEA. CAM ON CHOWLSEA. CAM ON CHOWLSEA.”

We were playing much better now. A few half-chances, and then on fifty-eight minutes, a strong run from Loftus-Cheek in the centre was followed by a prod of the ball to Sterling, who cut inside and left his marker Joe Worrall on his arse before perfectly curling an effort into the top far corner of the goal.

Bliss.

GET IN YOU BASTARD.

His celebration, this time, was far more euphoric, and so was ours.

Clive was full of praise : “you called it.”

But this was Chelsea 2023, not Chelsea 2009 – that photo from Baltimore succinctly illustrates the cyclical nature of our sport’s teams – and just four minutes later, a ball was pushed into the six-yard box by Orel Mangala and I immediately feared danger. The ball was headed home by that man Awoniyi, with another unmarked team mate alongside him to give him moral support and guidance, with Mendy was beaten all ends up. A VAR review couldn’t save us.

Double European Champions Chelsea 2 Double European Champions Forest 2.

On seventy-three minutes, Kai Havertz replaced Felix and Hakim Ziyech replaced Madueke.

Clive threatened to leave.

I tried to give him hope.

“Sterling hat-trick mate.”

He definitely grimaced this time. But so did I.

Every time that Ziyech got the ball, either in the middle of a wriggling, shuffling dribble, or at a free-kick, I genuinely expected him to provide some magic. To be fair, his brief outing was not without merit but we could not, quite, claim the winner.

It ended 2-2.

The away fans celebrated loudly inside Stamford Bridge and out on the Fulham Road. This was a big point for them in their dogged fight to avoid an immediate relegation back to the Second Division, er The Championship.

The day seemed to be all about Nottingham. On the drive home, we were to learn that Craig’s Notts County dramatically edged out Chesterfield at Wembley, so well done to them. Forty years ago, Notts finished in a respectable fifteenth place in the First Division.

Talk about cycles.

Next up is the toughest away game of them all. I am fearing our trip to Manchester City next Sunday.

Anyone dare to join me?

Baltimore.

London.

Stockholm.

Tales From Fool’s Gold

Posted on April 2, 2023 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Aston Villa : 1 April 2023.

April Fools Day In Fulham

There are three games to detail in this edition; two from 1983 and one from forty years later. Let’s do things chronologically.

On Saturday 19 March 1983, Chelsea played a London Derby against Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park. With Chelsea eager to pick up as many points as possible from the remaining games of the Second Division season to stave off relegation to the Third Division we could only eke out a 0-0 draw.

The Palace team included on-loan full-back Gary Locke who had played over three-hundred games for Chelsea after his debut in 1972. Locke played more games for Chelsea than Gianfranco Zola, Graeme Le Saux, David Webb, Micky Droy and Gary Cahill, but I fully expect there are folk reading this who have never heard of him. I guess this is normal, if not a little sad. I spoke with Bill from Toronto before the Everton game about this. He confirmed that many of the newer Chelsea supporters that he encounters simply have no care in the world to learn about parts of our history.

Gary Locke played in the very first Chelsea game that I ever saw in March 1974 and his performance is the only one that I can honestly remember much about; in the second-half he was playing right in front of me in the West Stand Benches and I recollect a succession of well-timed sliding tackles to thwart Newcastle United’s attacks down their flank.

Also playing for Palace was Jerry Murphy, who would make a move in the opposite direction in 1985. I was getting good at the “guess the gate” sideshow. I predicted 14,000. It was actually 13,427.

A week later, on Saturday 26 March 1983, Chelsea played Barnsley who were managed by the former Leeds United defender Norman Hunter. In the “Forward Line” section – it took the place of “The Talk Of Stamford Bridge” for programme aficionados – there was a desire for the club to finish in a better final placing than the twelfth spot of 1982. The club was currently in thirteenth place, but just six points above a relegation spot. There was news that our star player Mike Fillery was seeking a move to a team in the top flight and was therefore recently placed on the transfer list.

In the 1981/82 and 1982/83 seasons I subscribed to the home programmes and I eagerly awaited their arrival right after games. These days we are bombarded with official club information via the internet and endless social media offerings. In those days, the programme was everything. It was our only link to the club. I devoured those small match day magazines with an absolute passion.

In the Barnsley edition, there is a two-page spread featuring Paul Canoville who had recently scored two against Carlisle United. Needless to say, these were the first goals scored by a black player for Chelsea. Until then, Canners was our only black player. Sadly, the letters page contained two pieces from supporters complaining about racist abuse aimed towards Canoville at recent games.

On this day, Barnsley went in 1-0 up at the break and went on to win 3-0. My diary doesn’t detail any great shock nor surprise at this reverse. The gate was just 7,223. It was getting easy, so easy, to guess our home attendances. The most recent five home fixtures produced depressing figures.

Cambridge United : 7,808

Derby County : 8,661

Blackburn Rovers : 6.982

Carlisle United : 6,677

Barnsley : 7,223

Our substitute was debutant Keith Jones who replaced Clive Walker. Not only was Jones our second -ever black player, but he was the first player to reach the Chelsea first team who was actually younger than me. He was born on 14 October 1965, three months after me.

I was seventeen, coming up to eighteen in July. I remember that this game provided a particularly sobering moment for me; that someone younger than me was now playing for my beloved Chelsea. I found it hard to cope with the thought that I would be supporting and cheering on a lad who was younger than me.

At that moment, I may well have uttered my first-ever Chelsea “fackinell.”

As an aside, I had played football for my school teams from 1976 to 1982, but had drifted away from playing in 1982/83. There may have been occasional games within the school, but I think my competitive football came to an end in 1981/82. Regardless, the presence of Keith Jones in the Chelsea team had undoubtedly meant that I had missed the boat to become a professional footballer or a footballer of any standing whatsoever. That a lad younger than me was infinitely better than me at the tender age of seventeen had left me somewhat deflated. I still find it hard to forgive him.

Forty years later, our underwhelming season was starting up again after a fortnight break with another 5.30pm kick off at Stamford Bridge.

Aston Villa, who have won only twice in twenty years at Stamford Bridge, were to be the visitors.

There was no great sense of enthusiastic anticipation as I made my way up to London in the morning. The driving was tough going – “hello rain, hello spray” – but I made good time and dropped PD and Parky outside “The Eight Bells” at around 11.45am. All of us were not expecting much of a spectacle. In fact, the mood was pretty sombre. Sigh.

“Just can’t see us scoring” was a familiar lament as the day developed.

I was parked up on Bramber Road at around midday and the first three hours of my day at Chelsea would be spent meeting up with friends from Edinburgh, New Orleans and Dallas. But first, I wanted to involve my third passenger in a photo that I had been planning in my head for a month or so.

I have written about the Clem Attlee Estate before and how it has undoubtedly housed thousands of local Chelsea fans since its inception in the late ‘fifties. The tower block that overlooks the Lillee Road, consisting of three wings, dominates the first few minutes of my walk down to Stamford Bridge. I’ve taken a few photos of it in the past. On this occasion I wanted to pay homage to our gritty past and so I arranged for Ron Harris to stand in front of two of the building’s wings.

I hope you like it.

For the next few hours, I chatted with some pals.

First up, Rich from Edinburgh, visiting Chelsea again, this time with his uncle’s son Matt, on an extended holiday from his home in Perth in Western Australia.

A few former players were milling around.

There were plenty of laughs as Bobby Tambling told a lovely story about Terry Venables scaring Eddie McCreadie to death at a hotel in the Black Forest while on tour in West Germany. McCreadie was apparently scared of ghosts, so Venables borrowed a pair of Bobby’s black pyjamas and hung them outside McCreadie’s window as a storm was raging outside. A window was rattled, and McCreadie pulled the curtains back and screamed in horror much to the amusement of those in adjacent rooms.

Next up, Jonathan from Dallas, a chap that I was meeting for the first time, but who has been reading these ramblings for a while, and whose daughter was to be one of the team of mascots for the day’s game. The wait was long; eleven years. Initially his son was on the list, but COVID got in the way of his turn and was now, sadly, too old for mascot duties. The baton was therefore passed to his sister. I enjoyed chatting with Jonathan about a few topics. We briefly touched on the recent rumours, unproven, about Chelsea re-igniting the option of moving to Earls Court. Although a stadium upgrade is likely, and needed if I am honest, I’d prefer the current regime to sort the bloody team out first.

Lastly, my good friend Stephen – visiting from New Orleans with his wife Elicia and her friend Makeda – arrived at about 1pm and I handed over tickets that I had been keeping warm. I last saw Stephen in his home town of Belfast ahead of the Super Cup game. It would be Madeka’s first-ever Chelsea game.

As ever, Ron gave the same welcome that he gives to all Chelsea virgins : “if we lose, you’re not coming back.”

It was a pleasure for me to have the briefest chats with Ken Monkou. I first saw him play in August 1989. He would go on to become our player of the year that season.

At about 2.30pm, I sped off down to Putney Bridge tube to meet up with the lads – and lasses – again. There was subdued talk of the game. Bill from Toronto was back for another match, this time with his wife Beth Ann, her first one too.

I chatted mainly to Andy and Sophie. We centred on the current state of affairs at Chelsea, but also yakked about Vincent Van Gogh, my relatives’ migration to Philadelphia in the nineteenth century, visiting Canada and our combined love of Bournemouth. It’s not all about football.

Despite the desperate state of our play at the moment, I loved Sophie’s reaction to the news that she had been sorted with an Arsenal ticket. It is surely a mess of a club right now, but nothing beats going to a game. She punched the air and smiled wide.

I had earlier said to Andy that “I can’t understand people who say they want the season to end. I bloody don’t. It’s what I live for, this.”

Andy was surprisingly upbeat. Sophie and I questioned his sanity.

There were a few Villa fans on the tube back to Fulham Broadway. They were full of song and were singing praises of Unai Emery and John McGinn on the train and as they alighted at our destination. I inwardly sniggered. Well, you would wouldn’t you?

I was in at 5pm. The troops slowly appeared. My chat with Oxford Frank was predictably down beat.

“Just can’t see us scoring.”

The team?

Don’t ask.

Kepa

James – Koulibaly – Cucarella

Loftus-Cheek – Kovacic – Enzo – Chilwell

Felix – Havertz – Mudryk

The appearance of not only Reece James but Marc Cucarella in a back three while both Benoit Badiashile and Trevoh Chalobah were on the bench was unfathomable. This forced Ruben Loftus-Cheek as a far from convincing right wing-back on us yet again. Oh my life. I was hoping for a better performance from Mykhailo Mudryk in this game than in recent others. I wanted to see more of the Anfield Mudryk than the post-Anfield Mudryk. At least Enzo and Felix, two bright points surely, were playing. I prepared myself to be frustrated by Kai bloody Havertz yet again.

Before the teams appeared, a brief chat pitchside with John Terry and Roberto di Matteo, chatting about a “Legends” match versus Bayern Munich to raise money for the Royal Marsden Hospital, where Gianluca Vialli received treatment in his battle against cancer. John Terry joked he would play in his full kit.

There was a decent crowd; less empty seats than against Everton a fortnight earlier. Of course Villa had the standard three thousand. I was eerily aware that this was all happening on April Fools’ Day. I wondered what sort of headlines were waiting to be written. Our last game on this day of the year was the achingly depressing defeat to Tottenham in 2018.

The game began.

We were back to normal, attacking The Shed in the first-half. Without knowing it at the time, a wild effort from Mateo Kovacic after just two minutes set the tone for the rest of the evening. I can barely remember a shot from relatively close to goal that ended up so high in the upper tier. Soon after a shot from Mudruk inside the box was blocked by Emiliano Martinez. We were dominating the early exchanges but with some irritating early evidence that things might not go our way. Kai Havertz took an extra touch inside the box, as he often does, and invited an easy block. There was a scissor kick from Kovacic, similar to his fine goal against Liverpool last season, but on this occasion the effort almost went out for a throw-in.

Off the pitch, this game began quietly and continued the same way.

On the quarter of an hour, Ollie Watkins slid a shot wide in the visitors’ first attack. Just after, John McGinn slammed a shot from outside the box that hit the bar. A minute later, a ball was lofted towards Watkins, but two Chelsea defenders were drawn to the ball. It was my opinion that Kalidou Koulibaly, seeing the whole of the play, should have shouted down Marc Cucarella’s hurried chase to head the ball. Instead, the Spaniard’s touch just set the ball up nicely for Watkins, who had run from deep, to lob Kepa.

A voice nearby blamed Kepa, but it was hardly his fault.

So here we were again, dominating possession, finding it hard to finish, and a goal down.

The rest of the half continued in much the same way. If I am honest, our approach play was quite decent at times. Two players took my eyes as always; Enzo showed an eagerness on the ball and an ability to spray passes into space. And Felix exhibited fine skill at times, his happy feet taking him away from markers in tight areas. On the flanks, there were two different stories. Although he was away in the distance, Ben Chilwell looked to be doing all the right things at the right times, yet Ruben Loftus-Cheek forever looked a square peg in a round hole. His inability to cross the ball was annoying everyone.

The chances mounted up. The fleet-footed Felix forced a save. Then there was a lofted ball to Havertz that he chested down and volleyed, but the shot was straight at the ‘keeper. After a fine pass from Kovacic, a weak shot from the disappointing Mudryk. Loftus-Cheek continued to frustrate on his unconvincing forays down our right. He kept doing the simple things badly.

With half-an-hour played, Stamford Bridge was yet to warm up. I hadn’t joined in with a single song, nor had the majority of others.

We were ghosts again.

Kovacic as playmaker once more, this time a fine lofted ball towards Chilwell who advanced inside the box but slammed an effort against the woodwork. Half-chances came and went as the first-half continued. Chelsea’s approach play continued to hit some nice notes but we had no hint of a cutting edge.

Another Havertz effort was saved by Martinez. Late on, a dink into space from Enzo – becoming his trademark – set up Chilwell to head the ball in.

YES!

Sadly, our joy was short-lived when a tug on Ashley Young – who used to be a footballer – had been spotted.

There were muted boos at the end of the first period.

That a dirge from the hum drum Coldplay was aired at half-time just about summed it all up.

Our finishing had certainly been lukewarm.

I was waiting for a freshen-up – the footballing equivalent of a wet wipe to tidy up our grubby finishing – in the form of substitutions at half-time but there was nothing.

Attacking our end, the Matthew Harding, I was to appreciate the fine play of Chilwell at closer quarters. Soon into the half, he turned beautifully but shot weakly.

Just after, the Matthew Harding woke up, and me too.

“CAM ON CHOWLSEA. CAM ON CHOWLSEA.”

I am ashamed to admit that this must be the latest in a game that I have ever got involved.

Fackinell.

On fifty-six minutes, we failed to clear a corner and the ball was worked back to the onrushing McGinn, galloping in at pace. I caught his shot, sadly, on film. It flew into the net, with Kepa well beaten. This was only their fourth or fifth effort on goal yet they were 2-0 up.

Another “fackinell.”

And I was mocking their “we’ve got McGinn, super John McGinn” chant at the tube station.

More fool me.

With that, at last some substitutions.

N’Golo Kante for Loftus-Cheek.

Noni Madueke for Mudryk.

“Off you go, Ruben.”

But, but, but…what of the shape now?

Madueke at wing-back, Reece still inside, but Kante appeared to be playing off Havertz and alongside Felix in a front three.

Oh my fucking N’God.

Our play actually deteriorated.

Madueke cut inside but curled one over. Kante shimmied nicely but pushed a low drive wide. This was desperate stuff. The mood inside Stamford Bridge was horrible. It wasn’t top level toxicity, but the natives were not happy.

Our play and chances continued to frustrate us.

“You don’t know what you’re doing” rung out.

It got worse.

“You’re getting sacked in the morning.”

I thought to myself…”why wait until then?”

And I was only half-joking.

Two more substitutions.

Conor Gallagher for Kovacic.

Christian Pulisic for Cucarella.

In the last few minutes, the setting sun behind the West Stand produced a ridiculously warm glow to the metalwork on top of the towering East Stand and the bricks of the hotel and flats behind the Shed End. It gave the whole place a strange feel, almost ethereal.

Fool’s Gold anyone?

At the end of the match, the boos descended down from those who were still in their seats. Many had left.

I met up with Elicia and Madeka underneath Peter Osgood’s boots and put the borrowed season tickets safely away.

“Sorry that we lost. Sorry it was so quiet.”

“Oh my. There were some angry people near us.”

“I can imagine. I bet you heard some bad words, right.”

“We did.”

It was a grim walk back to the car.

Surely there are not many Chelsea supporters left who would be saddened if Chelsea pulled the plug on Graham Potter?

Next up, a terrifying game with Liverpool at home.

See you there.

Heroes And Villains

Tales From The Counting House

Posted on March 12, 2023 by Chris Axon

Leicester City vs. Chelsea : 11 March 2023.

We stepped into “The Counting House” at 11.30am. This pub, formerly part of an old cattle market, is equidistant between Leicester Tigers’ Welford Road stadium and the Leicester City Foxes’ King Power Stadium. It must do a great trade during these two sporting seasons. We only heard about this pub being the designated “away” pub before our game, just before COVID struck, in 2020. It’s a great boozer, modernised well with a long bar, and plenty of room for an overspill outside where beers are poured at a “pop-up” facility. We – the four of us, PD, Parky, Salisbury Steve and little old me – soon settled at one of the last remaining high tables. We had timed it just right.

This was another relatively long day following The Great Unpredictables.

I had set my alarm for 6.30am and I picked up PD and Steve at 8am, his Lordship just after. The drive up the Fosse Way was as picturesque and as pleasurable as ever. We breakfasted at Moreton-In-Marsh, then zipped around Coventry and headed towards Leicester. We used the last disabled parking space right outside the pub. As trips go, it had been nigh-perfect.

I have known Steve for a couple of years. He watches games near Parky in the Shed Lower and now drinks with us down “The Eight Bells”. It was good to have him on board. He added a little sanity to the day.

When we reached the pub only fifty or so other Chelsea supporters were present. I didn’t recognise any of them, not one. There is a rumour flying around at the moment that there is a way to “beat the system” of the VWR by using an app that opens up hundreds of browsers at one time. It is no wonder that many established old-school regulars at Chelsea, not au fait with such nefarious processes, never seem to get hold of away tickets these days.

The place soon filled up and at just after 12.15pm the first “Carefree” echoed around the bar. Two games were being shown on the bar’s large TV screens; Bournemouth vs. Liverpool and Bristol City vs. Blackpool. I didn’t really bother too much with either of them, though we loved to see Bournemouth take the lead against Liverpool and Mo Salah strike a penalty well-wide of the goal towards the end of the game.

How we laughed.

I wasn’t sure if I’d be laughing later. It would be “typical Chelsea” to follow up that fine win against Borussia Dortmund with a draw or, gasp, even a defeat against Leicester City. My prediction was a draw. To win three games in eight days might, I thought, be pushing it just a bit.

This would be my eighth visit to the King Power Stadium; I have missed three due to a holiday, being snowed in and “not being arsed” for a midweek League Cup game.

We walked the short distance to the ground just after 2pm.

I had swapped my ticket with PD’s so I could get a different perspective. Previous visits have always plotted me down the front; I fancied a change. I was well-rewarded with a seat right in the middle of the upper reaches of our away corner. Steve was ten yards away to my left, a row in front. PD was way down in row three alongside Al, Gal, John and Parky.

King Power Stadium slowly filled up and eventually came to life.

Our team?

Kepa

Fofana – Koulibaly – Cucarella

Loftus-Cheek – Enzo – Kovacic – Chilwell

Mudryk – Havertz – Felix

We have certainly raided Leicester City in recent years; Kante, Drinkwater, Chilwell, Fofana. I suppose their revenge was the 2021 FA Cup win, a fair trade-off, though I am sure they will never admit it.

The teams appeared.

The home team were dressed completely in royal blue while the away team were kitted out in garments based on foundation cream.

At the other end of the stadium, a rather pathetic “tifo” display took place involving a few white flags – presumably not of surrender – and a banner depicting the club’s trophies. The stadium is as bland as bland can be, quite different from Filbert Street with its four lop-sided stands.

Modern football, eh?

Around the ground, tucked under the roof at the rear of the home seated areas, Leicester City parade hundreds of small flags – not sure what they depict – but this looks messy, as if they have hung out all of their laundry to air.

The game kicked-off.

The badinage between both sets of supporters began early.

“Wesley Fofana. He left ‘cus your shit.”

“Potter and Boehly are fucking shit.”

“Ben Chilwell’s won the European Cup.”

A shot from James Maddison was easily saved by Kepa.

Ben Chilwell took a corner over in the far corner and as the ball dropped into the six-yard box, I experienced an immediate flashback to last season when I photographed a similar delivery onto the head of Antonio Rudiger and a goal followed. He loved playing at Leicester did Rudi. This year, Wesley Fofana headed the ball on and Kalidou Koulibaly kept the ball alive despite it ending well past the framework of the goal on our left. His cross went way deep. Chilwell, out on the right still, was the recipient and he was shaping up to make a direct hit, which I thought was being optimistic in the extreme. The angle was so tight. To my joy, he kept the ball low and it scudded into the net.

GET IN.

How he enjoyed that, running over to the crowd in the main stand, cupping his ears, and loving it all. My former work colleague Sally, watching with her young daughter Lily, was only a few yards away in her season ticket seat in the corner. Ouch.

Despite my pre-game reservations, we were 1-0 up.

The Chelsea crowd, buoyant before the goal, turned the volume up further.

“We’ve got Enzo in the middle. He knows exactly what we need.”

The front three were fluid, with Mykhailo Mudryk often in the middle with Kai Havetz on the right. Mudryk’s first touch was excellent in that first part of the game. I wanted him desperately to succeed. In the bar and at the game, his song was sung loudly.

“Mudryk said to me…”

Maddison zipped a free-kick over from the left but Daniel Amartey headed wide from very close in. This was developing into a fine game of football.

The songs continued.

“Oh Roman, do you know what that’s worth, Kai Havertz is the best on Earth.”

I had said to Steve in the pub that I liked this one, since it was born out of the 2021 Champions League Final in Porto, yet also mentions, and honours, Roman.

It was mid-way through the half, and the songs still rattled along nicely.

“Vialli” Vialli! Vialli! Vialli!”

“Kovacic our Croatian man…”

A fine cross from Havertz from the right found Felix who was one on one with the Leicester ‘keeper Danny Ward. He advanced and dinked the ball over him. Surely this was going in. We waited for the net to ripple. To our amazement and dismay, the ball struck the right-hand post.

“He’s gotta score those.”

On twenty-five minutes, the whole away end combined for a thunderous “Ten Men.”

Just after, Keirnan Dewsbury-Hall (not just a footballer but the site of temperance movement meetings in West Yorkshire), let fly from outside the box and his shot took a deflection off the considerable bulk of Koulibaly. To our relief, the ball crashed against the bar.

The barrage of songs continued.

“From Stamford Bridge to Wembley…”

“Hello, hello we are the Chelsea boys.”

“His hair is fucking massive.”

Marc Cucarella was, again, having a decent game. When he man-marks closely, he is decent. When he gets pulled all over the place, his sat nav throws a wobbly and he gets shown up. But on this occasion, fine.

“Oh when the blues go steaming in…”

“Oh Frankie Lampard scored two hundred…”

Another fine move followed. Mudryk cut in from the left with pace and set up an advanced Ruben Loftus-Cheek on the right, who then played a delightful low ball towards that man Felix. His tap in made us roar again, and the players raced over to Sally’s Corner.

YES!

And then.

VAR reared its ugly head.

No goal.

Not long after, Felix lost possession, trying to be too fancy in our defensive third, and Leicester won the ball. It was touched on to Patson Daka, whoever he is, and his shot fizzed past Kepa at the near post. It was a decent strike to be fair.

The quiet home fans to my left were now chirpy.

“You’re not singing anymore.”

Next, two fine saves from Kepa in very quick succession from Maddison and Kelechi Iheanacho. The game kept providing thrills and spills.

Some folk around me were losing their patience with Mudryk whose ball retention was lessening with each pass.

With half-time approaching, Enzo found himself with a little space and spotted the central run from Havertz. He scooped the ball up with deft precision – Zola to Poyet in 1999, anyone? – and over the defence right into the path of Havertz who beautifully lobbed the ball over Ward. Magnificent. One of the great goals.

But nobody celebrated.

Not Havertz. My gaze centered on him. Was he sure he was offside?

Not any of the players. Were they sure too?

The stadium seemed still, frozen in time.

Leicester fans – football fans always fear the worst – were stony silent as they presumed a goal had been conceded.

Not us.

We were quiet too. And mightily confused. There were, maybe, a few yelps of pleasure. But the majority of us were predominantly numbed into silence. I twice looked around to check the reaction of the bloke behind me, and neither of us knew what was going on. With the players idly walking back to our half and with the referee on the centre-circle, we all came to the slow realisation that the goal stood.

But the fear of VAR had ruined that goal celebration – once bitten twice shy – and, although we were laughing and joking at the time, we all knew that VAR had insidiously buggered-up that moment, our moment.

Fuck VAR.

Incidentally, I have to mention it; this goal was eerily similar to one that I witnessed in deepest Devon in August when Owen Humphries scooped a ball over the Buckland Athletic defence for Jon Davies to score for Frome Town in an FA Cup tie. No fucking VAR at that level, though.

We were happy at half-time. I popped down to see the lads in the third row. All of them were bemused by the second goal too.

A change at the break.

Conor Gallagher for Felix.

We enjoyed a couple of early corners with Fofana forcing a fine save from Ward at his near post.

“Oooh Wesley Fofana.”

A new one this, I think.

Then Leicester enjoyed a little spell. The challenges were crashing in and Kepa went down injured after a save. This was an open game now. Leicester dominated for ten minutes or so. We held firm.

“Super, super Frank…”

“That’s why we love Salomon Kalou…”

I’d prefer songs about current players to be honest. Can we not serenade former players when we are winning 4-0 and 5-0?

On the hour, spaces opening up as we countered and there was an effort from Havertz, off balance, that flew wide. Gallagher had to awkwardly block off the line on sixty-five minutes as Leicester attacked at a corner.

“Oh Dennis Wise…”

There was a header from Havertz on the penalty spot but it was right at the ‘keeper

“We all follow the Chelsea, over land and sea…”

The boke behind me was in a quandary.

“I like Gallagher, I really do, but I struggle with what he does apart from basically run around a lot.”

I knew what he meant.

A fine move, but our man Conor shot right at the ‘keeper.

Kepa tipped a shot over. There were surely no complaints about entertainment value here. After Tuesday, here we all were enjoying another thoroughly enjoyable game of football. Throughout it, we were the team that showed a little more quality in all areas.

Up the other end, the ball came loose and Dewsbury-Hall missed a sitter. Phew.

On seventy-three minutes, Graham Potter made some substitutions.

Christian Pulisic for Chilwell.

Trevoh Chalobah for Loftus-Cheek.

With fifteen minutes to go, the ball was played to Mudryk who raced on and calmly slotted but we were all able to sadly spot the lineswoman’s flag raised for offside. His joyous slide was in vain.

Bollocks.

A Leicester substitute became the latest victim of the away choir.

“Jamie Vardy, your wife is a grass.”

Songs still roared on in memory of Gianluca.

“Vialli! Vialli! Vialli! Vialli!”

On seventy-eight minutes, I watched the movement of Havertz just as Enzo brilliantly played a ball into space.

“That’s on.”

Havertz outpaced his marker and kept possession well. He then crossed, deeply, towards Mudryk who was back-peddling somewhat but still managed to keep the ball alive by heading it back into the six-yard box.

Enter Kovacic who blissfully volleyed home from close quarters.

We celebrated wildly now.

The scorer, surrounded by team mates, sprinted down to our corner while fists and arms pumped into the air. These were superb scenes.

And then.

VAR.

I silently groaned.

FOR FUCK SAKE.

But I had seen Havertz break. He had to race past his marker. I was confident.

Goal.

I turned to bloke beside me :

“Six goals in eight days!”

The away end was now the loudest it would be for the entire day.

“Kovacic our Croatian man.

He left Madrid and he left Milan.

He signed for Frank. Said fuck off Zidane.

He signed for Chelsea on a transfer ban.”

Magical times.

It seemed, at last, that things were looking up.

Some very late tweaks, and God knows who was playing where but I did not care one jot.

Carney Chukwuemeka for Mudryk and Benoit Badiashile for Fofana.

“You are my Chelsea, my only Chelsea…”

Empty seats appeared. I was so proud to see Sally and Lily still staying until the very end.

“Is there a fire drill?”

“You’ve had your day out…”

“We’re gonna bounce in a minute.”

“VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI!”

There were seven minutes of extra time and, in it, Wout Faes – whoever he is – got sent off for a second yellow.

I loved seeing the players – and the manager, great stuff – celebrate a fine win with smiles in front of our section at the end of the game. Let’s hope the corner has been turned.

This was a bloody excellent day of football, the away support was back to its best after the no-show at Tottenham, the colour was back in our beautifully toned cheeks, and I even got to see Kev Thomas smile.

We met up back at the car and all was good with our world. I slowly navigated myself away, the route taking my car right past the old away entrance to their old Filbert Street ground at the end of those tightly-packed houses on Burnmoor Street.

I reached home at about 9.30pm.

It had been a fine day.

Next up, Everton at home and let’s win again.

See you in the pub.

Tales From The SW6 Derby

Posted on February 5, 2023 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Fulham : 3 February 2023.

There was an air of anticipation bordering on excitement – but only just, I am fifty-seven after all – as we made our way up to London for the SW6 derby at Stamford Bridge. Who on Earth could have possibly forecasted such a big transfer spend-up during the winter transfer window? Certainly not me. The events of the previous few weeks had left many, including myself, in a whirl. We had already seen a few debuts in January but there would soon be more ahead. Players – the majority of whom were new names to me – were joining Chelsea Football Club at a rate of knots not seen since the transfer flurry in 2003 when we plundered the market for Glen Johnson, Adrian Mutu, Damian Duff, Hernan Crespo, Juan Sebastian Veron, Geremi, Wayne Bridge and Claude Makelele.

I had heard of all of them.

The signings of 2003, twenty-years on, were a different ball game.

Did it all make sense? Again, who knows? It may take a while, and the test of time, to evaluate if the massive financial outlay on players will have been a success.

Into the future we go.

But first, let’s take a look back at two games that are on the schedule for revisiting from forty years ago.

Saturday 22 January 1983 : Wolverhampton Wanderers 2 Chelsea 1 – 19,533

After the surprising 6-0 win against Cambridge United at Stamford Bridge, a week later we were on our travels. We were up against promotion hopefuls Wolves at Molyneux. This game drew a very healthy 19,533, although not as many as the recent 22,567 for the visit of Leeds United to the Black Country. These were decent gates for the time; excellent, in fact, for the Second Division and actually pretty decent when compared to First Division attendances that season. On the same day that we visited Wolves, just 9,946 saw Coventry City play Swansea City and 9,718 saw Notts County entertain Arsenal in the top flight.

Wolves’ famous old stadium was in a state of flux in those days. A massive ground redevelopment had stalled and it meant that, due to the eventual planned movement of the pitch, the one completed stand stood around fifty yards away from the nearest touchline. The huge South Bank still stood, as did the cranked main stand and the covered enclosure at the north side, and it looked altogether ridiculous. Molyneux was eventually completed in around 1993. In 2023, the once distant stand is the only structure remaining, and in fact the north enclosure has been replaced not once but twice.

I am sure that I wasn’t expecting the goal rush of the previous weekend to continue and Chelsea didn’t let me down, losing 1-2 with Colin Pates the lone scorer. That evening, I moped around Frome with some school friends, from an eighteenth birthday party to a variety of local hostelries. I suspect that the trials and tribulations of Chelsea Football Club was not high on my list of conversation topics.

On the same day, Derby County drew 3-3 at the Baseball Ground against Leeds United in front of 17,005. The main story of that game, though, involved the hooligan element of the travelling support who detached many of the seats in the away stand, the Osmaston Stand, and launched them at anyone within range. Why do I mention this? On the following Saturday, Chelsea were to play at the Baseball Ground in the fourth round of the FA Cup.

The song lyrics “anything you can do, I can do better” were surely ringing in the ears of Chelsea’s support on the way home from Molyneux that evening.

Saturday 29 January 1983 : Derby County 2 Chelsea 1 – 23,383

I had high hopes for this cup tie. I was absolutely sure that we would ease past Derby County, who were not enjoying a great season themselves, and we would then then be handed a plumb home draw in the next round. For some days, I was convinced we’d get Manchester United, the team supported by Rachel, the girl that had briefly appeared in my life before Christmas and who was still the object of my unrequited affections. From forty years on, this seems all rather pathetic and I suppose it was. But at the time communication between the two of us was minimal at best – I was an expert of furtive glances and occasional smiles, which I am pleased to report were always reciprocated when we passed each other – but a Chelsea vs. Manchester United cup tie would have definitely, I was sure, got us talking.

The lure of the FA Cup managed to entice large numbers to the Baseball Ground on this Saturday forty years ago and this was typical of the era. Derby’s league average for the whole season would eventually be 13,601 – there were only 8,075 present for our visit in the September – yet this tie drew almost 10,000 more. These were big numbers. Of the 23,383 present – I was not there – it is highly likely that Chelsea would have taken over 6,000.

The Baseball Ground, cramped twixt terraced streets, factories and industrial units, was a classic football stadium, famous for its ridiculously muddy pitches and tight stands. There were double-deck structures at each end, and the stands did not run parallel to the pitch.

Sadly, Kevin Wilson gave the home team a 1-0 lead in the first-half, but Mike Fillery equalised with twelve minutes to go. Alas, Wilson – who would sign for Chelsea in 1987 – grabbed a very late winner. And, yes dear reader, a sub-section of the Chelsea support dutifully copied their Leeds counterparts the previous week by lobbing seats everywhere, even on top of fellow Chelsea supporters on the terrace below if I am not mistaken.

I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

There is no doubt, no doubt at all, that in 1982/83 Chelsea Football Club was more famous, or infamous, for its hooligan support than its football. This was an altogether strange thing for me to have to handle, especially being so distant from the club geographically, and so distant from the heartbeat of the club, and fellow fans. It was a lonely existence to be honest. There was, of course, in the warped logic of a school playground or sixth-form common room, some sort of badge-of-honour kudos in Chelsea’s reputation, but at the same time I longed for us to get back into the top flight again.

1982/83 was turning into a desperate campaign, a nightmare in fact.

Oh, and guess what? I was to learn on the following Monday that Derby would play Manchester United at home in the fifth round.

Fackinell.

Let’s hop forward forty-years. I was up at the stadium just before 5pm. There was a little time to kill, so I took a few photos underneath the old Shed Wall, which can be one of Stamford Bridge’s most photogenic areas. I found myself by the repositioned photo of Gianluca Vialli, and touched his left boot for luck and in memory of the great man.

I had already seen on various social media platforms that Chelsea would be celebrating the Chinese New Year for the game against Fuham and I had to wonder why. The players would be – wait for it – wearing special pre-game training tops honouring the year of the rabbit, and as I walked around outside a couple of stands, red Chinese lanterns were regularly positioned. It was all very odd and rather pathetic.

Why were we honouring the Chinese New Year? Is it now a big thing among sports clubs the world over? I must have missed that memo. Let’s just thank our stars that American Independence Day is in the summer. What about South Korea? What about Venezuela? What about Rwanda? Will they get their moments too? I know we are a global brand – ugh – now, blah, blah, blah, but it left me cold. I wondered if we will soon be honouring other important dates in the calendar. What about the onset of Lent for starters and, specifically, Pancake Day?

Yes, Pancake Day. I had an idea. Chelsea should market supporters’ shirts for our next home game against Southampton with the words “I’m with this tosser” on the front. Someone contact the marketing department pronto.

As I left the West Stand forecourt, a Chelsea steward was going into a frenzy, yelling out “bag search on the table, bag search on the table” as if his life depended on it. I looked back one last time and saw a mass of hi-viz tabard-wearing stewards standing in a regulated formation – maybe a 7/5/3 with pushed-on wing-backs – and I wondered if our team against Fulham might be sporting a similarly over-loaded formation to get everyone a game.

I walked down the Fulham Road towards the CFCUK stall. Mark Worrall had put aside a book for me – “Come Along And Sing this Song” – which is an old-style football annual type book detailing 1983/84 (which I covered during the 2008/2009 season here) and looks a fine tome. I took a photo of the “Broadway Bar and Grill” – formerly the “King’s Head” and then “The Slug and Lettuce” – which, despite being a very handy pub at Chelsea, I have only ever entered a few times. There was a buzz that you don’t often get on match days. The signings had certainly energised the Chelsea support.

Pre-match was spent in “Simmon’s” with Parky, Andy and Sophie from Nuneaton, but also some friends from California; Tim and Hooman, who I had met on a number of occasions before. A surprise guest was BJ from Dallas who I last bumped into over in Michigan in 2016. It was a joy to see him again. He was with Emily, originally from Missouri but now living in Dallas too. We had a decent natter. It was her first visit to Stamford Bridge. She received the usual “if we lose, you’re not coming back” welcome from me. There was talk of the upcoming trip to Dortmund – not long to go now – but I also mentioned the home tie. I had recoiled in horror when I recently read that West Upper tickets for that game are on sale for £240.

Yes, that’s correct, £240.

What was that about the normal working man being priced out of football? At this rate, even the well-off are being priced out.

“A family day out at the football? That’ll be a thousand pounds please, thanks, enjoy your pizza.”

We checked the team on Sophie’s ‘phone.

“Ziyech playing? What? The fucker was meant to be in Paris, sipping champagne and smoking Gitanes tonight.”

I immediately wondered why Enzo Fernandez was not playing. But I then spotted, with some relief, that his name was given as simply “Enzo.”

He was to take Jorginho’s number five shirt.

It was great to see Reece James back.

“Hopefully not too soon though, eh?”

Andy was excited about the game. And although I was too – something I thought I’d not be saying a few weeks back, maybe after Forest – I couldn’t help but say that, knowing Chelsea, it would be a 0-0 draw, “another false dawn.”

Andy gave me a very old-fashioned look before we then dived headlong into a chat into our shared Chelsea past and memories of Bolton 2005, Munich 2012 and Porto 2021.

I was in early. I had a quick chat with Oxford Frank – “not sure about the morals of all this, but I guess it’s not our money…well, it will be our money when our season tickets undoubtedly go up next season” – and a young lad behind me from Ukraine, draped in a yellow and blue flag, bless him.

The troops arrived. The ground slowly filled.

There was a montage of Dave on the front cover of the programme having recently totted-up his five-hundredth game for our beloved club. I checked the spelling of a couple of our new acquisitions then quickly forgot them. Noni Madueke was going to be a struggle for sure. It annoys me that attendances are nowhere to be seen in this season’s match programme. They don’t always appear in newspapers. It is a pet peeve that seems to have developed since the COVID seasons. I don’t get it. It wasn’t so long ago that Chelsea used to add away team’s numbers to all games too. Is it me being cynical in thinking that by not publicising attendances, the myth of all games being sell-outs continues unabated?

A little more history about the SW6 Derby.

This would be the forty-fifth Chelsea vs. Fulham game at Stamford Bridge in all competitions – League, FA Cup, League Cup, Anglo-Scottish Cup – since our first encounter in 1911. In the previous forty-four, Chelsea had suffered just two defeats. No wonder Fulham hate us so much. Of course, we are so ambivalent to them. So much so that they hate it.

Despite our close proximity, a little under two miles between the two stadia, there simply hasn’t been any notable tit-for-tat rivalry on the pitch. Our lack of matches against Fulham in our formative decades is the main reason. Of those previous forty-four games, only twenty-two took place from 1905 to 2001. If anything, the rivalry has only ratcheted up in recent years, with the other sixteen games having taken place since 2001.

Is this, then, a new rivalry, having been dormant for over a century?

Possibly.

It wasn’t so long ago that the quiet neighbours were a main stay in the Premier League. Fulham enjoyed thirteen straight seasons in the top flight from 2001/2002 to 2013/14. There was a time, with them floundering in the basement, that I wondered if Chelsea would ever enjoy a local league derby ever again. I can remember the joy of March 2002 – it seems odd to admit this now – when I saw a derby against Fulham for the first time in eighteen years…a decent game, a narrow 3-2 win, a good atmosphere.

The team? OK, here we go.

Kepa

James – Silva – Badiashile – Cucarella

Gallagher – Enzo

Ziyech – Mount – Mudryk

Havertz

It almost felt like a new beginning.

Back in December, during that shite break, the names Benoit Badiashile, Enzo Fernandez – I did not watch any of the World Cup remember – and Mychailo Mudryk existed in another world.

Certainly not in London SW6.

Pre-game, two crowd-surfing tributes to Reece James dominated the two ends. It was a nicely-timed “welcome back” to our much-admired right back. There was also an odd, awkward, moment when the PA asked us to remember Jorginho, now passing sideways at Arsenal. I have never known that before. I don’t remember the PA asking us to remember Gordon Durie after he fucked off in 1991.

How odd.

Anyway, Jorginho. He had his moments. I never warmed to him particularly and his style was difficult to get excited about, but he put in some decent performances over the five years. We’ll miss the hop, skip and jump at penalties, eh?

“The Number 5 is dead, long live the Number 5.”

The game began. It was a mild night and I took my jacket off and placed it on a spare seat. Another full house, or near it. The pitch, parts of it, looked ropey, with it looking close to cutting up.

Immediately, I became flummoxed at the sight of us attacking the Matthew Harding and it took me a while to adapt.

I whispered to Clive “some team that, now…”

My eyes were soon settling on Mydryk and Enzo.

I now have two Argentinian friends in Buenos Aires – hello Victor, hello Vanesa – and we had been chatting about our new World Cup winner during the immediate pre-match. I like it that Enzo once played under Hernan Crespo at Defensa y Justicia, one of the city’s legion of professional clubs, and he reminded me a little, facially, of Juan Roman Riquelme. I have developed a little love affair with Argentina of late, and we have had a trickle of Argentine players since the madness of 2003. Apart from Veron, Crespo and now Enzo, Wily Caballero and Gonzalo Higuain have recently played for us. I also recollect the fleeting presence of Franco di Santo who I once saw score a goal for us in Dallas, the home of Emily and BJ.

The number five seemed to be playing quite deep, but I hoped he had a licence to roam.

Vamos Enzo!

After the first ten minutes, I had to admit that Fulham had probably started the livelier of the two teams despite a little activity down our flanks. Mydryk looked lively at the start but he certainly had no wide open spaces to exploit, like at Anfield, and he soon started to fade.

I soon spotted Emily and BJ down in Parkyville.

On nineteen minutes, our first real chance, and a super lob over the back line from Thiago Silva towards Kai Havertz, but his prod was stopped by Bernd Leno. The offside flag was raised anyway.

To Clive : “it’s actually nice to have an away team attacking us, rather than a side defending deep all the bloody time.”

Indeed, the away team were tight, putting us under pressure and attacking with intent. On twenty-four minutes, the unmarked Andreas Pereira spun and shot low at Kepa in the Shed End goal, but our ‘keeper responded so well to parry.

On the half-hour, at last we had some chances of our own, two in quick succession. Mudryk set up Havertz with a fine pass, but another offside. And then Mount set up Havertz came close again, but his first-time blast was wasteful, drawing groans as it flew high off his boot. On thirty-five minutes, there was a crunching tackle from Enzo in the centre-circle, and this was followed by a perfectly-weighted pass out to Hakim Ziyech, but his right-footed shot was blasted high and wide. That little cameo from the Argentine warmed me.

The atmosphere had been pretty rotten until now, with few songs and chants. Fulham had sounded like West Ham what with their demands for us to stick our blue flag up our collective arses. At last the home crowd responded with a loud-ish “Chelsea, Chelsea” a la “Amazing Grace.”

There was a quick break from the visitors and with bodies in the box, they really ought to have scored; a long cross towards Willian was headed back but Kepa gathered.

In the final minute of the half, Benoit Badiashile – enjoying a good performance – brilliantly intercepted a pass and set up an attack. At last a perfectly-flighted ball from the foot of Ziyech found Havertz, but his studied touch saw the ball sadly strike the post. There was nobody close to touch in the rebound.

Clive : “Mount stood and watched. Lampard would have been racing in.”

It hadn’t been a great performance. There seemed to be a positive reaction to our showing at Anfield, but this one was drawing groans as the match developed. I don’t always do it, but I sent out half-time ratings in a WhatsApp group.

Kepa 7

James 5 – Silva 6 – Badiashile 7 – Cucarella 4

Gallagher 6 – Enzo 7

Ziyech 4 – Mount 5 – Mudryk 4

Havertz 5

At the start of the second-half, another debut ensued as Graham Potter sent on Noni Madueke to replace Mudryk on the left wing. His initial involvement was thrilling, with a great show of speed and a willingness to race away and dribble in any direction, like a footballing Forrest Gump.

To Clive : “maybe this will be it for the next few games, every second-half we get to see a new rapid winger thrilling us all.”

There was a cross from a relatively quiet James but Leno was able to claim the ball before Maduenke could pounce.

On the hour, Willian rolled back the years with a super direct run into our box down below us, but his effort was blazed over.

Clive : “man of the match so far.”

There was a horrible tackle on Peireira on Cucarella, but no red card after a VAR review.

Two more substitutions followed.

Dave for Reece.

Raheem Sterling for Ziyech.

Madueke was now able to run amok on the right wing.

To Clive : “to be honest, I think we are worse this half.”

There was a stupid foul that lead to a booking for Gallagher, then another fleet-footed run by Willian but a thankfully weak shot straight at Kepa. Those half-time ratings were dropping to fours and fives with only Enzo and Badiashile maintaining a decent level, although Sterling started decently.

On sixty-nine minutes, an optimistic lob from the half-way line from Aleksandar Mitrovic resulted in Kepa back-peddling but we were grateful that he stopped the ball high on the line.

We improved a little, with Enzo going close with a fine curling drive that flew past a post.

On seventy-five minutes, David Fofana substituted the very disappointing Mount, who was now sporting a haircut that must have been based on a certain Butt-Head from around 1994. I wondered if Dennis Bergkamp was available for a routine alongside him…

”Arsenal. You said Arsenal.”

To Clive : “how has Havertz stayed on?”

A shot from Gallagher – that I caught on film – flew past the post.

More groans.

Willian was widely applauded when he was substituted on seventy-five minutes, a fine servant over recent years for us.

On seventy-eight minutes, Fofana broke in well from the right and, after some decent footwork as he rounded Leno, was perhaps unlucky to see his shot blocked on the line.

Fackinell.

My biggest moan of the night? On at least one occasion in the first-half and two in the second-half, Chelsea players, I remember Mount and Gallagher, failed to get their corners past the first man. How is that possible? Nothing infuriates me more.

To the bloke behind me : “all that sky to hit…for fuck sake.”

Late on, we were cheered to see Ben Chilwell make a cameo appearance for the under-fire Cucarella.

It stayed 0-0. In the bar before, I was only semi-serious, but I suppose I knew deep down. I have been going to Chelsea too long now.

There was rowdiness from the Fulham fans on the walk down the Fulham Road as we walked past the CFCUK stall, on towards the “Broadway Bar and Grill”, and one mouthy lad must have barked this out five times :

“All that fuckin’ money and you still couldn’t beat us.”

Things were heated between a few individuals and several police were seen rushing to quell a few flashpoints. A few obvious tourists looked on in horror.

I must admit that I was getting annoyed with them, these Fulham fans, probably for the first time ever.

After well over a century, perhaps that rivalry is beginning to heat up a little.

A little mob of Fulham fans trotted off down the Fulham Road – I suspect the majority of their fans live more locally than us – and it seemed strange to thank that, perhaps, a few would be able to get home within a few minutes. I wondered if many lived on the Clem Atlee.

I made a quick exit and was soon heading west down the M4. I would get home at around 1.15am, my weekend over before it would begin. There would be no Frome Town game for me to relish on the Saturday; they had played on this Friday night too, a home game with Bishop Cleeve from near Cheltenham. At least Frome won 2-0.

A disappointing performance from Chelsea? Yes.

But I like the look of Enzo, who I hope can develop into the goal-scoring play-maker that we have missed for what seems like an ice-age. I think he showed enough promise in his first game for us for me to pin some hopes on him. He looked neat in possession, with no Jorginho-style dawdling, and his range of passing can hopefully set our runners free. The pre-match optimism seemed to have deserted everyone in the stadium by the end of the game, so whereas a nice win would have set us all up for a tough, but winnable, game at West Ham next Saturday, we now go gingerly into the future.

Cue clichés about “trusting the process”, the “long haul” et-bloody-cetera. Is Potter the man to lead us? Ah, that’s the $64,000 question. Or the $640,000,000 question these days.

See you in East London next Saturday.

Tales From Two Wins

Posted on January 17, 2023 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Crystal Palace : 15 January 2023.

Leaving West London after the away game at Fulham on Thursday, I turned to PD and sighed as I said “at least we haven’t got to schlep all of the way up north for our next game, with it being an easy-to-reach home game against Palace.”

He agreed but then spoiled the mood a little as he mentioned a trip to Liverpool the week after.

We were undoubtedly going through a very tough spell. Not only had we been defeated in three consecutive games, there had also been the sad and traumatic passing of Gianluca Vialli the day after the first defeat. This was a short and difficult period in the history of Chelsea Football Club; eight days full of losses and loss. It was a horrible time.

As we headed towards Stamford Bridge we tried to be as positive as possible about the future, but I think we all knew that the day would be difficult. There would be undoubted sadness as the club paid its respects to our much-loved former Italian player and manager. This would be, I was sure, as emotional as previous similar days at Stamford Bridge when we remembered Matthew Harding in 1996, Peter Osgood in 2006 and Ray Wilkins in 2018.

The day began with a delay. Parky’s village was almost cut off from civilisation due to flooding on two roads but I was thankfully able to head off on a lengthy diversion to reach him. The rain was incessant in that first hour but thankfully the day brightened up and dried out.

We often talk about “must win games” but this one really was. Under-pressure Graham Potter’s charges really needed to triumph against Patrick Vieira’s team.

Was I confident? Only maybe.

Despite the delay at the start of the day, I was still able to drop PD and Parky on Fulham High Street just before 10am. I headed off to take a few photographs of the floral tributes and the mementoes left at the base of the large picture of Gianluca Vialli that had been moved from its usual position on the Shed Wall. This position is at the far left, position number one, and I have always like that. Many players have played more games and scored more goals for us, but very few have ever been as loved as Luca Vialli.

As I stopped by, my camera clicked a few times, but I then needed to stop all that and just be alone with my thoughts in silence. I adsmired the wreaths, the bouquets, the flowers. There were many Chelsea scarves and a few Italian flags. A woman approached and solemnly positioned a scarf on the floor. I noted a touching reference to the white vest that Dennis Wise aired after the 1997 FA Cup Semi-Final win against Wimbledon at Highbury imploring Luca to “cheer up” and this made me smile.

My eyes were moist in the biting winter air.

I met up with the usual suspects down at “The Eight Bells” at around 11am. There were the usual “Only Home Fans” signs back on the windows for this game.

Business as usual.

Unable and unwilling to share an alcoholic drink with PD, Parky, Rich and Matt, I took a leaf out of Andy and Kim’s book and got my kicks via a full English breakfast.

We left bang on 1pm, keen to witness all of the pre-match commemorations.

There were black and white photos of Luca on the way in. The match programme featured a lovely image of the man. Inside, many words were written about Luca.

I was in with half an hour to go before the 2pm kick-off and Depeche Mode’s “Just Can’t Get Enough” was played again. I spotted all of the Chelsea players – split into the starting eleven and the substitutes – wearing black tops with “Vialli 9” printed on the back, with the font used being the same as on the 1996/97 shirts, a nice touch indeed.

My mind wandered.

During the last few years of my mother’s life, as she battled dementia with a cheery smile, I got into the very enjoyable habit of attempting to stimulate her mind by using a Chelsea-based word association game :

I would say a first name, my mother would add a surname.

“Ron”…”Harris.”

“Peter”…”Osgood.”

“Pat”…”Nevin.”

“Frank”…”Lampard.”

“Gianluca”…””Vialli.”

“Gianfranco”…”Zolo” (always Zolo, God that made me chuckle.)

I had a wistful smile to myself. Mum never got Luca’s name wrong.

We had been advised to be in for 1.40pm when some former team mates would honour Gianluca Vialli. Well, that time passed with no on-field ceremony and I wondered if it had all happened earlier.

Some chap appeared on the pitch with a microphone and he spoke briefly about Gianluca Vialli, and then asked us to – ugh – “make some noise!!!” (with exclamation marks no doubt!!!) and the Matthew Harding quickly responded.

“VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI!”

But then, what a mood killer, the PA blasted this into oblivion with “Park Life” by Blur. This was then followed by “Liquidator” and I grumbled away to myself. On a day of remembrance, it would have been lovely to have some silence ahead of the appearance of the teams with the supporters themselves being left to their own way of getting an atmosphere going.

Modern football, eh?

The teams appeared. We were shown a short video of Gianluca Vialli, with a nice voiceover.

“From the day you stepped through the door you set the standard at this club and captured our hearts.”

Goals and games were recounted, two goals against Liverpool in the Cup, one at Old Trafford, four goals at Barnsley, two goals at Tromso. The trophies came.

“Dreams came true under your management and you achieved your dream of becoming a Chelsea legend.”

Those incredible European nights were remembered.

“But above all Luca, you were a wonderful man. Charming, respectful, determined. You had a heart of gold that touched so many. Now our hearts are broken, but how lucky we were to have known you. Luca, we love you and we miss you.”

My eyes were moist again.

I wondered if Luca ever spotted my “Vinci Per Noi” banner that I took to many games from the summer of 1996 as our club became besotted with Italian footballers.

The Chelsea and Crystal Palace players made their way to the centre circle, solemnly followed by some former Chelsea players, of whom only Mark Hughes and David Lee did I immediately recognise.

Two large banners appeared at both ends of the stadium. The Chelsea players were each wearing “Vialli 9” training tops. A minute of applause was heartfelt, loud and respectful.

“VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI!”

It was suddenly time to think about football. I had missed the team announcements so as the game started I pieced it all together.

“Kepa in goal, looks like a three of the new boy Badiashile, Silva and Cholobah, Hall way out left, Ziyech way out right, a midfield pairing of the immobile Jorginho and the very mobile Gallagher, Mount and Carney supporting Havertz…no wait, Ziyech is too far forward, must be a back four then. No, they are too wide. Let’s see how it plays out.”

There were clear blue skies overhead.

Alas no Alan nor Clive with us today so PD and I stretched out.

The game began.

8 minutes – a subdued atmosphere. I wasn’t sure if this was because of the inherent sadness before the game, the nervousness about our recent play or the fact it was an early kick-off.

9 minutes – there was a rather half-hearted “Vialli” chant that really only got going in earnest thirty seconds into the all-important ninth minute. It dawned on me that Luca last played for us almost twenty-five years ago and I wondered if this was the reason. Are those that loved him in his prime now priced out of attending Stamford Bridge? Or was it indifference? I didn’t want to contemplate all of this.

12 minutes – some decent stuff from Lewis Hall in an advanced role on the left, with a keen readiness to power past his defender.

14 minutes – we enjoyed a decent little spell with Hakim Ziyech showing a willingness to get involved and shimmy down the right wing.

17 minutes – complete silence. The moment lasted for quite a few seconds. It shocked me. No shouts from the crowd. Nothing.

18 minutes – no goal threats at all thus far with Chelsea enjoying more of the ball, but then Palace went close at the far post.

19 minutes – a fine shot from Michael Olise was superbly saved by Kepa and then a “star jump” from Kepa foiled Tyrick Mitchell.

22 minutes – at last an audible “Carefree” sounded out from the Matthew Harding.

24 minutes – a bout of head tennis in the Palace penalty area was followed by a strong swipe at goal by Thiago Silva but not only did his shot go wide, an offside flag was raised too.

27 minutes – a well-worked foray down our right brought purrs from the crowd but Mason Mount shot weakly at Vicente Guaita.

30 minutes – we had dominated the game but the visitors had easily had the best few chances.

31 minutes – so quiet.

32 minutes – a great deep cross from Ziyech, but Kai Havertz’ slow looper dropped just over the bar.

39 minutes – another good advance from Conor Gallagher, the ball ending up with a shot from Hall that flew just wide.

45 minutes – Kepa was called into action to tip a strong header from Jeffrey Schlupp over the bar, and we then broke and had a couple of late chances on the Palace goal that sadly misfired.

Thankfully there were no boos at half-time and there was even a little applause. I turned to PD and mused on the game thus far…

“We’re playing well, the mood among the fans around us seems to be reasonable, but is that because our expectations are really at not a very high level? You have to say, all our players today, they’re doing alright but are any of them more than a…”

I paused briefly, wanting to say 6, I thought briefly of saying 7, but I went with my gut reaction and said…

“6” just as PD said “6” too.

At the break, new signing Mykhailo Mudryk appeared on the pitch, draped in a Ukraine flag.

“All these runners, we just need a playmaker to hit them” I moaned for the ninety-fifth time since Christmas.

The second-half began.

53 minutes – there was a fine shimmy under pressure and cushioned lay-off from Badiashile that reminded me so much of Frank Leboeuf in his prime. The debutant was impressing me.

55 minutes – a fine punch away by that man Kepa from Wilfred Zaha. That was four great saves at least.

56 minutes – a shot down below us from Havertz but it did not worry the Palace ‘keeper.

58 minutes – the loudest “Vialli! Vialli!” chant of the entire day. Phew.

63 minutes – Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang for Carney Chukwuemeka.

65 minutes – a corner down below me, some passes twixt Gallagher and Ziyech, a strong cross towards the penalty spot and my camera clicked as several Chelsea players jumped. The ball flew goal wards and the net rippled. There followed a run of relief to the corner flag and by the time Havertz had been swamped by team mates, the MHL was bellowing “Vialli! Vialli!” The header was a downward dab that Luca would have been proud.

66 minutes – Alan and I exchanged “THTCAUN” and “COMLD” via Whatsapp.

69 minutes – Dennis Wise, San Siro, you know the song.

70 minutes – a fine forward pass – honest, I saw it – from Jorginho set up Aubameyang but he was foiled by Guaita’s advance.

74 minutes – Hall set up Aubameyang but a shot was blocked.

75 minutes – the left-back went down with yet another injury to hit us. He was replaced by Kalidou Koulibaly.

80 minutes – a good free-kick was worked with the resulting cross being just too heavy for Havertz to connect.

81 minutes – a fucking superb block by Silva, what a man.

85 minutes – a superb diving save from Kepa thwarted Chieck Doucoure’s effort from way out.

89 minutes – Dave for Kai Havertz and Mateo Kovacic for Jorginho.

90 minutes – Palace continued to pile on the pressure with seemingly endless crosses coming in from their right. This was a nervous time, no doubt.

95 minutes – “Vialli! Vialli! Vialli! Vialli!”

96 minutes – a fine block from Trevoh Chaobah.

At the final whistle, I pointed with fore-fingers to the sky.

Phew.

A win for us.

A win for Luca.

A win for Chelsea.

We were OK; in fact, more than that, this was a better performance than in the recent run of games, but there is such a long way to go during this campaign. The match against Palace was our nineteenth league game of the season; only the half-way stage.

But a win is a win is a win.

And talking of wins…

Forty years ago to the day – Saturday 15 January 1983 – in addition to lamenting the recent news about the break-up of Stiff Little Fingers on the previous Thursday and after withdrawing my applications to several universities on the Friday, I was elated that Chelsea had defeated Cambridge United 6-0 at Stamford Bridge. The goal scorers were Mike Fillery with two, Joey Jones, John Bumstead, Alan Mayes and an own goal. The gate however was a disappointing 7,808.

In 1983, all was doom and gloom at Chelsea and SLF were no more.

I need not have worried. Last year, Chelsea were crowned World Champions and I saw SLF play a gig in my home town of Frome.

Next, Anfield.

I’ll see you up there.

Tales From Home And Away

Posted on January 14, 2023 by Chris Axon

Fulham vs. Chelsea : 12 January 2023.

When I was driving home from Manchester City on Sunday evening, mid-way through the packet of Fruit Pastilles maybe, I realised that I had acquired a sore throat. In these days of COVID and an apparently vigorous new ‘flu strain, I was obviously fearing the worst. As I drove on, I thankfully didn’t experience any other ‘flu or COVID symptoms, and in fact the sore throat thankfully lessened as time passed. It soon dawned on me that it was all due to the singing that I had done during the game at the Etihad Stadium. In a way, it made me happy, it comforted me. It confirmed that my appearance at the game had not been merely passive. It meant that I had been actively involved in cheering the boys on.

It often used to be like this.

Sore throats after football.

Often at work after games the previous day, I would be ridiculed for my first few utterances. But it was part of football back then.

Turn up. Have a beer. Pay your money at the turnstiles. Cheer the team on. And on. And on. And on.

I suspected that many Chelsea supporters were experiencing sore throats after Manchester. What a show of force and resilience that indeed was.

Top fucking marks.

Next up was a game at Craven Cottage, down in deepest SW6, against our nearest rivals Fulham. This was a game from September that was postponed due to the death of Queen Elizabeth II, and would now take place on a Thursday evening in January.

My alarm woke me at 4.45am. I was to work a “flexi” shift from 6am to 2pm, then drive up to London with Paul and Glenn, PD and Parky, P Diddy and Lord Parky, my match day companions for much of the last five years and beyond.

During my shift at work I told a few football fans (sic) that I feared the result and that we’d lose. I may have said that I fancied Willian to score, just to rub it in. Fulham were faring well this season. This would not be an easy game. The previous evening, I had delved into the record books as I prepared some thoughts about what I should include in this edition of the blog. I knew that our recent record against Fulham – London’s oldest club – was excellent in recent times, but our dominance over them stretched back decades.

Since a 0-2 loss at Stamford Bridge in October 1979, we had played Fulham forty times across all competitions and lost just once. We had won our last seven games against Fulham. I saw all this domination and it made me gulp. Not only did I feel that a Fulham win was long-overdue I had a sixth sense of it happening later in the day. I explained these figures to a couple in the office and said “and I reckon tonight they will beat us for the second time” but their expressions suggested that I was being overly-dramatic.

I thought to myself…”mmm, they don’t know Chelsea like I do.”

I had pre-booked a JustSpace spot outside a flat in Putney, just south of the bridge. I made good time, the roads were relatively clear. I dropped PD and Parky outside “The Eight Bells” at around 4.45pm. My parking spot was from 5pm. I reached it at 5.05pm. I work in logistics.

Normally at Fulham – from memory, every time except once since 2004 – we drink at “The Duke’s Head” in Putney, but we would return to our local “The Eight Bells” on this occasion because it was just easy to meet others there to hand over tickets. We are pretty familiar with this particular spot now, the area both sides of the river, and as I donned my baseball cap – New York Yankees – and zipped up my rain jacket – Victorinox – it felt nice and secure as I walked north towards Fulham.

St. Mary’s Church was floodlit as I passed. The apartments at Putney Wharf were illuminated blue – pretty sure David Luiz used to reside here – and Putney Bridge itself was floodlit too. Craven Cottage was hiding behind a slight bend in the river.

I would soon be in the warmth of “The Eight Bells”, our home away from home at Chelsea, er Fulham – the borough, not the football club, confusing isn’t it? – the past four years. I always presumed that the pubs in this neck of the woods were Fulham pubs on their match days, but the landlady recently confirmed that the three nearest boozers nearest Putney Bridge – the tube station, not the bridge, confusing isn’t it? – were designated as “away” pubs. Thus, “The Eight Bells”, “The Temperance” and “The King’s Arms” were all Chelsea pubs on this night.

I reached the pub just at 5.20pm. It seemed odd, I must admit, to see an “Only Away Fans” sign on a window. It was crowded, lots of the younger element, virtually no colours, all Chelsea. PD and Parky were sat close to our usual table with a few other friends. As I squeezed out at 6.30pm to hand over tickets, a young chap entered and exclaimed “small, innit?” and I replied “and getting smaller.” There was no space anywhere.

The mood in the pub was mainly boisterous with a few songs being aired. For once, I wanted to reach Craven Cottage in plenty of time. It is usually a struggle to reach kick-off time due to the comforts of “The Duke’s Head” and a slightly optimistic guess of how long it takes to walk through Bishop’s Park. On this particular evening, it was just a few hundred yards less than a mile. As we walked through the park, the bright floodlights came into view to the north and I could not resist stopping to take a few atmospheric photographs of the gnarled silhouetted trees and the gnarled masses walking purposefully to the match.

The area outside the away turnstiles is by far the best part of Craven Cottage and, along with the narrow street adjacent to the main stand at Goodison, is my favourite away day location for photographs and ambiance. The red brick, the signage, the historic cottage itself, the hawkers, the Haynes statue, the floodlights. It’s magical but, I guess, in only a way that a football fancier would really appreciate.

This spot is the definition of the phrase “Fulhamish.”

I was in at around 7.20pm. I spoke with a few friends and some – the fools – thought that we would win. My mouth went dry and I found it hard to answer their obvious optimism.

This was my first visit since March 2019, a 2-1 win. Since then, Fulham have been relegated, promoted to a COVID-hit season, relegated and promoted again. They are the ultimate “yo yo” team, or if their much-derided middle class support might say, a “yah yah” team (Peter York, 1981, thanks for that.)

At last the new Riverside Stand is functional for match days, if not fully. I have been keeping tabs on its slow progress for years. On this night, the lower section and the outer flanks of the upper tier were able to be used.

My mate Nick, born in Battersea, called over to say that he saw his first-ever game here, back in the ‘fifties, when many Chelsea supporters used to pop over to Craven Cottage when we were away. Joe Cole and Gary Cahill, with huge BT Sport mics, walked past and were serenaded.

It was announced that our new loan signing Joao Felix was starting.

Kepa

Chalobah – Silva – Koulibaly

Dave – Kovacic – Zakaria – Hall

Mount – Havertz – Felix

Chelsea in those crappy Tottenham navy socks. Why?

Willian was starting for the home team.

PD and Parky made it in just before the game began, PD having trouble getting in on a ticket that initially appeared to be null and void. There were six of us squeezed into five spaces; PD, Parky, John, Gal and Al, with me somewhere in the middle. It was our version of a high press.

Fair play to Fulham. As with Manchester City, they honoured the memory of Gianluca Vialli before the game – there was a minute of applause – and I thank them for that. Previously dry, the evening’s only rain thankfully came and went very soon into the game.

It felt odd to be attacking the Putney End in the first period.

We started so well, with Joao Felix involved in most of our attacking thoughts. He had started the game so positively and his touch and urgency shone like a beacon in those first moments of the game. I counted three efforts on goal in the opening fifteen minutes alone. He also drew fouls from two separate Fulham players who were both booked. This was some debut. Shots from him, and others, flew at the Fulham goal.

Halfway through the first-half, this was an open game, and the Chelsea crowd were buoyant.

As with Cucarella at Goodison Park, though, I was a little picky with a song for the Portuguese signing being aired so soon in his Chelsea career. Others wait years.

“He came from Portugal. He hates the Arsenal.”

This was a remake of the Tiago chant from 2004; I suppose it is better than nothing. There is no doubt that Felix was the spark in our team and it was so good to see a player with a constant willingness to go forward. It was a jolt to our system. Other players – I am talking about you Mount, Ziyech, Havertz, Pulisic – must have looked on and thought “oh yeah I remember now.”

We had enjoyed most of the attacks on goal. Fulham had been neat but mainly on the defensive, with only an occasional attack worthy of the name.

Out of nowhere, a shot from Bobby Decordova-Reid smashed against our bar. Soon after, on twenty-four minutes, Willian wriggled inside the box and I spoke to John next to me.

“You know he’s going to bend one in, there you go.”

Sadly, I had a premonition about a Willian goal before the match but found myself calling the goal in real time too. It is a habit that I need to get out of. Maybe I should stay stony silent all game.

Willian wheeled away but did not celebrate. Top man.

Soon after, my phone lit up with images of myself being featured on BT’s coverage of the game.

I looked depressed, eh?

We kept attacking with shots from Felix, again, and Hall causing concern for Bernd Leno in the Fulham goal.

There was a piece of sublime skill from Thiago Silva towards the end of the first-half, a cushioned caress of the ball and a prod to safety, that only I seemed to spot. In the ‘eighties, it would have drawn applause, I am sure, from everyone in our end.

Late on in the half, a shot from Dave was deflected over after good combination play involving the new man Felix and a seemingly revitalised Havertz, and then Havertz set up Felix – yet again – but his shot was blocked from my view by a bloke in front of me. I had not got a clue how it avoided the goal.

So, the first-half, Chelsea with decent attacking, five efforts or so from Felix, but we looked naïve at the back. Grumbles at the break? Oh yes.

In that chat about Chelsea’s fortunes at work during the day, a work colleague had mentioned that someone on “Talk Sport” had mentioned that Chelsea were third out of three in the “West London League” and I mentioned that we were bottom of the same league in 1982/83 too.

Right, 1982/83, let’s go.

On Wednesday 12 January – forty years ago exactly – Chelsea played Huddersfield Town in an FA Cup third round replay at Stamford Bridge, just a mile and a half away from the current location of Chelsea Football Club’s first team. We won 2-0 with two late goals from John Bumstead, who didn’t get many, and Mike Fillery, who got more, in a match watched by a decent enough gate of 14.417. My diary that evening was surprisingly gung-ho, predicting that we would go to Derby County in the next round and win. I must have been light-headed and delirious.

Two minutes into the second-half at Craven Cottage in 2023, I captured the lone figure of Mason Mount taking aim with a free-kick against the backdrop of the inhabitants of the Hammersmith End. I watched the ball sweep goal wards. There was a mighty kerfuffle in the six-yard box as there appeared to be a save, a shot, a save, but then a goal given. I had no idea if the ball had crossed the line directly from Mount or via another player.

We were level.

I looked over to spot Alan’s face, a picture of determination and involvement. Loved that.

The Chelsea choir were suddenly in a playful mood.

“We are staying up. Say we are staying up.”

Sadly, Denis Zakaria fell to the floor in front of the dugouts and looked in considerable pain. He would play no more and was replaced by the less-than-appetising sight of Jorge Luiz Frello Filho, who currently has more names than fans at Chelsea right now. Zakaria – yet another injury, we must be experiencing our worst-ever run – looked utterly dejected as he limped around the pitch.

Worse was to come. Barely a minute or so after, Kalidou Koulibaly struck a firm ball at Felix’ upper body – “fuck was that?” – and the Portuguese player lost control. In attempting to rob Kenny Tete, he scythed him down, and a red looked likely.

Yes, a straight red.

A debut to remember for Joao Felix.

Collective brains whirled back forty years.

Chris : “Al, didn’t Joey Jones get sent off in his first game in 1982?”

Al : “Yes mate, Carlisle away.”

A little later.

Rob : “I bet Joey Jones didn’t have six shots on goal before he got sent off at Carlisle.”

Now we were up against it alright. A man down, I really wondered where our attacks would originate. But we kept going. There was a chance for Havertz breaking on the left but his shot was somehow blocked by Leno.

On seventy-three minutes, the former Manchester United winger Anders Pereira sent over a teasing cross that had Kepa beaten all ends up.

More commentary from me : “Kepa’s nowhere.”

Our ‘keeper came but misjudged the flight of the ball completely, leaving Carlos Vinicius to head into an empty net.

The vitriol aimed at Kepa was intense.

Immediately after, the away end sent out the equivalent of a “thumbs down” to the current ownership.

A Roman thumb, if you will.

“Roman Abramovich. Roman Abramovich.”

At the break, I had moaned to a friend who was standing behind me that I honestly wondered if the new owners have a clue about football. There are certain aspects about this new lot that shouts desperation. And maybe naivety too. Hopefully the season will improve and I will be completely wrong.

Then, a chant that has been heard sporadically over the years.

“We want our Chelsea back.”

I wondered which Chelsea this was.

The 1905 to 1954 Chelsea that won fuck all?

The 1971 to 1996 Chelsea that won fuck all?

Or maybe just the last twenty years of Chelsea that have won rather a lot?

Regardless, the mood in the Putney End was a feral one now, with shouts and chants raining down from behind. But amidst all of this, “Three Little Birds” made a very surprising appearance.

“Don’t worry about a thing ‘cus every little thing is gonna be alright.”

On seventy-nine minutes, Graham Potter changed things.

Carney Chukwuemeka for Chalobah.

Conor Gallagher for Kovacic.

Marc Cucarella for Hall.

Then, just after.

Hakim Ziyech for Mount.

We conjured up a couple of late chances for Havertz, but I think it is safe to say it was no surprise that we could not find the net.

For Fulham, our former player Nathaniel Chalobah came on in the last few seconds, thus missing his brother by around twenty minutes.

The final whistle blew.

Fulham 2 Chelsea 1.

I had sadly been right all along.

There were boos at the end, not from many, but from enough to make themselves heard.

“You’re not fit to wear the shirt.”

I was inwardly grimacing.

I’m still not a fan of booing after all these years.

At the end, I was keen to race back to my car. Both PD and Parky had struggled with walking the mile to the game and I did not want them to have to walk a mile and a half back to the car. I tried to leave quickly. I wasn’t able to pay too much attention to the interaction between players and our supporters. I was aware that a stern faced Mason Mount had the balls to come over to face the ire of some of our support. I believe, from comments that I would later hear, only Silva and Dave joined him. Many of my fellow supporters were yelling abuse, indiscriminately, though just as may were clapping the players off.

To boo or not to boo?

To clap or not to clap?

Answers on a postcard.

I raced back to Putney, walking close to the icy chill coming off the river. Walking over Putney Bridge, I overheard a middle-aged chap say to his friend :

“I guess I have seen some players down here over the years, but I think Willian is the best I have seen.”

I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

I thought back to Fulham’s last win against us, in March 2006, and walking over the exact same bridge, surrounded by jubilant Fulham fans – more so than in 2023 – and the memories were strong. Jose Mourinho oddly took off both Shawn Wright-Phillips and Joe Cole on just twenty-six minutes. Luis Boa Morte – who I had spotted on the touchline during the evening’s game, now a coach at Fulham – gave the home team their first win against us in twenty-seven years. Thankfully, the loss didn’t stop us winning the league in 2005/6.

Our eventual fate in 2022/23 is not certain.

My parking slot was to end at 10.30pm. I reached my car at 10.25pm. I work in logistics.

My car was pointed north once more, and I headed over Putney Bridge for the second time of the day. What a strange old evening it had been. An evening at home, but away, in this little part of SW6. Within ten minutes, I was able to park up on Finlay Road as it cut across Fulham Palace Road. PD and Parky soon found me. I edged up towards the A4 and we were away.

It had been an eventful evening for sure. What with the sending-off for Felix, the injury to Zakaria, the Kepa miss-hap, and the ultimate defeat, contrasting chants in the away end, it had been a typically chaotic Chelsea night of pain. There were half-serious concerns about relegation – “no, we have too much quality” – and I openly question those who yearn for a year in the second tier (mainly to flush out certain demographics in our support it seems) because as many clubs have seen over the years, promotion is never guaranteed.

Well, promotion is never guaranteed unless your name is Fulham – but not necessarily for all clubs that play in Fulham, confusing isn’t it? – of course. Those buggers seem to get promoted at every opportunity.

I eventually reached home at 1.30am, but I am never the best for dropping off to sleep straight away. It was while I was at home in the small hours that I learned that our scorer was given as Kalidou Koulibaly. I would eventually drop off to sleep at 3am.

4.45am to 3am.

It had been a fucking long day.

On Sunday, we head back to SW6 for a home game with Crystal Palace with the “Eight Bells” as a home pub once again.

See you there.

Tales From A Huge Loss

Posted on January 11, 2023 by Chris Axon

Manchester City vs.Chelsea : 8 January 2023.

I have feared that I might have to write this particular match report for a while. Ever since we heard that Gianluca Vialli had left his post with the Italian Football Federation, and was then re-admitted to the Royal Marsden Hospital before Christmas, many of us suspected the worst. Alas, on the Friday morning after our home game with Manchester City, the saddest of news broke.

Gianluca Vialli had died.

I was told the news by a work colleague in our office. I put my hands to my face and sat silent for a few moments.

This was just horrible, horrible news.

I had mentioned Luca only a few days previously in my match report for the Nottingham Forest game; that memory from almost twenty-four years ago, a crowded car-park, a photograph, an autograph, the perfect gent.

In fact, I was rather sparing with my comments about Gianluca Vialli in that report. I sensed that he didn’t have long to live. Pancreatic cancer is an obstinate foe. I erred away from saying too much about the former Chelsea player and manager. I’ll be blunt; I didn’t want to tempt fate.

That I mentioned Gianluca Vialli, though, in my last match report written while he was alive seems right.

And it also seems right that the great man took his last breath in a hospital on Fulham Road, just a few hundred yards from Stamford Bridge.

Luca, how we will miss you.

Being a big fan of Italian football in the ‘eighties, I was aware of the curly-haired striker playing for Sampdoria of Genoa, and watched with interest as he took part in the European Championships of 1988 and the World Cup of 1990. The blues of Sampdoria, with Vialli the leading scorer, won their first and only title in 1991. My first actual sighting of the man took place when I travelled to Turin in May 1992 to see Juventus and Sampdoria eke out a 0-0 draw at the Stadio Delle Alpi. Sampdoria were only a few weeks away from a European Cup Final with Barcelona at Wembley and so put in a rather conservative performance.

Not long after the loss to Barcelona, Vialli moved to Juventus for a world record £12.5M. With Juve being my favourite European team, and with Italian football being shown that season on Channel Four for the first time, I was able to keep tabs on both the progress of him and the team. In 1995, Juve won their first Italian Championship since 1986. In late 1995, I saw Vialli play for Juventus at Ibrox against Rangers in a Champions League group phase game; the visitors won 4-0, with Vialli the captain, and a certain Antonio Conte playing too. I watched in the Broomloan Stand, in a home section, but very close to the travelling away support. The Italians were on fire that night.

At the end of that season, I watched the European Cup Final in a bar in Manhattan as Juventus beat Ajax on penalties in Rome. Just over a week later, I was over on the West Coast – I remember the location, Gaviota State Park – when a ‘phone call home resulted in me learning that Gianluca Vialli had signed for Chelsea.

It truly felt that the stars were aligning.

Gianluca Vialli was to play for Chelsea. Just writing those words twenty-six years or so later still gives me goose bumps.

Of course, that 1996/97 season has gone down in Chelsea folklore for both happy and sad reasons. In addition to Vialli, the summer of 1996 brought new signings Roberto di Matteo and Frank Leboeuf to augment the previous summer’s purchases of Ruud Gullit and Mark Hughes. Our Chelsea team was certainly looking like it could seriously challenge for honours. But first, tragedy, and the death of director Matthew Harding. We all wondered if this would redirect the club’s focus, but not long after, Ruud Gullit signed another top-ranked Italian Gianfranco Zola, and the rest is history.

Ironically, we were stumbling a little before Zola signed. Looking back, I think it is fair to say that Hughes and Vialli were a little too similar in many aspects of their game, and it was the addition of Zola, a play-maker in addition to being a goal scorer, that allowed the team to reach its full potential. Manager Gullit certainly jiggled line-ups around to accommodate all three strikers, and on one memorable occasion, we were able to witness Chelsea alchemy of the very highest order.

Losing 0-2 at half-time at home to Liverpool in the Fourth Round of the FA Cup in January 1997, Gullit brought on Mark Hughes in place of Scott Minto and the triumvirate of Vialli, Zola and Hughes caused havoc in a scintillating second forty-five minutes. A swivel and turn from Sparky on fifty minutes, a delicious Zola free-kick eight minutes later, then two from Vialli on sixty-three and seventy-six minutes. Stamford Bridge was buzzing and we didn’t want the game to end. It is many Chelsea supporters’ favourite ever match. It often gets mentioned here and I do not apologise for it.

Of course we went on to win the FA Cup Final in the May of that year, our first trophy since 1971, and the appearance of Gianluca Vialli as a very late substitute for Zola resulted in the whole end yelling the great man’s name.

“VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI!”

Things never stay the same, though, at Chelsea and before we knew it, Ken Bates had dismissed Ruud Gullit after just a year and a half in charge, and chose Vialli to take on the role of player-manager. I’ll be honest, I was a little concerned, but I need not have been. In a glorious period supporting my team, Vialli won the 1998 League Cup, the 1998 ECWC, the 1998 UEFA Super Cup, the 2000 FA Cup and the 2000 Community Shield.

There has been greater success since, but I absolutely loved the vibe around the club from 1996 to 2000 – “the Vialli years” – and it is probably my favourite period supporting the club, although as a one-off season 1983/84 will never be beaten.

We came so close in 1998/99, only trailing eventual champions Manchester United by four points, but finishing third. If only we had won and not drawn our two games against United, we would have been champions, and the barbs aimed at us in 2005 would have been less prolific.

There was a lovely mix of characters at Chelsea in that era. We played some superb football at times. Ruud called it “sexy”, but I think under Vialli it became a little “cheeky” with a mix of expansive football, quick breaks, rapid-fire passing, with quality everywhere. What do I mean by “cheeky”? Think back to October 1999, Chelsea beating Manchester United 5-0, with Wisey winding up Nicky Butt. That’s what I mean.

There was style and swagger, those two Chelsea cornerstones.

As a player, I loved Vialli’s power, technique, movement, work ethic and goal scoring prowess.

As a manager, I loved his cheerfulness, his honesty, his diligence, the way he called the players his “chaps.”

I loved his big Italian tie, his sweatband, his grey pullover, his penchant for wearing a watch over his cuffs.

I’ll admit it.

He was a man’s man.

We all loved him.

Again, Chelsea being Chelsea, nothing stays the same and amidst rumours of player power, Ken Bates sacked Vialli as manager in September 2000.

I had seen the great man’s first game as a Chelsea player at Southampton in 1996 and I had seen his last game as manager at Newcastle in 2000.

Thank you Luca. We had a blast.

Vialli – I believe – continued to live in London after his departure and also had season tickets at Stamford Bridge for some, if not all, of the subsequent years. In doing a little research for this edition, I was able to plunder some photographs from a midweek game at Stamford Bridge against West Bromwich Albion on 12 February 2018. At halftime, Neil Barnett paraded three stars from the late ‘nineties and it was a glorious occasion.

My eyes were set on Gianluca Vialli. I am pretty sure it was the first time that I had seen him since he left us in 2000.

My match report from that night is called “Tales From The Class Of ‘98” and features these words.

“They slowly walked towards us in the MH and I snapped away like a fool. Each were serenaded with their own songs. They lapped it up. My goodness, it is the twentieth-anniversary season of our ECWC triumph in Stockholm, one of my favourite seasons. It is hard to believe in these days of single-strikers and “false nines” that in 1997/1998 we had the considerable luxury of four strikers.

Gianfranco Zola

Gianluca Vialli

Tore Andre Flo

Mark Hughes

And five if we include Mark Nicholls.

Bloody hell, those were the days. A two-man attack. Beautiful. Let’s get to basics here; I’d much rather see two top strikers in a starting eleven for Chelsea rather than two top holding midfielders. Who wouldn’t?

That season, we were certainly blessed. And each of the four had their own qualities, and it was always interesting to see how Ruud, and then Luca, chopped and changed the front two.

Zola – those amazing twists and turns, those dribbles, that appreciation of space, those passes to others, those goals.

Vialli – those blind-sided runs, the constant movement, the strength of that body, the willingness to run and run.

Flo – surprisingly skilful on the ground for a tall man, his touch was excellent and he weighed in with his share of goals.

Hughes – the last of his three seasons with us, but still useful for his strength in hold-up play, his galvanising effect on the team, and eye for a goal.

Glory days indeed. I loved that team those players.

Gianfranco Zola, Tore Andre Flo, Mark Hughes, Gianluca Vialli, Dan Petrescu, Frank Leboeuf, Graeme Le Saux, Gus Poyet, Dennis Wise, Roberto di Matteo, Steve Clarke, Ruud Gullit.

If anyone had said to me in 1998 that, twenty years on, only one of those players mentioned would get into my team of greatest ever Chelsea players, I would have screamed madness.”

As I looked at other photos from that evening, I gulped when I saw a photo of my friend Glenn and little old me in the hotel before the game with Ray Wilkins, who would pass away less than two months later. That night took on a new resonance for me.

Going in to the FA Cup tie at Manchester City, the focus in my mind shifted. Rather than get obsessed, and down-hearted, about a potentially tough game I realised that the whole day was now about being one of the lucky ones to be able to share our collective love for a much-respected footballer and, above all, man.

And the tributes poured in on the Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Not one soul said anything negative about Gianluca Vialli. He was truly loved, so loved.

Sunday arrived and I collected PD and LP and a long day lay ahead. I set off from home at just before 9am. By 12.30pm, we were ordering three roast beef Sunday lunches at “The Windmill” pub at the Tabley interchange off the M6. Two hours were spent thinking a little about the game later that afternoon but also about our recent sad loss.

My 1982/83 retrospective features, fittingly, an FA Cup game. On Saturday 8 January 1983 – forty years ago to the day – we played Huddersfield Town from the Third Division at Leeds Road. We eked out a 1-1 draw with much-maligned striker Alan Mayes equalising in the second-half. The gate was a very decent 17,064, which came just after a season-leading gate of 18,438 for a home derby with Bradford City. In those days, FA Cup Third Round gates would often be the largest of the season for many clubs, barring local derbies such as this one. I miss those days when “the Cup” was truly special.

It took the best part of an hour to reach the stadium. The expected rain hadn’t really amounted to much, but on the slow drive past City’s old stomping ground and other familiar sights, the bright winter sun reflected strikingly on the steel of new buildings and the red brick of old. In the distance, dark moody clouds loomed ominously. The quality of light was spectacular.

I dropped off PD and LP outside the away end at around 3.30pm and soon parked up. I made my way over the long footbridge that links the smaller City stadium to the main one. I had previously made a mistake in saying that I had seen only Arsenal at seven stadia. Manchester City tie that record; Stamford Bridge, Maine Road, Wembley, The Etihad, Villa Park, Yankee Stadium, Estadio Dragao. If you count the old Wembley and the new Wembley separately, they take the lead with eight.

Another bloody trophy for them.

As soon as I reached the concourse at Level Three – the top tier – there were shouts for “Vialli.”

I have to say that our support for this game blew my socks off. I originally thought that with the game taking place at 4.30pm on a Sunday, and on the back of us taking over 5,000 to the stadium for a League Cup tie in November, there would be no way that we would sell our allocation of 7,500 tickets.

But sell them we did.

Absolutely fantastic.

I was stood alongside LP in the middle of the top tier, alongside Rob, in front of Pete, close to the Two Ronnies, while PD was in the middle tier. I was just glad to be watching from a different part of the South Stand and to not have hundreds of locals jabbering away at us all game long.

The place filled up. My ticket cost just £25, a good deal.

The team was announced.

Kepa

Chalobah – Humphreys – Koulibaly – Hall

Gallagher – Jorginho – Kovacic

Ziyech – Havertz – Mount

And some new names on the bench too.

City? A mixture of youth and experience, no Haaland.

So, a debut from Graham Potter for young Bashir Humphreys.

Shall I do the inevitable line about the manager asking if he was “free” for the game on Sunday?

Nah.

Kick-off approached, the players took to the field, I soon noted the players assembling on the centre circle.

“Ah, fair play City.”

There was an announcement from a voice saying that “Manchester City was sad to hear…” but I then lost the rest of the message as the Chelsea end applauded and sang.

“VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI!”

There were images of Luca on the two corner screens; black and white images, that cheeky smile.

Bless him.

It is a mark of how I assumed that we would perform in this match that I thought that, all things considered, we had a pretty decent start to the game. Both teams began brightly. But on each of our rare forays into the City half (is it me, or does the City pitch look huge?) we quickly ran out of steam, with no target man to hit.

On nine minutes – as requested – the 7,500 strong away army chanted again.

“VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI! VIALLI!”

Not too long after, a mightily impressive “OMWTM” rang out and I liked the fact that a few old school types sat down at around the “eight” mark. It always was better when we all got up on ten.

The City fans must have looked on in awe.

They then had the audacity to sing “YSIFS” and I groaned.

I wondered if the fixture was reversed and there was a 4.30pm kick-off in London, how many City would come down? Not 7,500 I am sure. In the FA Cup of 2015/16, City had brought barely 2,500 down to London on Sunday 21 February. Get my point?

On the pitch, City gained the upper hand.

After twenty-three minutes played, Rob and I were worried about a City free-kick about twenty-five yards out.

Me : “I don’t like this.”

Rob : “Especially Mahrez.”

Me : “There you go. Great goal.”

Sigh.

I will be honest, I didn’t see the handball from Kai Havertz that led to a VAR decision going City’s way not long after. Julian Alvarez struck from the resultant penalty.

In the back of mind : “at least we won’t suffer the ignominy of losing four consecutive FA Cup Finals this year.”

Sigh.

Chelsea were now chasing shadows.

On thirty-eight minutes, I saw a move cut its way through our defence.

“Oh that’s too easy.”

Phil Foden pushed the ball in from close range.

Game over.

Sadly, many Chelsea fans upped and left. This was my worst nightmare; our away end full of empty seats on national television. At the break, my friend Su from Los Angeles, made her way down to watch the rest of the game with Rob, LP and me.

“It’s character building this. By the time I see you again, you will be twice the woman you are now.”

It could have been more. We were awful and in so many different ways. I felt so sorry for the debutant Humphreys, who must have wished that he was needed in haberdashery or to look after Mrs. Slocombe’s pussy.

At the break, changes.

Denis Zakaria for Kovacic, surprisingly poor.

David Datro Fofana for Ziyech, truly awful.

But there were other appearances too, and my heart began to swell. Virtually all of the Chelsea supporters that had left after the third goal thankfully returned. Unbelievable stuff. Well done each and every one of you.

Proper Chelsea.

Good God, on fifty-five minutes Mason Mount shot at goal, deflecting wide, and I even caught the bugger on film.

On sixty-three minutes, more changes.

Omari Hutchinson for the ever dreadful Ziyech.

Carney Chukwuemeka for Mount.

Hutchinson showed a lot more confidence than on his meek appearance on Thursday. The new Fofana looked decent too.

On seventy-three minutes, another change.

Azpilicueta for Jorginho, the slow-moving and irksome irritant.

I found it hard to focus on anything really. The game seemed an irrelevance. The four of us kept our spirits up with gallows humour. Around us, there were loud songs for Thomas Tuchel and Roman Abramovich.

With five minutes to go, a foul by Kalidou Koulibaly gave City their second penalty of the game.

Manchester City 4 Chelsea 0.

Sigh.

With that, an exodus started but we stayed to the final whistle.

It was, in the end, all rather predictable. However, the mood in the away end was defiant throughout. The shouts in memory of Vialli were loud, and sung with passion, while there was anger and frustration at the current regime.

We left.

A chap with his daughter remained upbeat and suggested a surreal ending to this season and a very strange one in 2023/24.

“We win the Champions League but get relegated this season.”

“Ha” I replied…

”Real Madrid and Bristol City one week, Juventus and Rotherham United the next. Love it.”

On the walk back at our car I overheard a woman – a local City fan – talking to her husband and daughter.

“City fans singing about Chelsea’s support being effing shit…well, it wasn’t was it?”

“Thanks” I said.

She smiled.

I made good time as I wriggled out of the city.

How long did it take me?

“A pasty, two small Double Deckers and half a packet of Fruit Pastilles.”

The rain stayed away as I drove south and I made good time. We didn’t dwell too much on the defeat. But it certainly felt as if we were now supporting a different team and club, almost unrecognisable in fact. And that is not good.

As the reaction to another defeat hit social media, I was reminded that this was our first exit in the Third Round of the FA Cup since that shocking 3-5 defeat by Manchester United at Stamford Bridge in January 1998; our first game since 1970 as FA Cup holders. We were 0-5 down at one stage. But I still loved that 1996 to 2000 team. Oh for some of that spirit in 2023.

I reached home at 11.15pm. It had been a long, emotional, and sad day.

Next up, a local derby at Craven Cottage. See you there.