Chelsea FC Stadium, History, Events, Crest, Players, Rivalry and More

Chelsea FC is a professional English football club based on Fulham, London. It is located in the southwest central part of the city of London. The club's home ground is actually in the Fulham neighborhood not the Chelsea neighborhood. Chelsea currently play in the Premier League. The club's home ground is called Stamford Bridge which was built in 1905 and holds 41623 people.

History:

Chelsea FC soundings story begins in 1904 when Gus Mears bought the London athletics club and some surrounding property. His goal was to build a soccer stadium and lease it to an already established local club. Mears began building Stamford Bridge and invited Fulham FC to move into the stadium but Fulham declined.

Meres considered then selling the property but was persuaded to start his own soccer club by Frederick Parker. Mears was an amateur soccer player in his youth and absolutely loved the game so he took to this idea on March 10th 1905 at the Rising Sun pub, Mears along with a handful of other founding directors started Chelsea FC as a way to utilize Stamford Bridge.

The club still needed to find a league to play in and on the back of their new state-of-the-art Stadium plus strong player signings. They were admitted to the Football League's division. Chelsea were the first and so far only Club to have ever been admitted to the Football League without ever having kicked a ball first.

Nickname:

Chelsea have two nicknames the pensioners which is their old nickname and the Blues which is their current nickname. Chelsea were called the pensioners until the mid-1950s because their home stadium is in close proximity to the famous Royal Hospital Chelsea. The hospital houses British War veterans who are known as pensioners.

The club adopted the crest of the pensioners in 1905 and carried the nickname of the pensioners until Ted Drake became manager in the 1950s. Drake was strongly against the nickname due to his belief that it made the club seem old. so since Chelsea played in blue kits, fans began calling them the Blues which has been the club's nickname ever since the 1950s.

Crest:

Chelsea's original crest was that of a pensioner. It looked like an old war veteran with a hat beard and war medals on his chest. This was used from the club's founding until 1952 when Ted Drake insisted on a change. A simplified temporary crest with just the letter C f/c intertwine was used for one season before the club debuted a new crest in 1953. In the new crest, a blue lion holding a golden staff was in the middle of a circle.

The lion was a reference to the family coat of arms for the club's first president Earl Cadogan, the golden staff or Crozier is a reference to the abbot of Westminster who is the leader of the church in Westminster Abbey the famous nearby Church in London. Around the outside of the circle were three roses and two soccer balls, the Roses were a reference to England and the two soccer balls were obviously a reference to Chelsea playing the sport of soccer.

Chelsea Football Club is written at the bottom of the crest. This crest was changed in the 80s due to some trademark complications before the current crest was implemented in the 2004-2005 season to celebrate the club's 100-year anniversary. The club went back to the crest created in 1953 with a couple minor tweaks including making the lion and Crozier blue and dropping one of the Roses to create symmetry in the crest. The crests used today is more or less the same crest first debuted in the 1950s but it is able to be trademarked.

Important Events:

A historic club like Chelsea has many important events in their history.

• On April 23rd 1955, Chelsea FC beat Sheffield Wednesday 3-0 to secure their first ever first division title. The title was a bit of a shock as most people expected Chelsea to finish in the bottom half of the table that season but Ted Drake was able to lead the club to claim our first-ever top-flight chairmanship in their fifteenth year of existence.
• On April 2nd 1982, Chelsea was sold from the founding mears family to a businessman named Ken Bates for one pound. The club had been under performing on the pitch for years and were about 1.5 million pounds in debt. They were in danger of going bankrupt until Bates came to the rescue. Bates wasn't exactly loved by all Chelsea fans throughout his ownership of the club but he did steer the club back to stability and built a competitive squad over his 20 years of ownership.
• Roman Abramovich officially bought the club from Ken Bates on July 1st 2003 for 140 million pounds. That was a record sale for a English club at the time. With Abramovich his ownership came a huge influx of money and a changing of the way the Premier League and its clubs did business. A brama vich has attracted some of the best players and managers to Chelsea which has seen them rise to become one of the most successful clubs in English soccer history.
• On May 19th 2012, Chelsea B Bayern Munich on penalties in the Champions League final at Byron's home stadium of the Allianz Arena. Bayern took a lead late in the match but Chelsea was able to level in the 85th minute through club legend DDA Drogba. The match ended 1-1 with Chelsea winning 4-3 on penalties after seven rounds of shooting. It was a wonderful redemption for the club who had lost painfully on penalties in the 2008 Champions League final to Manchester United. Chelsea remains the first and only London based club to have won the Champions League or UEFA European Cup.

Supporters:

Chelsea supporters don't have any special nicknames or anything like that but the most passionate fans at Stanford Bridge are usually located in the shed and and matthew harding stand behind each goal at stanford bridge. Also, fans who are overseas or in other areas will generally adopt their cities name plus the name of the blues for an official supporters club.

Players:

Chelsea have had many great players in their history to modern legends I'd like to highlight here our Frank Lampard and John Terry. Lampard is the club's all-time record goalscorer as a midfielder and was a model professional in every way during his long career with Chelsea.

John Terry on the other hand was notable for both on field and off field exploits of which there were many of both. He was club captain for many years and nearly spent his entire professional playing career with the club. Peter Osgood, Jimmy Greaves, rode Hulett, Petter cheque, DDA Drogba, Eden Hazard and many others are the one of best players of Chelsea FC.

Managers:

Chelsea have had a slew of great managers in their history. Drake managed Chelsea to their first ever first division title and changed the club's philosophy with regards to training as well as scouting lower leagues for unidentified talent. Josie Marino is the other manager of Chelsea FC. He managed at Chelsea in two separate stints from 2004 to 2007 and from 2013 until 2015.

His self-appointed nickname of the special one is known to most of the soccer world at this point he lived up to that nickname almost immediately and won a Premier League title in his first season with Chelsea with a record 95 points.

In both his stints combined, he won three Premier League titles, two League cups and an FA Cup. He also won League and European titles at other clubs and is one of the most decorated managers in Chelsea history. Carlo Ancelotti and Antonio Conte are two of the most respected and well-known recent managers who have done well at Chelsea and elsewhere.

Rivalry:

Chelsea had many rivals. Fulham and Queens Park Rangers are Chelsea's historic and closest geographical rivals but those rivalries have faded a bit in recent times with Chelsea's rise to the top of English soccer and those two clubs struggles. Arsenal, Tottenham and Manchester United are the three main rivals of the club.

• The rivalry between Chelsea and Arsenal has really heated up in the last three decades. There were consequential and fiery matches prior to the 1990s but the rivalry really started gaining traction during this time period. Chelsea gave Arsenal their only loss in the 1990 1991 season and there were a handful of other intense matches in the 90s. When Roman Abramovich became owner of Chelsea in the early 2000s, things were taken to another level. Chelsea became immediate title contenders overnight and with the competition between both clubs for trophies and Clare's over the last two decades. The rivalry was also stoked by Jose Mourinho and Arsene Wenger's managerial feuds both in the media and on the touchline.
  
• Chelsea's Tottenham rivalry can be traced back to the 1967 FA Cup final which was the first to be contested by two clubs from London. Spurs won the match 2-1 with two former Chelsea players which helped ignite animosity between the clubs. In the 1974-75 season, the two clubs were battling to avoid relegation from the first division and met in a late season match. Spurs won that match to nil and effectively relegated Chelsea that season. Chelsea turned the rivalry around in the 1990s and didn't lose a match for 16 years from 1990 until 2006. Since then both clubs have built themselves into trophy contenders annually and matches between the clubs are always physical battles.
  
• Manchester United is considered a Chelsea rival due to man Chester United's role as the most decorated English club at least as far as domestic titles and brand value is concerned. Under Roman Abramovich is ownership, anything less than championships are unacceptable for Chelsea which means these two clubs are constantly competing for players and in the table. The rivalry has been helped by larger-than-life managers in Sir Alex Ferguson and josie marino as well. Josie Marino has switched to the manchester side of things and is trading words in the press with current Chelsea manager Antonio Conte. The rivalry doesn't feel quite as heated as the rivalry with the two other London clubs but Manchester United can still be considered a Chelsea rival.
  

Statistics:

• Chelsea have spent 80 3 seasons in the top flight in their history.
• The club has 22 major trophies including 7 FA Cups, 6 first division or Premier League titles, 5 League Cups, 2 UEFA Cup Winners Cup, one Champions League and one Europa League.
• The club's record first team appearance holder is Ron chopper Harris with 795 appearances.
• The club's record goal scorer is Frank Lampard with 211 goals.
• Petr Cech holds the club's all-time clean-sheet record with 227 clean sheets in starts and he was involved in one more clean sheet.
• The club's record transfer purchase was Alvaro Murata from Real Madrid on July 21st 2017 for about 58 million pounds initially plus an additional 12 million pounds in add-ons and Chelsea's record transfer sale was Diego Costa to Atletico Madrid on January 1st 2018 for about 57 million pound.
• The club currently holds the English first division record for highest ever appoints in a season with 95 points and also the fewest league goals conceded during a season which was 15 goals. Both of those occurred in the 2004 2005 season under the management of josée Mourinho.