THIS WEEKEND'S FIXTURE - -Chelsea Vs Arsenal

Again another one of my favorite fixtures, especially lately. Our record against Le Arse is close, we have played them a total of 69 times at the Bridge, of which we have won 22, lost 23 & drawn 24.The goals tally is 82 goals for & 90 against. So an 8-0 victory should put us about right lads. Our biggest win over Le Arse is a 9-0 thrashing in 1915 in the London Combination League, but outside that our highest League score at Chelsea is 3-1, which happened in Apr 1961 & Nov 1963. 

Recent Statistics: Recent results have gone in our favor sins “the special one” arrived. In the league we haven’t lost to them, managing to get a draw & a win at both venues, with the best result in the league being the 0-2 victory at the library last season, with goals from Robben & Cole. The two seasons prior to this with the “Tinker man” in charge we lost 3 & drew 1. In the 99-00 Season we had a decent year by finishing 5^th, Le Arse finished 2^nd .Again both games we lost 1-2 at their place & 2-3 at the Bridge. That game at the Bridge, to this day it haunts me, I’ve never seen such a one sided game, we were playing with them, we were 2-0 up & cruising they wouldn’t have scored if we had taken an early bath. But Arsene Whiner, all credit to him decided, with less than 20 minutes to go that it was all or nothing so he took off 2 defenders & put on Bergkamp & Kanu .Then 5 minutes later Kanu scored, then 5 minutes later Kanu scored again then right at the end, yes you’ve guessed it Kanu scored, only this time it was on the by- line miles away from anyone and he still got it in. I tell you even now its still total disbelief from 2-0 to 2-3 in 16 minutes. Our top scorer was Tore Andre Flo with 10 & Le Arse’s top scorer was some bloke called Henry with 17.

 

 

 

 

Memorable Match: It can only be one game and that was the League cup 2^nd leg semi final in Feb 98. In between the 1-2 defeat at The library 3 weeks earlier and the return leg we had lost Ruud Gullit and for some unknown reason Ken Bates in all his wisdom decided that Luca Vialli would be the ideal replacement. Everyone around Stamford Bridge that night was talking about Vialli not being the right man for the job, we really were worried things were about to go wrong…(and that’s putting it politely).Anyway the crowd got right behind the new Chels, knowing  we needed an early goal not just to settle the nerves but to bring the tie back to 2-2.So after about 20 minutes the score was 2-2 when Super Dan Petrescu made it 1-0 (on the night).Then Vialli was fouled just inside our half but the ref played on as the ball ran out to Di Matteo who unleashed probably one of the hardest hit shots I’ve ever seen at Chelsea. There was no way 2 goalies would have stopped it, it was going that fast. Seriously it hit the back of the net and you could hear the leather of the ball roll down the netting of the goal. The celebrations were wild as we were now 3-2 on aggregate, and things only got better as Mark Hughes put us 3-0 up, 4-2 on aggregate. Could we really be going to Wembley in Luca’s first game in charge? Right at the end Le Arse got a penalty that really put a damper on things, it was now 4-3 on aggregate with a few minutes to go. Thankfully the whistle went not only had we booked a trip to Wembley but we had beat Le Arse in getting there, and the start of a new Chelsea was being built.

CHELSEA LEGEND.. This weeks Legend is still at the club even though he no longer plays. Yes I’m talking about Mr. Consistent Steve Clarke. Steve began his career at Chelsea in the 1986-87 season, making his full debut in a 2-0 on Feb 7^th 87 Vs Sheff Weds (H), and surprisingly he didn’t score. He played a total of 421 games & scored 10 goals, his 10^th bringing total joy to everyone at Stamford Bridge when it went in against Liverpool in a 4-1 win. Everyone knew he hadn’t scored in something like 4 or 5 seasons yet when this went in the whole of the Bridge erupted. I remember looking at the scoucers and they were all wondering what the hell was going on!!!. Steve had to play in some pretty poor sides in his time, even though he did help us win a 2^nd division championship in 1989 he never once let us down. Towards the end of his career he got what he thoroughly deserved…Medals. He is our 7^th highest appearance maker, he captained Chelsea on the rare occasion that Dennis Wise was suspended, even taking over the role while Wisey was dealing with his taxi cab ordeal. A winner of just 6 full Scottish caps of which he won 4 at Chelsea. Steve Clarke always in my favorite 11, always a model professional and always a true CHELSEA LEGEND.   

CHELSEA TRIVIA: Chelsea’s first 11 overseas players: N Middelboe 1913, W Steffen 1946, F Mitchell 1949, R Oelofse 1951, T Potrac 1970, D Smethurst 1971, P Borota 1979, C Viljoen 1980, T Dorigo 1987, D Mitchell 1988, And K Monkou 1989.

QUIZ QUESTIONS:

LAST WEEK’S ANSWERS:

  1: The only team to beat Inter Milan at the San Siro …Birmingham in the old fairs cup

  2: 4 teams who start & end with the same letter are…Liverpool, Aston Villa, Charlton Athletic, and Northampton Town

THIS WEEK’S QUESTIONS

  1: Theres 22 different endings to football teams (i.e. City United) can you name them?

  2:  Which Stadium in England is at the highest altitude?

Next weeks lesson is Vs Everton

Until Next Time Then…….Cheerio!  Tel