Ian Macleay

Brian Mears

Terry Venables

In the blistering high summer of 2003, Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich acquired Chelsea Football Club. It was a sensational event that sent shock waves reverberating around the global village that is celebrity football in the twenty-first century. Chelsea, the institution, was transformed overnight into arguably the most powerful club in the world by virtue of the vast fortune bestowed upon them by their benefactor. This was an amazing twist to a story that started almost a century before on a piece of wasteground in west London. The genesis of Chelsea, founded in 1905, was pioneered by the Mears family, who would remain at the helm for more than two-thirds of that century. Brian Mears was a particularly significant figure in his role as chairman throughout the colourful period from the end of the swinging '60s until the early 1980s. In this follow-up to the seminal Chelsea: Football Under the Blue Flag, Mears and Macleay recount the events that have engulfed London's most glamorous club over the years. Its exciting major players, including Hughie Gallacher, Roy Bentley, Jimmy Greaves, Peter Osgood, Alan Hudson, Kerry Dixon, Dennis Wise, Gianfranco Zola and Frank Lampard, have become creatures of myth. Meanwhile, managers such as Tommy Docherty, Dave Sexton, Glenn Hoddle, Ruud Gullit, Gianluca Vialli, Claudio Ranieri and Jos Mourinho have proved to be some of the most flamboyant and controversial in the history of the game. Chelsea: The 100-Year History is peopled with unforgettable characters like the peerless Terry Venables and the late Matthew Harding. It is an embodiment of Mears' own passion for the club as he traces some of the most important matches and crises in its sometimes tragic trajectory from glory to impoverishment and back again to a glorious 100th season.

Brian Mears

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