H. Chelsea History (1980-1984)

Chelsea History (1980-1984)

Written by Loz in January 2009

There are a few key moments in Chelsea's history which you can point to and query whether we would be in existence if they hadn't happened. Maybe that is tad dramatic, but I think it is fairly safe to say that without these key events we may have been playing against Leeds next week rather than in the top flight. (Now now Loz, that was once us, you shouldn't mock them - bollocks I shouldn't).

More recent fans of Chelsea will recognise Abramovich's takeover as being one of those moments.

Those of us a little older in the tooth (though we are not talking sabre tooth tiger length like Nibs, Coombsie and Bluebeard) will think back to 1982 when Ken Bates bought Chelsea for the princely sum of £1.

This was a very different takeover from Roman's though - this was one that wouldn't turn the club round by the power of the wallet, this was one that would do it through sheer bloody determination, will and no end of sweat and toil. To me, Bates, for all his other negative foibles, remains the man who more than any other in recent(ish) history ensure Ordnance Survey had to keep a spot for us on the map.

However that was 1982. The 1980s began, in a somewhat orthodox and rather unadventurous fashion, in 1980.

Just to set the scene for you (alternatively don't be a lazy git and go back and read Lofty's articles on the 70s) we were in the old second division having been relegated in 1978/79, our stadium was a tip, we no longer owned it (cheers Brian Mears), we were skint - Ray Wilkins had gone to Manchester United and to cap it all we had Geoff bloody Hurst in charge - previously in charge of non-league Telford United!!

Hurst had taken over from Danny Blanchflower early in the 1979/80 season after we had been dumped out of the League Cup by third division Plymouth.

What we did have though was an away support that travelled in numbers and continued to do so irrespective of which league we were playing in. It is a popular pastime of lazy hacks and opposition fans to paint a picture of that away support as a gang of travelling animals hell bent on killing anything that moved, a reputation they had acquired through a period of hooliganism in the Seventies. I am not for a second denying Chelsea had a hooligan problem, but what I would emphasise is that it was a problem that was widespread in football and not just a problem for a small pocket in South West London!

The hooligans weren't all bad though - after all they did give us this classic chant:

In your Liverpool slums.

In Your Liverpool slums.

You look in a dustbin for something to eat.

You find a dead rat and you think it's a treat.

In Your Liverpool slums.

Which if you don't find funny must mean you are a scouser, which in itself is far from funny! Anyway back to the football!

Hurst was initially appointed as caretaker manager (he had been Blanchflower's first team coach) but was keen to be appointed on a full time basis. His case was strengthened when we went on a decent run and he issued an ultimatum to the board. They bowed to pressure (both from Hurst and the Chelsea fans) and offered him a three year contract which he duly signed.

The signing of Hurst had an immediate impact on Chelsea and it was not a good one! Hurst talked and Osgood walked. Hurst handed Ossie squad number 16 out of 16 (back in the days when numbers 1-11 meant something) and when Ossie queried it Hurst told him it was because he wasn't fit. Ossie had a hairy canary:

'"You've been coach here for three months. How long does it take to get a player fit then? You've sat on your backside, stabbed Danny (Blanchflower) in the back and I can't work for you. I'll pick my cards up."

Ossie never played football again. Other players also left. David Stride fell out with Hurst and joined Eddie Mac in America whilst Eamonn Bannon and Trevor Aylott were deemed to be surplus to requirements. However remember we were skint and therefore couldn't afford to bring in replacements (Hurst had talks with Keegan but he chose Southampton over us).

By Christmas the league was looking very open with one of about 6 or 7 teams all pushing for a promotion place. We were one of those six with the team engine being fuelled by the young and complimentary partnership of John Bumstead and Mike Fillery. However, as happened so often with Chelsea, great expectation was rewarded with a near miss. After an abject 1-0 defeat in the FA Cup against fourth division Wigan our league form began to oscillate like a pair of breasts on an enthusiastic amateur jogger. We drew 1-1 with Swansea in the 2nd last game of the season and, in doing so, dropped out of the top three for the first time in two months. In the last game of the season we needed to beat Oldham and hope that Sunderland slipped up in their remaining two games. We beat Oldham and Sunderland drew 1-1 at Cardiff. This means Sunderland would go up if they got a point off West Ham in their final game, they won 2-0 and we faced another season in Division Two.

At the end of that season Ron "Chopper" Harris moved onto become player coach at Brentford. He was offered a job as coach at the Bridge and said he would have accepted it if had been anyone in charge other than Hurst and his assistant Bobby Gould. Harris wasn't alone in this dislike for the management team. Micky Droy and Graham Wilkins also had little positive to say about them although this wasn't a universal sentiment as the likes of Colin Lee and Gary Chivers spoke far more favourably of Hurst (though not Gould who was seen by most as someone not to be trusted).

Having finished just shy of third spot in the previous season there was high hopes that 1980/81 season would see Chelsea return to top flight football.

The chances of achieving that took a hammer blow before the season had even kicked off. In July 1980 Chelsea went on a pre-season tour of Scotland and the night before we were due to play Hearts the squad went out for 'a few socials' in a local boozer. Hurst slapped fines around in such a manner you would have been forgiven for believing he was on a commission. Tommy Langley decided enough was enough and demanded a transfer, this was promptly accepted and our main goal threat (other than Clive Walker) was sold to QPR for £425,000. Langley who had been a Chelsea season ticket holder since he was a nipper later admitted "As soon as I walked out, I knew I'd made the wrong decision but it was too late. When I played for Chelsea I loved playing football, but once I left it just became a job." (I never realised that going out on the lash carried such a high risk - if I had suspected it might land me with a job at QPR, I may have reconsidered my own drinking habits!)

1980/81 was also the first season our poor first team ran out in pin stripes. I thought that was just for merchant bankers (that isn't rhyming slang). The first half of the season saw Chelsea in typical Jekyll and Hyde form. An atrocious start saw us pick up only three points in our first six games and we were knocked out of the League Cup by Cardiff. This was followed by an 11 match unbeaten run which put us in a promotion challenging position.

But this was Chelsea (meaning our history is like a Thomas Hardy novel - just as things are looking good, everything goes tits up!!) Our league form collapsed, we were knocked out of the FA Cup by Southampton and before long there was dissention in the ranks with some players, including Colin Lee and Gary Chivers, pointing the finger of blame firmly at Bobby Gould.

After seven games without scoring a single goal Hurst was sacked and Gould was appointed as caretaker manager. There were two games left, we lost them both and took our run of games without a goal to nine!

The fans were calling for the head of chairman Brian Mears and against Notts County on the final day of the season, County's second goal sparked a pitch invasion by 1,000 fans demanding Mears walk. Mears did eventually resign a month after the game against County but bizarrely waited till he had appointed a new manager before doing it.

John Neal was the new man at the helm, a manager, as you will soon see who proved he had a pretty good eye for talent on the cheap! Neal appointed Iain McNeill as his number two, had a look around at the squad and thought 'Bollocks' - what made it worse was that we had as much cash in the bank as Paul Merson has in his pocket after a night on the roulette table. Basically what John Neal took over was what he had to deal with and there was little hope of strengthening the squad.

So the players didn't change and to all extents and purposes our form didn't either - we carried on in erratic fashion, often putting together a couple of good results and then miserably failing to show up for a few games and getting royally turned over (none more so then when Rotherham put six past us without return at the end of October 1981). Petar Borota had a mare that day with blame for five of the six goals being placed at his door - he only played or Chelsea once more after that day with goalkeeping duties being handed over to a 17 year old Steve Francis.

An embarrassing League Cup exit at the hands of fourth division Wigan did little to improve the mood however there was some joy to be had from the FA Cup later in the season. We had struggled through umpteen replays to set up a fifth round tie against Liverpool, a tie which, due to us being out of the top flight for three seasons, was the highest profile game at the Bridge for many a moon. Chelsea and Liverpool fans and kicked off in the North Stand and the Chelsea players went out there with a similar approach, if it wore red chase it down!! Micky Droy was tasked with marking Kenny Dalglish and was immense. He recalls the game with some fondness "We had quick youngsters and the Liverpool boys didn't like it. Mind you they had some class. Kenny Dalglish was something else and I remember having to whack him a good few times. You had to do something to slow him down."

Chelsea scored after only eight minutes through Peter Rhoades-Brown and then went into major rearguard mode. Liverpool pushed and pushed for an equaliser but, somewhat ironically given we were playing the scousers, we stole a second, and decisive goal, deep into the second half when Colin Lee pounced on some sloppy defending to slot the ball past Bruce Grobbelaar (this being in the days when Bruce was paid to prevent the ball going in the net rather than paid to let it into the net).

Our reward or beating the scousers was a home tie against cup holders Tottenham, a team which boasted the likes of Hoddle, Ardiles, Crooks and Perryman, and a team that for us to stand a chance of upsetting would require all our top players playing at their very best. Sadly the football Gods shat in our airing cupboards. Our main goal threat Colin Lee was sent off in a league match and suspended for the cup tie and Micky Droy picked up an injury which kept him out of football for six weeks. Despite missing a pair so vital to our chances we took the game to Spurs from the offset and forged a deserved lead through a cracking free kick by Mike Fillery. Now some of you may remember when Scotland played Brazil and made the mistake of annoying them by going ahead through a David Narey goal (comically described by Jimmy Hill as a 'toe poke') with Brazil going on to win 4-1 at a canter. Well it looked like this game against Spurs was of a similar ilk when they scored three goals in quick succession. We did manage to pull one back through Alan Mayes but Spurs hung on and the dream of Wembley faded like Mod's 1980s collection of Razzle he has hidden in the attic.

The season fell away after that, we finished in 12th spot and our average attendance over the season dropped to 13,133, our worse record since the end of World War II. It would have been 13,132 but Geezer always bought two seats, one for him and one for his pizza.

April 1982 witnessed an occurrence that, in retrospect, can now be seen as a major turning point in our history. Ken Bates took over as club owner and rapidly became the club chairman. We were haemorrhaging money on a weekly basis, had debts in the region of £1.8m the players hadn't been paid for six weeks and Bates later commented that the commercial department couldn't even generate enough income to cover their own wages! Ken paid £1 for us and promptly raised ticket prices!

Neal was tasked with improving the squad on a budget so thin you could have slapped lippie on it and called it Kate Moss. Players left including cult hero Borota and Graham Wilkins who was once described as a promising full back - what he promised, and who to, remains a mystery. Replacements weren't exactly high profile but one in particular would go on to achieve legend status- a head banger striker with the temper of a pit bull that has its love spuds jammed in a nut cracker - step forward David Speedie.

The team was further strengthened by Joey Jones in October but we, as we had become accustomed to, carried on displaying a level of inconsistency, plummeted in the league, got knocked out of both cups very early on and the punters stayed away more and more.

At the Bridge there were often less than 10,000 home fans and away fans showed up in tiny numbers as our reputation for hooliganism scared away all but the most diehard (or those up for the fight). Gary Locke left and there was unrest in the squad as Gary Chivers, Clive Walker and Mike Fillery all felt they were not given a fair chance by Neal. There were only four games to go in the season, we were in the bottom three, facing relegation into the old 3rd division (we had never dropped into the 3rd tier of football in our entire history), and a lack of squad cohesion meant we were firm favourites to go down.

These were grim grim times and worth thinking about next time you get the hump because we drop two points at home against a team like Villa or Boro.

We drew the first two games 1-1 with both games witnessing supporters protesting against John Neal. In the second of these games David Speedie, in a manner we would come to expect and love, rose to a height that seemed to defy his 5 foot 7 frame, and gravity, to bullet a header into the net and give Chelsea the lead against Sheffield Wednesday. The third of the four games was against fellow relegation battlers Bolton. Speedie was suspended (something else we would get used to) and John Neal turned to Micky Droy for assistance with his team selections. Neal wasn't convinced that Clive Walker had the physical strength for the battle but Droy persuaded him to stick with Walker and also opt for the pace of Paul Canoville on the wing. Droy's wisdom was soon apparent as Walker scored the only goal of the match, a stunning top corner left foot strike as time was running out, to secure the three points. It wasn't just Droy's opinion that delivered that night, it was also Droy's performance. He was superb from start to finish and his performance was just as vital as Walker's winning goal.

Chelsea still weren't safe and needed to win their last game against Middlesbrough or rely on results elsewhere to secure their Division Two status. We drew 0-0 but it turned out to be sufficient to keep us up. We survived the drop by two points, and this was only achieved by avoiding defeat in those last four games, something that was unthinkable a few weeks earlier.

It isn't possible to discuss this era of the club's history without touching on the hooligan problem. Hooliganism in English football can, in one form or another, be dated right back to the 19th century. However the form we now know it in has its roots in the late 60s/early 70s with it becoming more organised as the 80s approached. During the 70s the concept of 'firms' developed then became established. To this day the name Chelsea is still synonymous with this era through the - Chelsea Headhunters. However it is a falsehood that has been perpetuated over the last 30 years that the hooligan problem was predominantly a Chelsea issue.

There were firms up and down the country. West Ham had the 'Inter City Firm', Spurs 'The y*d Army', Millwall's 'Z-Troop', and moving North we had the 'Zulus' of Birmingham, and the 'Leeds Service Crew'. A firm particularly worthy of mention were Manchester United 'Red Crew.' I say particularly worthy of mention because these days it is like they never existed but when United dropped out of the top flight in the mid 70s the created havoc wherever they went. Furthermore Liverpool's hooligans, other than the high profile incident at Heysel, seem to have been largely 'forgiven' their habits of relying on weapons and picking out away fans whose defences were weakened due to being accompanied by their children.

The early 80s saw English football continue to suffer in the shadow of hooliganism however it was also an era when the country at large was experiencing social unrest. The early years under Margaret Thatcher brought with it an increase in racist policing, picket line activity and a disturbing extremist uprising. Chelsea, unfortunately, were well and truly caught up in the latter as well as the general problem of hooliganism.

This article is a Chelsea history one so from now on I will focus on the hooligan issue from a Chelsea perspective however the introduction above is provided to remind people that this was a problem that touched clubs all over the country and not just top flight clubs with larger support bases.

At the same time I am unequivocal in my condemnation of the hooligan element at Chelsea just as I am with it at every club. Just a few weeks before starting this article I, after a disappointing 1-1 home draw with Tottenham, stood in Fulham Broadway in the early evening with a couple of forum regulars and witnessed a group of pissed up Chelsea fans singing about gas chambers, making Nazi salutes and finishing it all off with a raucous chorus of 'Sieg Heil'.

As far as I am concerned allegiance to a club or any loyalty to your own dies a death at this point - football rivalry pales into insignificance when put up against such a mentality of ignorance, hate and intolerance.

Anyway off my soap box!!!

There are plenty of books out there providing blow by blow (literally) accounts of a this era of football 'support', with an excessive number attempting to excuse, justify or even glorify their actions and I am not going to provide excessive detail and, in doing so, provide a further window to allow people to peer in and romanticise about something that should be buried but never forgotten. It is sufficient to say we did have a notorious support and, in particular, away support which, after incidents in trains, buses and away grounds, resulted in all Chelsea away games in the 1981/82 season being made all ticket after a riot at the Baseball Ground in November 1981. Again I emphasise that this was an era policed by Thatcher's Government, an era where the police delivered justice with the same iron rod and prejudice that it claimed to be policing.

Banning away fans never really solves the problem as those most determined will always get in and it would be many years before British football could truly claim to be largely hooligan free (and it will never be able to claim to be entirely free of it).

As well as hooliganism the early 80s also saw English football blighted by widespread racism. On April 12th 1982 Stamford Bridge bore witness to an incident that, to this day, is still considered to be one of the most shameful examples of racism, and a much quoted example of 'how bad things were' when racism in football is discussed. In the last few minutes of a game against Crystal Palace, a game we were winning 1-0, John Neal replaced Clive Walker with Paul Canoville. A black man in a Chelsea shirt - he wasn't greeted with the sort of encouragement most débutantes received - on the contrary he was greeted with a wall of abuse from the fans of the club he was representing. Monkey chants, booing and choruses of 'Chelsea are white' echoed from the stands. Racism was certainly not a problem unique to Chelsea but it was unheard of for a player's own fans to attack him in such a manner.

The modern day portrayal of this incident would have some believing that that was the day racism started in football but that couldn't be further from the truth. It had been prevalent on the terraces for the best part of a decade by then with players like Viv Anderson and Cyrille Regis (amongst others) being on the end of much vitriol from away fans up and down the country. Tapping in to this increase in racism was the National Front who saw football grounds as prime targets for recruiting new, and young, activists. They weren't just at the Bridge but they were often there in force. They sold propaganda promoting a white Britain and the expulsion of non-white immigrants from the UK, in and around the stadium and it was not unusual to see waves of people making Nazi salutes in the middle of the Shed.

Despite the abuse directed at Canoville and the public shows of support for him by John Neal and Pat Nevin (who openly attacked the guilty fans in a post match press conference) it took the club until half way through 1984 before they took any tangible action. Ken Bates launched a new policy promising to ban from the Bridge anyone found to have any involvement with the National Front and it wasn't long before the NF moved away from the Bridge and the levels of racism in and around the Bridge began to fade. By the second half of the 80s the likes of Ken Monkou, Keith Jones, Keith Dublin and Clive Wilson had all signed for Chelsea and none reported any abuse aimed toward them by Chelsea fans.

Back to the football and the 1983/84 season! With our second division status secured for another season Ken Bates looked to the future and it was a future he, contrary to John Neal's fears, entrusted to the current manager. The combination of being a lower division club and 'boasting' a bank balance that probably wouldn't buy you a programme, pie and a pint at the Bridge today meant we were looking in the bargain basement for new signings. There are 10% special offers, buy one get one free and then there is slipping three bottles of malt whisky in your inside pocket. The signing of 'Steady Eddie' Niedzwiecki from Wrexham for a mere £45,000 probably falls into the latter category.

Niedzwiecki was joined by Joe McLaughlin from Greenock Morton and then the moment we almost turned scouse with the steal of the century. Pat Nevin signed from Clyde for somewhere in the region of £90,000 (it should be pointed out Clyde wanted £185,000 but the final fee was set by a tribunal). The Bridge's front door was now as open as a five dollar whore's legs and the squad revamp was continued by the arrival of Nigel Spackman from Bournemouth and, to top it all, King Kerry arrived from Reading for £150,000 (plus a further £25,000 if was capped twice by England).

Space in the squad for these new arrivals was freed up by mass clear out which saw the departure of Gary Chivers, Mick Fillery, Alan Mayes, Bryan 'Pop' Robson, Mick Nutton (Just paid the taxi fare), Bob Iles, Phil Driver, Kevin Hales, Chris Hutchings and Peter Rhoades-Brown. The final piece of the jigsaw was to strengthen the coaching team by welcoming back Blues legends Peter Bonetti as goalkeeping coach and John Hollins as a player/coach. Colin Pates was then appointed club captain and we were all set.

By Christmas we knew four things. The first was that this was a much improved Chelsea side, we were sitting in a promotion spot with all the new signings having impressed in the first half of the season. Second that in Dixon we had found a goal machine as he was netting as freely for us as he has the previous season for Reading when he was the top goal scorer in the third division. Third, in Pat Nevin John Neal had unearthed a wing genius and finally the fourth lesson was that Dixon and Speedie hated each other!

Speedie, by scoring for fun in the reserves, had forced his way into the first team at the expense of Colin Lee (Dixon's preferred striker partner) and his partnership with Dixon led to goals galore for the pair of them.

However all was not so rosy off the pitch, Speedie thought Dixon was a lazy git not prepared to bust a gut for the cause (Speedie, on the other hand, would bust his own gut for the cause and also the gut of anyone who got in the way of the cause!) and the pair had numerous fights on and off the field.

Boxing Day 1984 saw a milestone in the club's history as we took to the pitch with a shirt sponsor (Gulf Air) for the first time. This sort of deal was not as lucrative as the modern day shirt deals (even relatively speaking) and it certainly wasn't sufficient to dig us out of the financial hole the club was in. Our future at the Bridge was under threat with the Mears Brothers selling their shares in SB property to property developers called Marler Estates (see Stamford Bridge History for more details)

Our form dipped (at the time we probably claimed that rain sodden pitches were not suited to our classy football but lets be honest, we have slumped far too many times post Xmas for that old excuse to wash!) and John Neal turned to the transfer market to try and help turn things round again. In came Mickey Thomas (at this stage without his DIY currency making toolkit), a player Neal knew well as he had given Thomas his breakthrough in football at Wrexham way back in the 1971/72 season. It was Paul Canoville who lost his first team place to Thomas and he was to be kept company by Johnnie Hollins who found himself replaced at right back by Colin Lee.

This appeared to have an instant impact. We beat Derby then beat table toppers Sheff Wednesday 3-2 (a game in which Chelsea fans took pleasure in seeing Mickey Thomas deck Andy Blair who had goaded Thomas about the marital troubles he was having). We went on the charge then, brushing teams aside and displaying an almost invincible quality managing a 3-3 draw against Cardiff despite being 3-0 down with only six minutes to go. We had a midweek game away at Pompey and a win would secure promotion. All was going well courtesy of goals from Nevin and Thomas but we got sloppy and conceded twice before the game ended. 8,000 Chelsea fans had travelled to the South Coast that day, not all of them in search of the seaside! Things kicked off and seats torn out of the stadium and hurled at a line of coppers who had formed a cordon.

Not sure what all the fuss was about to be honest, we knew we still had a further chance to win promotion and only Leeds stood in our way - piece of piss - well actually it was! The following weekend Leeds offered as much resistance as France and we thumped them 5-0 with Dixon scoring the perfect hat-trick whilst the other two goals came from Thomas and Canoville. This time the fans pitch invasion was one of jubilation although referee Gilbert Napthine may argue differently as he was knocked over in the melee! Napthine wasnt the only thing that suffered that day, disgruntle Leeds fans attacked our scoreboard - they aren't the bravest up Norf!!

At this point we were only promoted, not champions however Sheffield Wednesday stumbled in their final games and a last day of the season win over Grimsby saw us crowned second division champions on goal difference. The players didn't get to lift the trophy until the first day of the next season as the FA had taken it to Sheffield expecting them to win the title - instead of that they just got pissed, very pissed!