Season by Season: 1933/4

If 18^th position in May 1933 was enough to end manager David Calderhead’s tenure at Stamford Bridge, new boss Leslie Knighton hardly set SW6 alight in his debut season.

In fact, the Pensioners ambled to an even lowlier 19^th under him. Knighton’s former club, Birmingham City – mid-table regulars under him – finished one place lower. It was hardly his fault, though.

Despite the regular under-achievement, with lucrative gates of 50 and 60,000 a frequent occurrence at Stamford Bridge the ambitious board had been prepared to invest again in summer 1933.

Knighton used his contacts across the Irish Sea to bring in stylish Tom Priestley (famous for the idiosyncratic skull-cap he wore on the pitch) and combative midfielder Billy Mitchell, who would serve the club well in his time. The manager also brought in flame-haired winger Jimmy Argue from his former club and bought Scotland's keeper Johnny Jackson from Partick Thistle.

Never the less, the new man had been swiftly alerted to the enigma of Chelsea that had defeated Calderhead and now challenged him. In his first match in charge, no less than six internationals took the field at newly-promoted Stoke’s Victoria Ground. And lost 0-1.

A 5-2 home victory over struggling Wolves was followed by on-the-road defeats at Huddersfield (1-6) and Sheffield United (1-4), not helped by a massive list of key injuries that virtually killed the season.

There was plenty of talent, but team spirit? Once again the glamour boys were favourites for relegation come Christmas.

The football world was all too ready to enjoy our usual underachievement. A popular song from the halls at the time was 'The Day That Chelsea Went And Won The Cup', which related all the equally unlikely events (lawyers waiving their fees, cabbies having change of a fiver etc) that took place on a day that the satirical writer could obviously never foresee. This despite the Pensioners reaching the semi-final in 1932.

“Brave as a lion. Quick, safe, sure.” Leslie Knighton hails Jackson, one of his two great keepers

There were green shoots of promise to enjoy. Once fit Johnny Jackson would clearly prove a fine acquisition, a goalkeeper to rival Vic Woodley. Both would play regularly for their country – Scotland and England respectively – and they became the best of friends despite the professional rivalry. Jackson had all too quickly lost his first-team place through injury, but was still selected for Scotland on recovery.

Two goals in the FA Cup from Stanley Matthews helped Stoke heap more misery on us in the Cup as we lost 1-3 away, but as fitness returned a flurry of five consecutive wins in March and April saw off the last real threat of the drop. The next season, it was hoped, would bring fewer injuries and genuine progress.

Off the field, the greyhound racing that would entertain (and impoverish) crowds of punters for three and a half decades was launched at Stamford Bridge in July 1933 (pictured, top left). Former star winger Harry Ford was one of those who worked on the turnstiles at the evening meetings.

In 1933/34...

Facts & figures: More than 10,000 punters regularly attended greyhound events at the Bridge.

Cup run: Fifth round (losing to Stoke City).

All the rage: Aussie batsman Don Bradman is the new toast of Ashes cricket.

Season by Season: 1932/3

1932-3 was a season with the foreboding familiar to any fan of an attractive but ineffective team, of any era. Chelsea had made some significant signings since returning to the top flight, including the prolific Hughie Gallacher and the best keeper of his generation, Vic Woodley.

But early results suggested that veteran manager David Calderhead’s squad needed more than freshening up. It had aged with him.

In fact, thoughts turned to whether the “Sphinx” as this poker-faced Scotsman was known, was still up to the job after more than a quarter of a century. Football, after all, had changed. After the Great War, the world had changed too.

Chelsea’s status as the butt of music hall comedian was still unfortunately alive and well. The swanky west Londoners losing on the south coast to lowly Brighton & Hove Albion was the latest in a long line of FA Cup humiliations. Luckily, high-flying Arsenal lost to Walsall and stole some of our thunder.

And there was consistency in the board’s policy of multi-purposing Stamford Bridge. Stadium owner Joe Mears had ambitions to place Chelsea at the heart of the football establishment while encouraging lucrative non-football fads to be staged in SW6. The two goals were not always complementary.

In December 1932 the stadium hosted the England football team’s surprise international victory over the brilliant Austrian ‘Wunderteam’. Quite what the FA made of Mears’s latest move, though, we can only wonder.

Since 1929 the cinder track around the pitch perimeter had been used by Claude Langdon, a showman and entrepreneur, for high-profile matches of the speedway league, or dirt-track racing, imported from Australia. The Amateur Athletics Association had moved its annual meets to White City because of the disturbance to the running surface.

The Stamford Bridge speedway club had been successful and attractive, with star riders such as Gus Kuhn (pictured, top right) rapidly becoming celebrities of British sport, and between 1928 and 1932 Langdon made himself a fortune. He was soon to fall foul of stadium owner JT Mears's machinations, however.

“Langdon, I’m afraid you’ll have to go. I’m thinking of having greyhound racing here at Chelsea.” Joe Mears breaks the eviction news to speedway supremo Claude Langdon

Mears, always with an eye for novelty, had already decided that speedway had had its day, and informed Langdon. The Stamford Bridge landlord had noted the swift emergence of a new proletarian sport as a magnet for betting enthusiasts and, despite moral panic voiced in Parliament, wanted to be in at the start of greyhound racing.

There may also have been other motives involved: it is interesting to note that two of the shareholders in the White City, Harringay and Stamford Bridge Greyhound Racing Bookmakers Association were Harry and Joe Sabini, members of the notorious Clerkenwell gang masterminded by Darby Sabini that ran gambling in London.

A controversial aspect of Mears’s leasing agreement with greyhound promoter Major Dixson was the creation of a company called ‘The Stamford Bridge Stadium Ltd’, which would dominate decisions taken regarding the stadium and come back to haunt the football men with its demands for half a century.

On the pitch there was little of note, except one of the most excruciating matches in Chelsea history – at Blackpool, October 29^th 1932. The game had taken place despite icy conditions all across the north-west. As it wore on, with a north-easterly wind driving heavy, freezing sleet into their faces, Chelsea’s ‘southern softies’ began to wilt like precious orchids.

By the end, only six visitors remained on the pitch. The other five were in the dressing room, apparently being tended for exposure. It was also rumoured that the players were under the misapprehension that the referee had to abandon a game when one team was so far depleted. He didn’t, and Blackpool won 0-4.

Len Allum (on debut), Bill Ferguson, Harry Miller, James O’Dowd and Albert Oakton – you did Chelsea's reputation no favours! Luckily, only 7,311 people were there to laugh at the poor dears.

Eventually, a 4-1 win at Maine Road in May secured 18^th place and safety. Finally, after 26 years of under-achievement, the great servant David Calderhead made way for the respected Leslie Knighton as secretary-manager.

In 1932/33...

Facts & Figures: Chelsea escaped relegation by just two points.

Cup run: Third round (losing to Brighton & Hove Albion).

All the rage: Popular music recordings – newly-formed EMI dominates the market for “78” records.

Season by Season: 1929/30

As related in the previous episode of this chronicle, Chelsea spent the summer of 1929 on a gruelling but inspirational jaunt around South America, squaring up with considerable success to the best players of Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay.

The Stamford Bridge players undoubtedly helped the Uruguayans in their ultimately successful preparation for the first ever World Cup. But David Calderhead’s squad also emerged from the experience bound together more as a team.

The only significant addition to the playing staff would come not in pre-season, but winter, in the form of George 'The Bomb' Mills, a hulking centre-forward with an unimpressive pedigree around Kentish clubs.

Mills made his debut against Preston North End on December 21st and opened his account in a 5-0 drubbing. He went on to top-score with 14 goals that season, but he wasn’t the only striker finding his range: the habitually goal-shy George Pearson and Harry Miller both found the net with confident regularity as the whole team gelled wonderfully.

The 1929-30 season was exceptional in several ways: it brought 13 of the 41 league goals managed by Miller over his decade and a half at Stamford Bridge; Pearson’s 12 out of a total 33 notches came in what was easily the best of his seven seasons at Chelsea. Even the veteran stylist Andy Wilson managed double figures in his penultimate term as a player.

“Our latest leader, he went over the top at 2.30, and at 2.32 dropped one of his bombs in the enemy’s camp.” The Chelsea Chronicle summarises debutant Mills’ impressive performance against Preston

Mills, though, would become one of our most consistent marksmen, with a return of 116 league goals in 220 appearances. By the time he arrived Chelsea’s season was looking promising.

Regular keeper Sam Millington kept 15 clean sheets; his teenage stand-in, Frank Higgs saw out his entire Chelsea career of just two matches this season and managed one shut-out, a 3-0 thrashing of Spurs.

The decisive period began on Wednesday 12 March 1930. A visit to Bradford brought two points and a 3-1 winning margin. Chelsea won the next four matches to establish one of our best sequences, on the back of which the Blues rose from third place to second.

As the final matches of early May arrived, Chelsea were still clinging to that final promotion slot, and a reassuring second win against Preston set up the closing game, at Bury, thus: rivals Oldham, two points behind but with a superior goal average, would snatch promotion if they won and Calderhead's men lost.

One precious point would suffice.

As it turned out, both hopefuls wilted in the spotlight. In Lancashire the Pensioners were nervy, and a host of chances was "frittered away by needless fanny work," as the Daily Mirror put it, while Bury won 1-0.

Oldham, though, were always behind at relegation-threatened Barnsley, and lost 1-2. As a result, on the 25th anniversary of the club’s existence, Chelsea were promoted back to the First Division.

A few weeks later, an all-time great would arrive from Newcastle to spearhead our top-flight challenge: the mighty Hughie Gallacher.

In 1929/30...
Facts and figures: Chelsea lose once all season at home, winning 17.
Cup run: Third round, losing to Arsenal.
All the rage: the British press rubbishes the World Cup, because foreigners invented it.

Season by Season: 1928/29

The crowds still came. The players – their mid-blue draw-stringed shirts, white shorts and dark socks now part of the scenery in the Second Division – still laboured.

Chelsea’s form was as depressed as the national economy. The Pensioners finished this season a dismal ninth and a promising FA Cup campaign in which they had stormed past Everton 2-0 had fizzled out.

Drastic action appeared necessary. Particularly in the context of the time, Chelsea’s next move in the close season of 1929 was typically radical, and likely to have been the brainchild of chairman Claude Kirby, a football visionary and shipping broker.

Here also we find an enduring, occasional theme in Chelsea’s history: helping foreign national teams prepare for a World Cup.

In the Sixties, Tommy Docherty’s Blues, with their 'Latin-American-style' attacking full-backs Eddie McCreadie and Ken Shellito, accepted an offer to play a series of friendly matches against Germany intended to increase the experience of the likes of the young Beckenbauer before the 1966 World Cup.

The precedent was set, however, by his fellow Scot David Calderhead agreeing to send his players on a gruelling boat trip across the Atlantic to South America to play matches against representative XIs from Argentina, Brazil and the Olympic champions of Uruguay.

The games, played in massive, vibrant stadiums, also saw Chelsea line-up against great clubs of the region such as Boca Juniors and racing Club of Argentina, and Sao Paolo of Brazil - Chelsea becoming her first professional side to play that city.

“We really learned the meaning of team-work out there, and the fortnight’s sea voyage on the way home set us up for the big effort.” Great Chelsea forward Andy Wilson on the Pensioners’ epic post-season tour of South America

The Pensioners also introduced another Kirby innovation, numbered shirts (pictured), to the region (earning the nickname 'Los Numerados'), and played under floodlights for the first time, in Rio, decades before the experience came to London.

Uruguay, celebrating its centenary year in 1930, had been selected by Fifa as the venue for the first ever World Cup that year. Unlike 1966, no England team would be participating. (Many other European associations also baulked at the journey time, cost and time involved, not to mention their concerns about the climate.)

In the space of six weeks' touring Chelsea edged a Buenos Aires XI 3-2, lost 0-4 to Racing, beat another Buenos Aires select 1-0, went down 3-4 in an epic tussle with Boca Juniors; grippingly held Sao Paolo 4-4 and then lost to them 2-3, drew with a Rio de Janeiro representative side 1-1, and finally faced a Montevideo XI.

The visitors were outdone in the first match 1-2, but triumphed in the second, played at the newly-built 100,000 Centenario Stadium in the Uruguayan capital, by two goals to one. The tourists left a lasting impression in the region, and steamed out of La Plata with the cheers of the South American crowds ringing in their ears after an experience they would never forget.

The matches against high class European opposition were excellent practice for the locals too. Masterminded by the early genius of South American football, Juan Carlos Bertone, those Montevideo XIs effectively comprised the Uruguayan national side.

Thirteen months later, Bertone’s men lifted the 'Victoire aux Ailes d'Or' World Cup trophy, having beaten Argentina in the final.

The South Americans were not the only ones to benefit from the previous summer's encounters, however. Two months before that win, in May 1930, Chelsea would be promoted back to the First Division.

In 1928/29...
Facts & figures: – ninth place in Division 2 was Chelsea's worst ever finish right up until 1976.
Cup run: Fifth round, losing to Portsmouth after a replay.
All the rage: sexual equality – women are given the same voting rights as men.

Season by Season: 1927/28

Continuing Chelsea's mid-Twenties tradition in the Second Division of great quality everywhere on the pitch except in front of goal, 1927/28 saw David Calderhead's side finish a tantalising third. Again.

Three points behind promoted Leeds, whose defensive record was inferior but who, pointedly, scored 23 goals more.

Who was to blame for this persistent lack of poke? The board might be cited for failing to replace the likes of Whittingham and Cock with players of similar quality. Equally, manager Calderhead, now in his twentieth season at the Bridge, was unable to convince his paymasters to speculate to accumulate.

'The Sphinx' had always shown them loyalty; perhaps a little more bullishness would have been useful.

Nevertheless, two players deserve special mention. Firstly the great full-back Tommy Law, Stamford Bridge's adopted Glaswegian, who would only play twice for his country, both against England.

Tommy made his international debut on 31 March 1928 as one of the famous 'Wembley Wizards' who took a dismal England team apart 5-1. (Chelsea bought two more Wizards, Gallacher and Jackson, a few years later.) It would have been interesting to hear the banter in Chelsea’s dressing room after that show of gratitude to his adoptive country.

"The Scots prefer heavy turf to light ground because it makes all the difference to the harmony of their ball control and jugglery,” Sporting Chronicle’s timeless excuse for an English defeat – the pitch

Secondly, Jimmy Thompson (pictured) arrived from Luton Town. A winger converted to centre-forward at Stamford Bridge, he netted in his opening three matches and weighed in with a third of the team's 75 goals scored in this, his first season. His playing career at the Bridge unfortunately lasted just one more campaign, allegedly after an argument over money.

But he was to make an immeasurable contribution in his post-war role back at the Bridge as chief scout. A big, loud east-ender with slick, centre-parted hair and false teeth that would slipped disarmingly during his frequent, hearty laughs, Jimmy became one of the great Chelsea characters in the 1950s and Sixties.

He was unorthodox in his recruitment method to say the least, playfully building up the espionage element of his job, taking promising kids from his neighbourhood on trips to the seaside and suddenly hustling them into a doorway because “The Spurs scout’s coming!”

Thompson was also incredibly persistent and persuasive, winning the signature of a string of great players, including Jimmy Greaves, Barry Bridges and Terry Venables, from his boyhood streets and from under the noses of West Ham and Tottenham. Few have played such a vital, undersung part in the history of our club, and it all started in 1927.

In 1927/28...
Gratuitous fact: Tottenham are relegated from Division One.
Cup run: First round, losing to Wolves.
All the rage: flying solo – lonely Charles Lindbergh crosses the Atlantic for the first time.

Season by Season: 1926/27

The third season of our third spell in the Second Division had that feeling of déjà-vu all over again. Leaders of the pack in the early stages, Chelsea stuttered in the colder months, recovered, then crucially faded again, collating just three points from a last possible ten. David Calderhead's side finished fourth, following fifth and third place finishes in the previous two campaigns.

The defence would concede a respectable 52 all season – second best at that level – but once again the attack was found wanting at crucial times. Albert Thain and Bob Turnbull, Bobby Charlton combover hairstyle and all, managed a half-decent 31 League goals between them, but no other player could reach double figures in support. Manchester City finished third with 46 more strikes than Chelsea's 62.

Two new arrivals were especially significant. Tommy Law was a Glaswegian full-back who would make more than 300 appearances for Chelsea, establish himself as a solid if unspectacular international performer, and even turn down a more lucrative contract with French club Nimes to stick around until 1939. Law was a great and popular servant at the Bridge, renowned for his crowd-pleasing slide tackles. He also scored 19 goals, many of them penalties, in that time and became a regular on the Bridge terraces after the boots were finally hung up.

An astute replacement for the popular Ben Howard Baker, 30-year-old Sam Millington became our stalwart between the sticks. Walsall-born Millington (pictured keeping goal in the Cup against Cardiff City) was invariably seen with wide, flat cap on head in public, masking another Charltonesque pate, and would set a record of 78 shutouts in his 245 games over six seasons in west London. Half a century would pass before Peter Bonetti, he of the gloves not the titfer, would eventually break that record.

Team resources were generally stretched. In early November the club received news that Turnbull, current top scorer who had notched 20 the previous season, was to serve a lengthy suspension for disciplinary reasons.

"Chelsea F.C. yesterday received official notification from the Football Association that Turnbull, their centre-forward, has been suspended for two months for an incident in connection with the match between South Shields and Chelsea on the South Shields ground on Saturday, October 9" Daily Express, 6 November 1926

The following day a fine of £45 was handed out to the Pensioners by the FA (and to Spurs and Clapton Orient) for not fielding the strongest available league side in the London Combination Cup - despite reaching the final at Highbury and going on to beat Orient there, 2-1.

Happily, after threadbare fare in recent years, there came a surprisingly rich FA Cup run too. Chelsea saw off, amongst others, Accrington Stanley (who are they?) by 7-2 – one of our all-time great wins. Thain and Turnbull weighed in with five and six goals respectively in that competition.

A full house in the sixth round – the furthest the team had progressed for ten years – witnessed stalemate between the Blues and First Division runners-up Cardiff City.

The return at Ninian Park was a fantastic affair. Chelsea conceded a penalty but fought back only to lose by the odd goal in five, Andy Wilson also missing a vital spot-kick for the Londoners. The Welsh went on to lift the Cup, seeing off Arsenal 1-0 in the final.

In 1926/27...

Facts & figures: 70,184 watch the first match in our FA Cup tie against Cardiff at the Bridge

Cup run: Sixth round, losing to Cardiff City in a replay

All the rage: feline fine – the Cats Protection League is founded

Season by Season: 1925/26

These days it seems every week some official guardian of the beautiful game has a new idea to 'improve' the sport. Make goals the size of a house, they say, or blindfold the goalies.

Weekly phone-ins often carry the call from supporters to tool the ref up like Tring’s answer to RoboCop. So let’s go back to a simpler time for the game, where football was football, and – oh dear, even then they just wouldn’t let it lie...

In the summer of 1925, all levels of the national game in England adopted a new offside law. No longer did three opponents have to be between a player and the goal. Now it was down to two.

Faster, fewer stoppages, clearer decisions, more goals, they said. And, by Jove, they were right.

“Revolutionised football starts to-day in all parts of the country.” Daily Mirror, Aug 29 1925, on the new offside law

In what indicates an unusually practical pre-season training approach for secretary-manager David Calderhead and co., Chelsea not only instantly mastered the law-change’s effects on defending, but managed to exploit the new attacking options quicker than anyone else in the Second Division.

After 13 games the Pensioners were unbeaten, had scored 36 goals, conceded just eight (better than the next tightest defence, Derby’s, by five) and topped the table from Middlesbrough by a massively superior goal average.

That was in early November. Following a Christmas Day draw with Blackpool, though, Chelsea had slumped to third, out of the vital promotion slots as injury and loss of form began to bite. And there they would finish, with no end-of-season play-offs to keep hopes of a return to First Division alive.

Money was still relatively tight at the Bridge too. The season’s notable new arrivals had, by necessity, both been forwards.

Local lad Albert Thain would stick around till 1931 and notch a half century of strikes in that time. Bob Turnbull, a better-travelled Scots striker, would manage the excellent strike-rate of 58 from his 87 games in Chelsea blue, ending in 1928.

In nets, Scouser Peter McKenna made his mark, began vying with iconic amateur Ben Howard Baker (pictured in action during the 2-0 win over Bradford City) for pre-eminence. The first Chelsea player born in the 20th century, he had an excellent shot-stopping record but was perhaps a little too short, at 5’10”, to thrive at the upper levels of a game in which the aerial punt was an approved method of attack.

Simeon 'Sam' Millington who joined at the season’s close, would soon eclipse McKenna as the Pensioners’ new goalkeeping hero.

In 1925/26...

Facts & figures: Chelsea’s cup visit to Crystal Palace set a then stadium record of 41,000
Cup run: Fourth Round, losing to Crystal Palace
All the rage: 1,750,000 workers go on General Strike to stop employers reducing miners’ wages