So Chelsea won the Champions League, and now we’ve all had a chance to get over it a little, let’s consider what that means. Is it better than winning the Premier League? Well, yeah, in some ways I guess it is. You are champions of the whole of Europe, not just of England. But is it harder to win than the Premier League? Not really. Because you don’t need to be the best team in it, you can be the seventh best, beat the eighth best in the quarters and then get a couple of lucky results and suddenly there’s John Terry pushing you out of the way for a photo. But everyone knows you need to be the best team in the League to win it, because that’s what league football decides.
The Champions’ League is a league in name only. Uefa have basically tried and failed to turn the old European Cup into a European Super League, even going as far as introducing a second group stage at one time. That proved too unwieldy, so it was soon scrapped, and as Arsène pointed out at the time, that turned it back into a cup competition. It now has exactly the same format as the World Cup finals, and I don’t hear anyone claiming that’s a league. All right, they only play each other once in the World Cup finals’ groups, but that’s a time issue and they’re on neutral ground anyway. Would France, World Cup winners in 1998 and European Champions in 2000, have been knocked out of the World Cup finals in 2002 quite so easily if it were a true league? A great team does not become a bad one that quickly, and the Fifa rankings, flawed as they may be in many ways, demonstrate this: France remained in the top two or three places solidly from 1998 to well after 2002, despite the catastrophe of Japan/Korea, when they went home having failed to score a goal.
The World Cup is usually, but not always, won by the best country in the world (1974 and 1978 being the most obvious years when it wasn’t). Is the Champions’ League usually won by the best team in Europe? I’d say it’s usually won by one of the best two or three, and almost always by one of the best four or five, but there are exceptions even to this. Cup competitions by their very nature allow the lesser lights to shine; hence Millwall, Portsmouth and Cardiff all reaching FA Cup finals in the last few years.
The top leagues in world football have evolved to have between 30 and 40 matches per season, because this is the minimum number required to decide who really is best. The best team doesn’t always win a particular match, but 30 or 40 matches will average out the luck much more effectively than a cup competition. Other sports may require more or fewer games to remove the element of fortune: the baseball season seems to be hundreds of games long, while American Football matches are won by the better team so often that 15 or 20 games is enough and extending the season beyond that would be a waste of everyone’s time.
So should we be bothered that Chelsea have won a cup? No. Who cares? Let them enjoy it. They’ll never be the Arsenal.
Win some, lose some. Fortunately.
2/6: Nice to see so many Chelsea fans reading my blog and commenting. If the comments are purely abusive then I don’t bother posting them, so don’t waste your time. I don’t mind reasoned argument and different viewpoints. I don’t even mind completely illogical argument if it’s not abusive. I do mind terrible spelling and grammar, but I’m not going to bother correcting it for you and making you look cleverer than you are. By the way, you may like this as well, it’s all about Chelsea: http://wp.me/p1I44P-9d
Strangely, with all the Spurs piss-taking on this blog, their fans never turn up and comment. Maybe they can’t write.
angryofislington 
How many years since you last won a trophy – please remind me!
JT legend
The ONLY team in London who have won the Champions League – suck on that!
“They’ll never be Arsenal”
LOOOOOL and who said we wanted to be Arsenal? WE ARE CHELSEA!
hahaha! I can smell the jealousy. 🙂
I think he meant you’ll never be as classy as arsenal.. You can buy the league and the champions league but you definitely can’t buy our class!
Awww, this web page wreaks of jealousy
Who wants to be the Arse anyway?!! 7 frigging years without a trophy. In your so called “decorated history” never even won the European trophy, who wants to be such a team? Just wait and watch, while you remain trophy less we will make your history, history. We are proud of Chelsea and your hatred and gullibility makes us feel even prouder. Stop being jealous and undermining other teams efforts and instead focus on your own team.
Is it 7 years now? And let’s see Chelsea have won 2 Premier Leagues 4 FA Cups and now a European Cup … thank God we’ll never be like Arsenal a dead club run by a rich old family who make profits every year and don’t give a damn about their fans!
Let see what they will do with in the next. Season.
Where did you guys finish this season….oh right, in 6th place, 2 behind Tottenham and 3 behind AFC….great season in the EPL? The best thing you did all season was to get into the CL for next year at Tottenham’s expense…thank you for that!
We have never had to buy a trophy like you clowns did, we won them by fair and honest effort rather than using a sugardaddy Russian oilygarch to viagra up our squad.
this is quite possibly the dumbest comment on the internet. well done weeone.
“So should we be bothered that Chelsea have won a cup? No. Who cares?”
So why write about it? And no, you shouldn’t be bothered about Chelsea, just be bothered why coming third in the League is considered a success for Arsenal or perhaps you would have settled for that pre-season?
Bless all the Chavs jumping on to have their say!
Bottom line – the WHOLE of Europe saw Chavsea become the most UNDESERVED winners of the trophy since its inception. Battered by Napoli, Humiliated by Barcelona, Destroyed by Bayern, but yet they made it with their best two defenders – Woodwork & PenaltyMisses.
Chelsea are NOTHING!
N O T H I N G.
Bought everything they’ve ever won, zero class, zero history.
A racist club, with a racist captain, spearheaded in attack by the biggest cheat in World Football, the most repellent left back in football, and run by a criminal oligarch.
13 Titles. One team in London. Always will be. Class can’t be bought.
I defy anybody to name a team who has won the European cup without luck. It’s not Chelsea’s fault that other teams can’t finish and do what they are supposed to. Chelsea had a game plan and stuck to it with hunger and dedication and yes, luck. But like I said, no team has won it with out it.
“They’ll never be the Arsenal.” What self respected team wants to go 7 years without winning a trophy?
We will never be Arsenal, but we are CHAMPIONS OF EUROPE something Arsenal have NEVER been
Oh dear oh dear – nothing smells quite like a bitter gooner, go and watch your “fabulous football”, what a pile of shite…how many trophies have Chelsea won since the last time Arsenal won anything??? Every time Chelsea have been rubbish since I started watching them – relegation, going bust, all sorts of trouble – what’s always kept me going is the thought that it could have been worse, I could have been an Arsenal fan. In the distant past, you were miserable bitter winners, and you’re the same as losers. Get a life
Pure sour grapes. Just give us a buzz when you lot win a trophy okay.
Who cares. Its a pointless argument. Chelsea won the CL. Nuff said. I love Arsenal but we are so far from winning anything. Leave them alone and move on.
How bitter can you be? And the comment “you’ll never be Arsenal”, why would we want to be? And also luck does not come in to it, luck is when the ball hits a beach ball and goes in or when your side are losing late on and the games called off due to bad weather. Beating the European champions while being down 2 goals and down to 10 men is not luck!
We must remember that Chelsea were never a power house in England a d they only hot to where they are thru a billionair playing with his money. It was inevitable that they would win it eventually with all the money spent so not much of a surprise there. It also shows that a truly great team will win it and still be in the reckoning for the league. Chelsea were so ordinary last season that all they had to play for was The CL, so chucked in the towel for the league. If arsenal thru all their eggs in one basket like that then we would also win it, we were the better side this year we just didn’t chuck it all in the one bet. We all know what happens to sides that do this, the next season they don’t perform cos they get found out for the lucky sides they are. Bring on next season.
Oh and JT is a me, me, me type of player, a true c**t of highest order.
Poor excuse for a man.
1 more thing, Arsenal fans are not jelous, if spurs had have won it then we would be jelous cos they are a team that are not financed by unlimited money so would have to do it the normal, fair way that teams have done it for many years. That would make us jelous, cos Chelsea haves much money and the Russian openly stating he wants the ‘Holy Grail’ it was expected to happen. Enjoy this part if your non-history, cos that’s all you got. It’s like a women with tiny boobs, getting a boob job and flaunting it. We know that they ate fake and more importantly SHE knows they are PLASTIC and FAKE, she will NEVER have real boobs so will always be known to be masking her true identity. Just like Chelsea FC!
What’s the difference between Chelsea using their millions from a rich owner and Man Utd/Barcelona/Real Madrid using their millions from global merchandising and massive stadiums to win the Champions League? The answer is nothing, we’ve all spent millions on players to win trophies, that’s what the big teams do, that’s what football is nowadays, that’s why Arsenal have stopped winning things.
Everyone keeps saying that Chelsea won the Champions League with money and yes, we definately did, but Man Utd, Man City, Barcelona, Real Madrid, Inter Milan AC Milan and many others didn’t win it with similar amounts of money available, we’re not the only team in europe with money.
Why don’t you have sugar daddy?? Cause sugar daddies are rich…and rich ppl got class…and Arse have no class 🙂
that’s a good excuse for not winning a trophy in eight years, I’ll remember that the next time that I try to give a reason for not succeeding. “Oh I was just spreading my time out, not putting it all in one basket so that’s why I didn’t succeed.”
And we won TWO trophies this year alone, that’s TWO more trophies than you arse’s have won in the past eight years total. Bravo.
I think you’ll find we were playing for the FA cup and oh yes, won that too – but then, that’s only a cup competition.
I think you’ll find Arsenal put all their eggs in to one basket because you only had one basket to put them in anyway. Out the Carling Cup, out the FA Cup and out that pointless competition the Champions league.
your tears taste wonderful, arses. arse whiner is rubbing off on the entire lot of you. Be as jealous as you must, I for one cannot imagine what it would feel like to not have one player on my team’s entire roster who knew what it felt like to lift a trophy… any trophy. That’s sad, considering even Portsmouth have players who know that joyous feeling.
Jealousy is a cruel thing, it’s been 7 years now since Arsenal won a cup of any kind and insead of saying it isn’t good enough and that cirtain things need to change (manager, transfer policy, ect.)you’ve resorted to saying that cups are not worth winning and the league is the only thing that matters, although I bet those weren’t your thoughts after the League Cup final agaist Birmingham.
Also, I wouldn’t say that the Champions League is easier to win than the Premier league, it’s not like the FA Cup where you could be drawn against a League 2 side for a couple of rounds and get a Championship side in the final, there’s a very high chance that you’ll be drawn against one of the best sides in Europe and unlike the Premier league one bad result could knock you out of the competition for good, you don’t usually get a second chance.
So what would you prefer, a 3rd place finish in the league or a 6th place finish, a domestic cup and to be crowned champions of Europe?
Mathematically, 1 gazillion League titles, fa cup, Carling cups << 1 champions league title.
you'll understand the equation when your team win's one
I completely agree with the sentiment of this post.
The only thing I question is the need to write it.
Everyone’s already forgotten the spawniest CL win in history.
Let’s just leave it that way.
Arsenal are absolute shit and same goes for that cheese eating surrender monkey manager of theirs, champions of anything is better than top 4 in one and not winning anything in what is it now 7 years? Get real dirty goons
Wow, sad AND bitter…enjoy that feeling! Never mind, one day you might start winning stuff again.
Regards from the Champions of Europe (and the first London team to do it).
Eat your heart out fellas! Chelsea are the Champions of Europe. The 1st & only London side to achieve this feat! Arsenal cud’t even win a coin toss in 7yrs! Pathetic
Is this for real?
Are you not just a bit bitter and jealous that Chelsea won the Champions League and therefore became the first team in London to win the competition?
Is it not the case that all the major teams (and not so major teams) in Europe want to win the Champions League every season? And why is this? Is it because as you say it is just a cup competition and anybody can win it? No, I think not!
Arsenal fan debating the relative merits of trophies won = nun dishing out family planning advice.
Chav’s plastic fanboys debating the relative merits of trophies won=whore trying to become a nun.
Tick tock Tick tock
Because chelsea won d champions league now is no more a major trophy, a league that most club want to participate even if they don’t win it. Av you forgot that play off is arsenal birthright? Is better you change your businessman coach that work for his selfish interest because of his share in arsenal. Don’t be suprise if arsene leave arsenal today & collect his money from d club to form his own club till know you that if has been toying with your team. A club that didn’t think of his fans that need trophy. Did chelsea spend more that man city, real madrid to mention few.
And to all of the Chelsea fans who are posting their responses about the article on here, yes I agree that AFC haven’t won anything for the last seven years, but ask yourselves the following questions and see what answers you come up with.
1) How many managers has your owner / benefactor fired during the last seven years, because they won’t allow him too pick and meddle with the team?
2) Where would CFC be without his backing and if Ken Bates were still in charge?
3) What will happen to your club, if and when your owner /benefactor gets bored with throwing money for both new managers and players at your team?
4) How are CFC going to function under the FPP rules? and finally,
5) What do you really think that your owner / benefactor is really using your club for?
And please don’t think it’s footballing reasons…
We’ve had more trophies than managers since roman came in. If it was the choice of having either less trophies, or less managers, what would you prefer?
Before roman came in I had great memories with Chelsea and it was a different time with less expectations and maybe even a more fun day out because of that. But seeing us win the title in mourinho’s first season and winning the champions league were without doubt the best days of my life, let alone the other 6 or so trophies we’ve won since roman came in. Do you think any Chelsea fans care about what happens if he leaves? We’re in a far better position now than we would have been without him. If Bates was still in charge? Who knows, but probably in the shit. The thing is, you are clutching at what if’s – many football clubs are defined by highs and lows and it’s what has made certain clubs what they are. Who wants a stable club, doing the same thing year after year. The joys involved with football are experiencing the lows as well as the highs. Imagine what it feels like to see your team fighting for its life to stay in division 2, to go on to win a record breaking league, the double, champions league, several domestic cups and even more memorable matches that would have been unimaginable. I don’t care what happens as long as Chelsea exist, being a ‘big’ team could bare no importance to me. We are not united, liverpool or arsenal and my resounding feeling on leaving any of those grounds on an away day is thank god for that.
They’ll never be the Arsenal…. hahaha i fell off my chair laughing at that…8 years n waiting..lmfao
We would have won if it wasnt for a selfdeluded,arrogant,self important french twat.GG would have won it.
Danish pastry….Go back to LeGrove you moron and stop spreading your filth on other websites….you won’t be missed.
Emirates Cup hahahaha! You never know one day gooners, it may be as big as the Champions League and then you can claim to be the most successful team of all time! Classy!!! I think your names on it again next season! Bless!
f*** you chelsea fans.7 years ago you were nothing and still you are nothing.you won cup just by dirty football and dirty money.we are arsenal best team in london .
Look up Herbert Chapman, then get a new argument.
Sometimes it feels like im on another planet to some arsenal fans. Is “class” the new replacement for trophies? What is classy about arsenal in particular that other clubs just don’t have?
Arsenal football club – the franchise club moved from dial square and renamed and rehoused by a rich, ruthless sugar daddy. The same corrupt owner who bribed his way to get arsenal into the top division. The same man who bribed other players to join your club. And let’s not forget arguably your most famous team (and manager) was BOUGHT from another club. Class.
Or perhaps you want to talk about players – remind me how many have had alcohol and drink driving offences. Van Persie and wilshere’s behaviour towards women. Fans that boo your own players, fans that turn against any player that wants to move on to bigger things when you cant accept that the same thing happened to other clubs for years. Fans that sung “Liverpool” when you played Chelsea shortly after Liverpool knocked Chelsea out of Europe. And if someone can explain to me the sense in having a statue of a player who is not only still alive, but still playing for you, id love to hear it.
You can kid yourselves all you want about how easy it is to win the champions league, until you’ve won it, you’ll never know what it takes. Yes, Chelsea may have has a bit of luck winning it, but in more deserving seasons we didn’t. No club has come closer to winning it without doing so than Chelsea.
Arsenal have no more class than any other club, all clubs have their prouder moments and less proud moments. You’re delusional if you think arsenal are any kind of exception. Had you anywhere near the level of Chelsea’s success of recent, I can guarantee ‘class’ wouldn’t be harped on about like it is now. Get over the fact that arsenal aren’t what they were, no club will be dominant for ever and other clubs will have their day eventually. Chelsea had to endure years of shit off you lot, and if anything, seeing you lot really hate us having our day is EXACTLY the response I’d want.
What a ridiculous article and what stupid comments from Arsenal supporters.
Bought our success? So if we have bought our success, so have the likes of United, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Inter Milan, AC Milan and Bayern Munich who have all spent more money than Chelsea over the last 20 years.
It takes more than spending money to win things. Liverpool and Tottenham have spent way more than Chelsea over the same period and look where its got them…nowhere.
So what? Chelsea spent money? You Arsenal clowns forget we needed too as we would of closed down…and despite our financial woes we were still competing for Champions League football.
Its okay to be jealous, 7 years without silver-wear…struggling for top 4 more than ever in recent years…big players leaving to be successful…can’t attract the big money names…while watching your rivals secure 10 bits of silver-ware in the same time period and the first London team to be European Champions. I’d be very jealous too if we went from Invincible’s to where you are now.
But don’t try and discard our achievements, winning football matches is about outscoring your opponents or by a penalty shootout…we did that against the best teams in Europe this year (Napoli, Benfica, Barcelona and Bayern Munich). When you can do the same, come talk to us. Until then, stay quietly in our shadow until you can win things again.
Even worse, comments from Chelsea fans on Arsensl forum! True definition if johny cone lately, glory hunting plastic boob job fans that are Chelsea. You might be better off now than before with Ken bates in charge, but when things change for bigman, (Putin, Russia? face it he is dodgy) as we all know times do, then you will be worse off than when with Ken bates! But you won’t care cos being glory hunters you will jump in the next super massive star before it goes super nova!
But Arsenal will still be there competing, as we have always been for over 125years
it would be better if you could spell, mate. still, why whinge when you can reminisce over pires, bergkamp and henry. one of the three is still making a name for himself in the mls….hahahaa
I am not surer what the purpose of this stupid article was but it certainly brought out the AAAs from so-called Arsenal supporters and of course the plastic chavs defending their team’s achievements. Being an impartial observer of this melee, I commend Chelsea for winning the CL under difficult circumstances and really admire DiMatteo’s achievements in squeezing blood out of a rock with what was left of the Chelsea team after AVB decimated it. What concerns me is whether the crazy Ivan will keep DiMatteo as manager and if not, what this will say for Football in general and Chelsea in particular.
silly bitter goons.
Good teams loan players to bad teams. That’s why Arsenal has Benayoun.
Nothoughts….Good teams sell crap to bad teams and that’s why Cheatski has Torres! Bad teams fire managers as fast as Chelski…another sign of poor management! You guys don’t deserve DiMatteo.
Everyone remembers the Champions & in this case it is CHELSEA!!!
Napoli (Who we’re paired with/&eliminated Man City at group stage & beat UNDEFEATED Juve in the Coppa Italia) was no easy task having to go to extra time after a 4-4 aggregate.
Benfica (Who we’re paired with/&eliminated Man United at group stage & Won their League Cup) we’re so close to bringing the blues down.
Barcelona are Barcelona. (Chelsea > Barca > Milan > Arsenal?) Makes sense in math
& Bayern Munich were 8 minutes away from lifting the cup.
It is easy to criticize. But Chelsea fought hard and we used the resources available to get the job done. It might have ‘too defensive’ to some fans but football has so many factors you can not just go and attack wildly for 90 minutes. There are many things to consider going into a match, for example, history(especially in aggregates).
Arsenal was the first English team to qualify from the group stages and placed pressure on the other England teams (SO WHAT? ;P) But we’re paired with Italian giants AC MILAN. Arsenal fought hard and came to a whisker of taking down the Red & Black in London. Arsenal had more than enough chances to put Ac Milan down. Sometimes you need a little luck from the football GODS to grant you a wish of success and in this case the Football GODS sided with Chelsea.
What if Arsenal was fortunate to eliminate AC Milan & we’re once again paired with Barcelona? Arsenal has history with Barca and I know for a fact that Wenger would integrate parts of the past and try to style gameplay to a successful score to overcome Barcelona, don’t you think?
It was our destiny to win the Champions. When Di Matteo beat Napoli and went into a frenzy, he felt he had the necessary ambition to put the critics in their place and win the cup, such as yourself. So lets go back to your thesis:
So should we[Arsenal fans] be bothered that Chelsea[THE CHAMPIONS OF EUROPE] have won a cup[MAKE THAT 2]?
YES! AND VERY! Chelsea doesn’t want to be Arsenal just as Manchester United doesn’t want to be Man City. Every team finds an identity and Chelsea has one. Hard Work and Dedication, which led us to win a DOUBLE! Arsenal has money to bring in calibre players to help RVP even more. He practically carried the team to 3rd place. When he is off target, Arsenal suffers. Podolski is a player to consider but with Mancini approaching RVP to play with a team that can WIN TROPHIES, it will be hard to resist the temptation of lifting a cup.
agree, disagree? let me know.
Regardless, i’ll KTBFFH!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Great post Juan…..and very fair minded I find! We have nothing to be ashamed of at Arsenal and will achieve more than Chelsea with less investment and managerial merry-go-rounds! I find it tragic that Arbamovich is considering someone to replace DiMatteo, who to my mind deserves manager of the year for his turnaround of Chelsea and for squeezing blood out of a rock.