The best part of Chelsea’s Club World Cup win has been the salt
By Travis Tyler
Chelsea is the Champion of the World. Not Champion of the World as in the winner of the Super Bowl, but a legitimate Champion of the World having won an international competition to prove the point.
That may sound painfully obvious, but it needs to be made painfully obvious for some. To get into the Club World Cup, at least in the old format which has just finished (probably), a team from Europe had to win the Champions League. Few anywhere in the world would call the Champions League a small trophy. The Club World Cup may not be as prestigious, but the barrier for entry is huge even if the European Champion is expected to become the World Champion.
Winning it was a big moment for Chelsea as it completed their trophy cabinet. In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t the biggest trophy of the season. But it was important because it was the one that was missing. It was important because, last time, Chelsea blew it. It was important because any team with ambition goes into a cup final wanting to win the silverware regardless of how big and important it is.
But, somewhat surprisingly, the best part of Chelsea becoming world champions was the salt from fans of rival clubs. Particularly those representing clubs that have never qualified for the Club World Cup to begin with because they’ve never had a sniff at the Champions League.
First, you have Arsenal fan Piers Morgan who is desperately trying to remind people he exists and is out of a job. In fairness, he by no means represents Arsenal fans because most of them can’t stand him either. But it takes something truly special to make a tweet like this one or this one.
The former is hilarious because A: Arsenal have never been in the Club World Cup and haven’t been close in over a decade and B: Arsenal is currently the third highest London club in the table, and that’s assuming Tottenham doesn’t win their game in hand and go level on points.
The second one is hilarious because somehow winning one trophy perfectly well over a decade ago is seen as a bigger achievement than winning every trophy. But, Arsenal won’t have to worry about that for some time as finishing top four will be a huge ask for them for some time to come.
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Even funnier than that is closeted Manchester City fan and former Chelsea player Craig Burley. After spending most of last Spring talking about City being the favorites for Champions League, Chelsea won it. That got the Blues into the Club World Cup, a competition City has never been in. He tweeted this to hype his City up over Chelsea celebrating silverware.
Now, Burley is right, City has created a huge gap in the Premier League. And you know what? They’d readily trade their last Premier League for the Champions League and a spot in the Club World Cup. The entire point of them getting Pep Guardiola and backing him with the wealth of a midsized nation was to win the Champions League. Half a decade on and that spot in their trophy cabinet sits empty and dusty. Sure, they’ll likely get another Premier League. But they want the Champions League and pretending otherwise is ignoring reality.
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Perhaps the icing on the cake is that these two are supposed to be making a living off of being in touch with reality yet they are so far up their own posteriors that they can see the back of their teeth. Chelsea is the Champion of the World, yet the best part of all of it is the salt of the fans that haven’t even seen their club in the running.