As part of Chelsea’s 120th anniversary coverage on their site, The Athletic took a survey of Chelsea fans that are part of their subscriber base and there were some shocking results. They asked the fans the following questions: favorite player, favorite manager, most disappointing signing, most disappointing manager, as well as cult hero and favorite moment of the club’s history.
The favorite player race was quite close as Frank Lampard won with 24% of the vote which should come as no surprise considering he is the club’s all-time leading scorer. Second place went to Eden Hazard which suggests some recency bias but Didier Drogba rounds out the top 3 with 17% of the vote.
Some of the older fans are represented as Giafranco Zola got 13% of the vote but a surprising 20% went with “other” as their choice. If I was part of the survey I would have put Drogba first, Lampard second, and Ngolo Kante third so that would qualify as “other” as well.
For the manager category, Jose Mourinho was the runaway winner with 62% of the vote and many Chelsea fans still pine for “The Special One’ to come back to Stamford Bridge. Carlo Ancelloti was second with 11% of the vote and surprisingly Thomas Tuchel was third as he is certainly remembered for bringing the club their second Champions League tropghy.
Roberto Di Matteo doesn’t get a mention despite his winning of the first UCL trophy but he is likely represented in the 11% that voted for “others”. The most disappointing manager was Andres Villas-Boas who many thought was the next incarnation of Mourinho but he was a bust at Chelsea and everywhere else.
Graham Potter takes second place which is surprising considering the Blues were in a transition period at that time. Both AVB and Potter had the misfortune of trying to follow the footsteps of popular managers so that might be why they got so many votes. For some reason Maurizio Sarri got a bunch of votes despite winning the Europa League at Chelsea.
Romelu Lukaku and “others” took the title for most dissapppintoing signigns with 31% and 27% of the vote respectively. Lukaku has surpraased Fernando Torres in that categorgy since his tenure was shorter and his price tag nearly doubled what the Blues paid for Torres. I thought Lukaku would lead the Blues to Premier League glory and he was not nearly as sympathetic a figure as Torres who tried so hard but just couldn't live up to his price tag.
We would love to hear from you all via social media what you think of these results. Let us know on Twitter at @prideolondon of your picks for these results!