UCHAMBUZI

Pre-match briefing: Crystal Palace v Chelsea 

Saturday afternoon’s match brings a capital challenge for Chelsea and a special landmark for our captain. Club historian Rick Glanvill and club statistician Paul Dutton have the details...

TALKING POINTS

After yet another lengthy interruption, welcome back to a Premier League campaign in which Chelsea are now the only unbeaten team (Charlton, Nottingham Forest and Bristol City are undefeated in the lower tiers). The league leaders have won two and drawn one on the road so far, but now face testing trips over the next two weekends, with a home Champions League tie in between.

The clash at Old Trafford next Sunday may attract the admiring glances but this weekend retribution is demanded and London pride is at stake. The loss in this corner of south London last March cost the Blues dearly and the fact it was self-inflicted only added to the pain. It is the only defeat in our last 15 matches against teams from the capital.

Nineteen points from a possible 21 is the second finest start to a season of the Premier League era. The best was also made by Jose Mourinho’s Blues in 2005/06. Back then no points at all were dropped until the 10th match, a draw at Everton. 

Key Stat
John Terry is due to captain Chelsea from the start for the 500th occasion tomorrow.

Terry will be the only Chelsea player to reach this landmark and wearing the armband for the 500th time is no mean feat considering the status of some teammates he has captained – Frank Lampard, Didier Drogba, Michael Ballack, Petr Cech among others.

In 2002 Chelsea boss Claudio Ranieri said of the then 21-year-old: ‘He knows he’s my “new” captain. After Desailly and Zola, it is him. He is my point of reference for the future.’ Zola’s departure and a lengthy injury for Desailly opened a door for Terry in autumn 2003 that has never seriously looked like shutting.

Chelsea’s all-time captains

John Terry  499

Ron Harris  324

Dennis Wise  298

Later, likening Terry to the great Franco Baresi, who skippered AC Milan from the age of 22, Ranieri added: ‘Wearing the armband is not important in itself, the key thing is that they are just leaders. He is a leader – a leader inside. John may be young but he can transmit something from inside. This is a quality of character that is only in some players, not all.’

Anyone who knows JT will be aware he will want to make amends for last season’s crucial own goal at Selhurst Park. Against Manchester City and Arsenal especially this season the ‘leader, legend’ has looked as exceptional as ever.

Talking of great captains, Chelsea’s Vivian ‘Jack’ Woodward (pictured right) has been in the news as a result of Wayne Rooney’s inferior England goals/games ratio. Woodward netted six in five games for England during the 1910/11 season while at Stamford Bridge and was skipper in all of them.

Other prolific Pensioners for England were George Hilsdon and Jimmy Greaves. Gatling Gun’s eight caps, 1907-1909, brought 14 goals, including four in Hungary. Greaves’s tally while at Stamford Bridge was 15 caps, 16 goals.

During the recent FIFA break Diego Costa scored for his adopted country, Spain, for the first time. The Brazil-born striker has hit nine goals in seven Premier League games for the Blues this season. Should he score on Saturday he will become the second quickest Chelsea player to reach double figures in the top flight after the charismatic John Gilbert ‘Jack’ Cock 95 years ago.