Remembering the Chelsea team of 96-97 that changed English football

In the run-up to the game, Chelsea fan and still-relevant musician Suggs released ‘Blue Day’, the west London club’s official FA Cup final song ahead of their victory at the old Wembley Stadium.

The Madness frontman is joined in the video by a squad of Blues players, each with varying degrees of enthusiasm, all watching on as he sings: “We’ve got some memories, albeit from the seventies.”

Looking at Chelsea these days it seems bizarre to think that – just two decades ago – they were a team still waxing lyrical about past glories.

The ‘you ain’t got no history’ accusations may be wide of the mark, but they weren’t close to the team they are today.

While the Abramovich era saw a switch flicked in the Chelsea narrative, it wasn’t quite the instant zero-to-sixty move revisionists might have you believe. Indeed, the first influx of investment and talent came more than half a decade earlier, with the arrival of striker-turned-sweeper Ruud Gullit.

The first few years of the Premier League saw Chelsea establish themselves as a mid-table side, but Gullit’s move to player-manager – and the personnel changes it produced – was a turning point.

Gullit took over from Glenn Hoddle at the start of the 1996-97 season, and within months the club had made the shift from an English club into a European one.

Out went Paul Furlong, John Spencer and Gavin Peacock; in came Frank Leboeuf, Gianluca Vialli and Roberto Di Matteo, with Gianfranco Zola joining the squad before the turn of the year.

It was a watershed year for the club, with a sixth-placed finish and an end-of-season tally of 58 goals, their highest since Division One became the Premier League. In over two decades since, they have finished lower only once.

Before the Chelsea