Rarely has there been such a promise of turbulence at the top of the league with nine clubs having changed their head coach in the off season and a host of transfers in and out of the English game threatening to shake up the competition. In other words, the Premier League has spent this off-season being the most Chelsea version of itself it can be. Of course, the Blues have kept up their end of the bargain with a new head coach and big-money signings.
As we look ahead to the 2026-27 season for some of England's biggest clubs, let's check in at Stamford Bridge, where the drama is rarely in short supply. There were few more remorseless winning machines in English football than Chelsea under the ownership of Roman Abramovich, and even though the sale of the club to BlueCo in 2022 brought a downturn in league form, this has been a club that has found its way to silverware, most notably the Club World Cup. Then again, if you just want trophies then (for the time being) Manchester City or Arsenal might be your best bet.
What Chelsea offer is plenty of winning but without the insistence on being such a quiet organisation. Not the boys at Stamford Bridge. For two decades or more, barely a year has gone by without a ride on the coaching carousel, tales of dressing room malcontents or big-money transfers.
A fan of Days of Our Lives? You still might find the plot twists at Chelsea to be too outlandish. It is probably better than last season's table would have you believe.
Chelsea ended the season in 10th, but with the division's sixth-best goal difference and fourth-best expected goal difference. Almost every statistic you might read about Chelsea in 2025-26 is coloured by a disastrous disciplinary record: their eight dismissals (plus one for former head coach Enzo Maresca) were more than twice as many as any other side and only one short of the Premier League record. It is hard to get a confident read on a team that spent nearly 10% of their league minutes a man down and whose internal discipline was shot during Liam Rosenior's brief tenure.
Perhaps when there is such a preponderance of disciplinary issues -- since the change of ownership Chelsea have 18 red cards for players and staff, three more than any other Premier League team -- it tells us something about the attitude of a squad that was recruited with an eye on youth and selling on in the future. Certainly the club itself seems to have acknowledged that the time is right for something of a rebalancing in terms of age and experience. Gone, for now, are the largely inexperienced managers who populated the Stamford Bridge dugout.
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