Chelsea’s sad season, at least on the men’s side, has left everyone too bummed out to party.
On the women’s side, there is plenty to celebrate: Emma Hayes’ side has already won the FA Cup, and is on the brink of a fourth straight Women’s Super League championship. Chelsea has one of the best women’s teams on the planet, with Sam Kerr scoring for fun, Lauren James having a revelatory season, and so on. They will have a party, because everyone is having a blast.
Chelsea’s men’s team? Not so much!
The Evening Standard reports that Frank Lampard’s bunch, who are on course for a bottom-half finish, will not have an end-of-season awards event before heading off for the summer.
It’s not the first time the Blues have finished the year without some sort of soirée. Last year, the international sanctions against former owner Roman Abramovich meant no party, while the pandemic offered a pretty straightforward reason to skip the event in 2020 and 2021.
Players will receive their end-of-season awards before Chelsea’s Premier League finale against Newcastle, and will be spared the awkwardness of a luncheon where everyone desperately just wants to go home.
No party a good call for Chelsea
The 2022-23 season has been an ongoing calamity at Stamford Bridge. Todd Boehly, who for a spell was the club’s interim sporting director despite having no experience in that role in the sport, spent over €600 million on new players. Chelsea added so many new faces that the locker room literally couldn’t fit them all.
Spending has generally gone hand-in-hand with success at the highest levels of the game over the last couple of decades, but Chelsea has been an utter mess on the field. Thomas Tuchel was barely tolerated before being fired seven games into the campaign, while Graham Potter was given just a few months before also being shown the door.
The Blues will finish the season with a club-worst points total in the Premier League, and their players have to endure Boehly coming to the locker room to tell them they’ve been embarrassing.
In those circumstances, who would want a party? Scrapping the festivities might be the best decision Chelsea has made all year.
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