Chelsea vs Man City Timeline & H2H Stats

In some regards, Chelsea were the blueprint on which Manchester City’s success has been based. New owners, in Chelsea’s case Roman Abramovich, in City’s, essentially the Abu Dhabi Royal Family, came in and invested huge sums to turn around the fortunes of an underachieving club.

Chelsea enjoyed great success but City’s achievements are on another level, partly due to the greater financial resources of the owners and to a degree because they learnt from Chelsea. In recent years, games between these two teams have not always been top-of-the-table affairs, with the Stamford Bridge outfit having slipped below the best teams in England. Nonetheless, games between Chelsea and City remain huge clashes, even if there is no major historic (or recent) rivalry between the clubs.

Chelsea were founded more recently than many of England’s great clubs, dating back to 1905, whilst City were formed in 1880. With both teams having moved around the divisions a little, they have met slightly fewer times than some other major clubs but even so, they have played each other around 180 times.

Until more recent times, it was Chelsea that had the advantage by some distance, in part thanks to claiming 18 wins from 24 games early in the PL era. However, City have closed that gap and the record is now very even. The first time they ever played was way back in 1907, a 2-2 draw at Stamford Bridge and over the years they have had some huge tussles. There is no doubt about the biggest clash of them all though.

Chelsea Spoil City Dreams

City won the Champions League in 2023 but for many years they kept falling short, often in the relatively early rounds. They steadily made progress though and made it through to the final in the 2020/21 season. On the 29th of May, 2021, they faced Chelsea in Porto and were firm favourites in a season in which they finished a full 19 points clear of the Stamford Bridge side.

However, in a one-off game, anything can happen and, brilliantly managed by Thomas Tuchel, Chelsea fully deserved their victory. Tuchel won the tactical battle with Pep – no mean feat – and Chelsea were the better side, proving good value for their 1-0 win.

Kai Havertz scored the crucial goal after 42 minutes and N’Golo Kante, who won the Man of the Match award, was superb in limiting City’s attacks. The pre-match favourites managed just one shot on target in the whole game.

Chelsea’s Full Match History Against Man City