For the third consecutive year, we have at least one new addition to the WAGNH Community Player Ratings Hall of Shame, a.k.a. (televised) games from the past fourteen years where the overall average rating was below 4.0. (As usual, the caveat about “televised games” is to explain why the 4-2 home defeat to third division Bradford City in the 2014-15 FA Cup is not on this list.)
And this one’s right up there near the “top” (well, bottom). In fact, it is the lowest rated home game in the history of these ratings — beating the record that was set just a couple years ago. For nearly a decade, we used to have to go back to “The Mourinho Season” to find such horrendous performances at the Bridge. Now they seem to be occurring much more frequently (and not just away).
What lovely times we’re living in!
3.02 — Manchester City 6-0 Chelsea (2019.II.10.)
In what still remains a true statement, it’s tough to see (a modern era) Chelsea ever “topping” this performance and result, which remains the team’s worst loss in three decades. We were down three inside of 20 minutes, down four by half, and gave up two more in the second half for good measure. The nadir of Sarri-ball, or any ball.
3.36 — Brighton & Hove Albion 3-0 Chelsea (2025.II.14.)
The team showed no desire, said head coach Enzo Maresca, but our mentality was just one of the many aspects lacking in this one. In fact, we were found lacking in just about every aspect of the game, from attack to defense, from planning to focusing, from strategy to execution.
3.42 — Arsenal 5-0 Chelsea (2024.IV.23.)
“When we conceded the third goal the team gave up.”
-Mauricio Pochettino
3.62 — AFC Bournemouth 4-0 Chelsea (2019.I.30.)
This was the away game before the (aforementioned) City away game, and with Chelsea giving up four goals in the second half of this one and four goals in the first half of that one, we managed to lose 90 minutes of (away) football by a combined 8-0 scoreline. Now that is truly impressive!
3.69 — Chelsea 0-3 PSG (2026.III.17.)
Chelsea had lost this Champions League Round of 16 tie in the first leg already, so all we really wanted to see was some reasonable effort, a bit of quality entertainment, and some care. We conceded twice in the first 15 minutes, and it only got more embarrassing from there. Not one player stood out; everyone was simply bad.
3.69 — Newcastle United 3-0 Chelsea (2018.V.13.)
Antonio Conte’s last Premier League game in charge, which began with Chelsea holding a slim chance of qualifying for the Champions League (Liverpool won so it didn’t matter in the end), but ended up with yet another hilarious collapse. A week later, Chelsea beat Manchester United in the FA Cup final so yeah, good luck figuring out football.
3.83 — Steaua Bucharest 1-0 Chelsea (2013.III.13.)
There were many lows of the (We’re-Just-Not-That-)Interim Blues, and this was certainly one of them. Chelsea came back to smash Steaua 3-1 in the second leg of the Europa League Round of 16 and would eventually go on to win the competition. In retrospect, viewed through the lens of recent seasons, it must be acknowledged that this interim era looks pretty okay.
3.95 — Chelsea 2-4 Wolverhampton Wanderers (2024.II.4.)
The lowest-rated game at Stamford Bridge in the history* of our WAGNH Community Player Ratings (*see caveat in intro) … until today! That said, we would finish both this season (2023-24) and the following season (2024-25) strongly despite the springtime games that made this list. Can we do the same this season?
3.95 — Sheffield United 3-0 Chelsea (2020.VII.11.)
Outside of the first few minutes, Chelsea were never in this game, which was played in July in an empty stadium thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic. What made the result even more shocking was Chelsea’s generally very good play and form during “Project Restart”. Like the current editions, this was a fairly young and inexperienced team, but with Frankie’s Fledglings we at least seemed to be on the right path for (re-)building towards a more positive future.
3.95 — Watford 4-1 Chelsea (2018.II.5.)
Conte lost 3-0 to Bournemouth in the game before this and asked the club for an official vote of confidence, which was then followed by an even worse performance as 10-man Chelsea were destroyed at Vicarage Road. In fairness, Chelsea, after falling behind, actually equalized in the final ten minutes despite playing a man down since the 30th (Tiémoué Bakayoko taking the ultimate prize with a 1.4 individual rating). But Watford took the lead again immediately after Hazard’s equalizer and the Blues folded from there.
Fun fact: Bakayoko’s rating stood for a long time as the lowest individual rating. It was “bettered” by Robert Sánchez’s 1.1 against Manchester United earlier this season (when he got himself sent off in the fith minute).
3.96 — Chelsea 1-3 Southampton (2015.X.3.)
The Mourinho Season was already in full swing by the time Sadio Mané inspired Saints to their first win at the Bridge in 13 years. Fun fact: this was Falcao’s one and only start in the Premier League (he would play just three more times for us that season for a grand total of 35 minutes, and we would lose all three games).
3.99 — Chelsea 0-2 Brentford (2023.IV.26.)
The worst of a most terrible season, the first of the post-Abramovich era. This was the fifth in a run of six successive defeats in all competitions as we wanted nothing more than for the season to end. We set quite a few new marks for futility in this season, and unfortunately, improvement on that has been marginal at best…
vs. PSG (CL, H, L 0-3)
EXCEPTIONAL (8.5-9.5): —
EXCELLENT (7.5-8.4): —
GOOD (6.5-7.4): —
AVERAGE (5.5-6.4): —
SUBPAR (4.5-5.4): —
BAD (3.5-4.4): João Pedro (4.2), Acheampong (4.2, sub), Sánchez (4.0), Cucurella (3.9), Garnacho (3.9, sub), Lavia (3.8, sub), Neto (3.8), Caicedo (3.8), Enzo (3.8), Chalobah (3.8), Hato (3.7), Delap (3.6, sub), Palmer (3.5)
TERRIBLE (2.5-3.4): Santos (3.4), Tosin (3.3, sub), Sarr (2.6)
OVERALL
