Long before the arrival of Roman Abramovich and the alteration of Chelsea’s path forever, the club was a middling one that won silverware on a regular basis but, if we’re all being honest about it, rarely troubled those at the top of the table. There is something quite amusing, therefore, about the fact that the first piece of major silverware that was put into the Stamford Bridge trophy cabinet was the First Division title. The man that led the Blues to that trophy as the club captain was Roy Bentley, whose name will be known to relatively few Chelsea supporters in the modern era. That, though, is a crying shame and shouldn’t be the case.
Roy Bentley’s Honours as a Chelsea Player
| Season | League Titles | Domestic Cups | European/International Cups |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1954-1955 | First Division | – | – |
Who Was Roy Bentley?
Born in Shirehampton, near Bristol, on the 17th of May 1924, Roy Thomas Frank Bentley was one of eight children. He was a talented footballer, playing as an amateur for the local side, Bristol Rovers. It wasn’t long before his talents were spotted by another club in the area, allowing him to turn professional when he joined Bristol City as an inside forward. That was in 1941, but it wasn’t long before his burgeoning football career got interrupted by the Second World War. Keen to do his bit, Bentley joined the Royal Navy and spent the majority of the war on destroyers that were tasked with escorting conveys across the Atlantic Ocean.
When the war was over, Newcastle United decided that Bentley was the man who would be able to help them get out of the Second Division, choosing to pay £8,000 for his services. He spent 18 months at the club, with many of them being spoiled by a mystery illness that caused him to lose two stone in a dramatically short period of time. Even so, there were definitely some highlights. Bentley scored in a game that remains in the record books, seeing Newcastle beat Newport County by what remains the biggest margin in Football League history: 13-0. He netted 18 times in 36 games in his first season, but his second didn’t go so well.
Joining Chelsea
It was during his second season at St James’ Park that Bentley was hit by his illness, causing him to play just 12 times and scoring a mere three goals. When Chelsea turned up offering £12,500 for him in the January of 1948, therefore, the Geordies were only too happy to accept. There were some fears in London that the Blues had made a massive mistake, but those fears were soon proven to be misjudged. Bentley was moved into the centre-forward position, with his speed of both foot and thought seeing his form improve almost as rapidly as his healthy. He gained a decent amount of weight in his first season with the Blues, but struggled in front of goal.
Having arrived at Stamford Bridge as a replacement for Tommy Lawton, many fans compared the two unfavourably during the initial time he was at the club. He scored a mere three times in his first four months, but when his fortunes changed they changed markedly. Having moved South on the advice of his doctor to try and find a remedy for lung trouble he’d been having, Bentley became the first deep-lying centre-forward in the English game often unsettling opponents. The fact that he also boasted a powerful shot and was a decent header of the ball meant that he was able to score 23 goals by the end of his first season.
Chelsea’s form was not exactly linear during Bentley’s time at the club, being best described as ‘patchy’. Yet it was thanks to his goals that the club was able to go on an FA Cup run that was arguably the most meaningful the club had in the best part of 20 years. He scored a screamer against Manchester City in quarter-final, cementing a 2-0 win, as well as a goal to give them a lead by the same scoreline against Arsenal. Unfortunately for the Blues, though, their London rivals were able to turn that around and knock them out in the semi-finals. For Bentley, selection for the London XI that took part in the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup resulted in him playing on the continent for the first time in his football career.
Becoming Chelsea Captain
The first time that Bentley wore the captain’s armband actually came well before he was given the responsibility full-time. It happened when Chelsea defeated Everton 2-1 in the league at Stamford Bridge, seeing him keep it for a 3-2 defeat at Blackpool. Fast-forward around six months and he got another spell, this time in a run of wins against Liverpool, Wolverhampton Wanderers, Fulham and Bolton Wanderers. Having scored in two of those four games too, it was clear that Bentley wasn’t afraid to lead from the front. There were two more occasions on which he was captain before being made it properly, against Middlesbrough and Leeds United.
Then, having proven that he had what it takes to lead Chelsea as the club captain, Bentley was handed the armband permanently by the new manager Ted Drake. That was in 1952, with Blues going through steady improvements in the years that followed. Having finished 19th the season before, it looked like not much had changed when the club finished in the same position at the end of the 1952-1953 campaign. The following season, however, there were definite improvements as Drake let Chelsea to an eight place finish with 44 points on the board. Bentley had been an important part of that campaign, but better was to come.
Winning the Title Then Moving On
The 1954-1955 season would go on to become the most important in Chelsea’s history. The captain played 41 times in the First Division for the Blues, scoring 21 times; a quarter of the total league goals scored by the club. That included goals in wins over Bolton Wanderers, Huddersfield Town and a hat-trick against his former club Newcastle United. Although he didn’t score against Sheffield Wednesday in the penultimate game of the season, the Blues won 3-0 and secured the title with a game to spare. That game was against Manchester United, with Bentley scoring the consolation goal in a 2-1 loss that didn’t matter: they were champions.
At the time, no one could’ve imagined that it would be the last time that Chelsea would win the league that century. The club even tried to be pro-active, having a clear-out of the championship winning team’s old guard ahead of the 1956-1957 season. That included the departure of the main who had lifted the trophy above his head as captain, Roy Bentley. He was sold to Fulham, allowing him to stay in London and giving him a new lease of life, shifting back to right-half initially and then centre-back a year later. He was a football-playing defender thanks to his technical ability in the years before the likes of Alan Hansen made it well-known.
In 1962, Bentley was given a free transfer to leave Craven Cottage, remaining in the capital by joining Queens Park Rangers. Suffering from severe stomach cramps, Bentley chose to ignore the advice of doctors, who told him he shouldn’t play any more, helping QPR to win the Third Division title. He took up coaching there, leaving the club in 1963 to become Reading’s manager but failing to get them out of the Third Division. Although he got Swansea into the Fourth Division, he was sacked in 1972 and turned his back on the game, initially taking up journalism whilst also playing poker semi-professionally.
Bentley did return to football as the Club Secretary at Reading before taking on a similar role at Aldershot. He retired to Berkshire, regularly attending Chelsea home games, and in 2005 he joined Stan Willemse to carry the Premier League trophy onto the Stamford Bridge pitch and hand it over to John Terry; one captain passing it on to another.