There aren’t many seasons in Chelsea’s history that have contained three permanent-or-caretaker head coaches, a Champions League return, a Wembley cup final and a fight to stay out of the bottom half, but that’s exactly what 2025-2026 delivered. The Blues arrived back at Stamford Bridge as world champions, having beaten PSG 3-0 in the Club World Cup final that summer, and Enzo Maresca looked to have the club moving in the right direction. Instead, it turned into one of the most turbulent campaigns of the BlueCo era, one that somehow still ended with a run to the FA Cup final.
Maresca’s exit came on New Year’s Day, with the club and manager using the deliberately vague phrase ‘parted company’ amid a genuine dispute over whether he had resigned or been sacked. Calum McFarlane took charge of first-team affairs for a week as caretaker before Liam Rosenior was appointed on the eighth of January. Rosenior’s start was excellent, winning eight of his first eleven matches in charge, but seven defeats in his last eight games, five of them without scoring, saw him sacked on the 22nd of April after just over three months at the helm.
McFarlane stepped back in to see out the campaign and Chelsea eventually finished 10th in the Premier League with no European football to look forward to. The parting shot came months later, when Maresca was confirmed as Manchester City’s new head coach, succeeding Pep Guardiola at the very club that would go on to deny Chelsea in the FA Cup final, resulting in a need for compensation to be agreed between the Blues and Maresca. Whether he goes on to be more impressive there than he was at Stamford Bridge remains to be seen.
Tournament Record
That FA Cup run was the one bright spot of the campaign. Charlton Athletic were beaten 5-1 away in Rosenior’s first match in charge, before Pedro Neto’s hat-trick sealed a 4-0 win at Hull City in the fourth round. Wrexham pushed the Blues all the way in round five, forcing extra-time before Alejandro Garnacho and João Pedro settled it 4-2, and a rampant Chelsea then put seven past Port Vale at Stamford Bridge in the quarter-finals. Enzo Fernández’s solitary strike saw off Leeds United in the semi-final, but a much tougher challenge lay ahead in the final.
It was Manchester City that Chelsea had to take on at Wembley, with Pep Gurdiola’s side having reached the showpiece event for the fourth time in succession. The Spanish coach’s final season at the Etihad ended in a domestic cup double by beating Chelsea 1-0 in the final through a second-half Antoine Semenyo goal, extending the Blues’ wait for FA Cup silverware for the first time since 2018. That all but put the nail into the coffin of a disappointing season, which was at least given a slight lift with confirmation of Xabi Alonso’s appointment as manager for the 2026-2027 campaign.
The League Cup brought a similarly promising run before falling just short. Lincoln City, Wolverhampton Wanderers and Cardiff City were all beaten to set up a semi-final against London rivals Arsenal, who won 4-2 on aggregate courtesy of a 3-2 first-leg win at Stamford Bridge and a 1-0 second-leg victory at the Emirates. Arsenal would match Chelsea’s FA Cup fate of being beaten in the final by Manchester City, but the Gunners would have a much better end to the season than the Blues thanks to their first Premier League title since 2003-2004.
Chelsea’s return to the Champions League, their first appearance in the competition since 2022-2023, also had its moments, not least a 5-1 thrashing of Ajax at Stamford Bridge, before a heavy 1-3 defeat away to Bayern Munich showed the other side of a wildly inconsistent season. The last-16 draw paired Chelsea with Paris Saint-Germian in a repeat of the previous summer’s Club World Cup final, but there was to be no repeat of that result. PSG won 5-2 in Paris and 3-0 at Stamford Bridge to progress 8-2 on aggregate, leaving the Blues disappointed.
In the league, results were similarly feast or famine. There was a 5-1 win at West Ham and further big victories over Wolverhampton Wanderers and Brentford, but also home defeats to Brighton & Hove Albion and some Bayern-esque batterings, such as the 3-1 loss at home to Leeds United in the December. A poor run under Rosenior and then McFarlane meant Chelsea never really got going after Christmas and the season petered out with a 2-1 defeat at Sunderland on the final day, leaving the Blues 10th and, for the first time in some years, without any European football of any ilk to look forward to.
Transfers In
Chelsea’s summer business in 2025 was as busy as ever. Here is a look at the players brought into Stamford Bridge, along with where they were signed from and the fee involved where known:
| Player | Signed From | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Mike Penders | Genk | £17 million |
| Dário Essugo | Sporting CP | £18 million |
| Liam Delap | Ipswich Town | £30 million |
| Mamadou Sarr | Strasbourg | £11.8 million |
| Kendry Páez | Independiente del Valle | £17.2 million |
| João Pedro | Brighton & Hove Albion | £55 million |
| Jamie Gittens | Borussia Dortmund | £48.5 million |
| Jorrel Hato | Ajax | £35.5 million |
| Estêvão | Palmeiras | £29 million |
| Alejandro Garnacho | Manchester United | £40 million |
| Ishé Samuels-Smith | Strasbourg | £6.5 million |
Chelsea’s winter window was, as has become customary in January, extremely quiet on the incomings front, with only Academy business taking place at St George’s Park level.
Transfers Out
As is always the case at Stamford Bridge these days, a substantial number of players moved on to make room in an already bloated squad. Here is a look at the players who left on a permanent basis, either in the summer or the winter window, along with their new club and the fee received where disclosed:
| Player | Sold To | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Marcus Bettinelli | Manchester City | £2.085 million |
| Kepa Arrizabalaga | Arsenal | £5 million |
| Lucas Bergström | Mallorca | Free Transfer |
| Bashir Humphreys | Burnley | £14 million |
| Mathis Amougou | Strasbourg | £12 million |
| Đorđe Petrović | Bournemouth | £25 million |
| Noni Madueke | Arsenal | £48.5 million |
| João Félix | Al-Nassr | £26.2 million |
| Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall | Everton | £25 million |
| Lesley Ugochukwu | Burnley | £23.2 million |
| Armando Broja | Burnley | £20 million |
| Renato Veiga | Villarreal | £26 million |
| Carney Chukwuemeka | Borussia Dortmund | £24 million |
| Alfie Gilchrist | West Bromwich Albion | £1.2 million |
| Christopher Nkunku | AC Milan | £32 million |
| Ben Chilwell | Strasbourg | Free Transfer |
| Raheem Sterling | Feyenoord | Free Transfer |
Alongside those permanent departures, Chelsea also sent a number of fringe players out on loan across England and Europe, including Nicolas Jackson to Bayern Munich and Aarón Anselmino to Borussia Dortmund, whilst several more academy graduates left for smaller clubs on free transfers or undisclosed fees.
2025-2026 Chelsea Squad
Here is the Chelsea squad for the 2025-2026 season, based on the club’s registered first-team players:
| Player | Number | Country | Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| Robert Sánchez | 1 | Spain | Goalkeeper |
| Marc Cucurella | 3 | Spain | Left-Back |
| Tosin Adarabioyo | 4 | England | Centre-Back |
| Benoît Badiashile | 5 | France | Centre-Back |
| Levi Colwill | 6 | England | Centre-Back |
| Pedro Neto | 7 | Portugal | Winger |
| Enzo Fernández | 8 | Argentina | Midfielder |
| Liam Delap | 9 | England | Forward |
| Cole Palmer | 10 | England | Forward |
| Jamie Gittens | 11 | England | Winger |
| Filip Jörgensen | 12 | Denmark | Goalkeeper |
| Dário Essugo | 14 | Portugal | Midfielder |
| Andrey Santos | 17 | Brazil | Midfielder |
| João Pedro | 20 | Brazil | Forward |
| Mamadou Sarr | 19 | France | Centre-Back |
| Jorrel Hato | 21 | Netherlands | Left-Back |
| Trevoh Chalobah | 23 | England | Centre-Back |
| Reece James | 24 | England | Right-Back |
| Moisés Caicedo | 25 | Ecuador | Midfielder |
| Teddy Sharman-Lowe | 28 | England | Goalkeeper |
| Malo Gusto | 27 | France | Right-Back |
| Wesley Fofana | 29 | France | Centre-Back |
| Josh Acheampong | 34 | England | Defender |
| Marc Guiu | 38 | Spain | Striker |
| Estêvão | 41 | Brazil | Winger |
| Roméo Lavia | 45 | Belgium | Midfielder |
| Reggie Walsh | 46 | England | Midfielder |
| Alejandro Garnacho | 49 | Argentina | Winger |
| Jesse Derry | 55 | England | Winger |
| Shumaira Mheuka | 62 | England | Striker |
| Gabriel Slonina | 44 | United States | Goalkeeper |
Kit & Sponsor
Chelsea’s 2025-2026 home kit, made once again by long-term supplier Nike, was one of the cleanest the club had produced in years when it debuted at the Club World Cup in the summer, with the shirt worn without any front-of-shirt sponsor at all. That uncluttered look didn’t last. After lifting the Club World Cup, a golden FIFA Champions badge was added to the chest, followed by a new sleeve sponsor in FPT, before the club finally confirmed IFS, styled as “IFS.ai” to promote the software firm’s Artificial Intelligence platform, as the new main shirt sponsor part-way through the season.
The away and third kits followed the same Nike template used across the club’s various strips. It has become normal for Chelsea to get through several away and goalkeeper designs within a single season, and 2025-2026 was no different.