You don't get a nickname like 'Chopper' without either being a literally enormous success with the ladies or a footballer from the days when 'right nutter' was something to put at the top of your CV. While we can't be sure about the first part, Ron Harris is one of the all-time great figures in Blues history and a notoriously uncompromising defender at a time when players were so hard they were probably expected to run off a broken leg and kidney failure after a quick brush with the magic sponge. Harris turned out almost 800 times for Chelsea, sticking with the club through thick and thin and succeeding Terry Venables as club captain in 1967. Unlike many hard men of the time, Harris was actually a hugely accomplished defender and a fantastic leader. He saw Chelsea through the infamously aggressive 1970 FA Cup final to claim victory in extra-time over Leeds and two years later, captained the club to its first major European trophy, the 1972 Cup Winners Cup. Now a frisky 69 years old, he mostly makes his living as an after-dinner speaker and pundit for Chelsea TV. Despite never holding back in the challenge, he's by all accounts a lovely man and someone who perhaps doesn't get as much credit as he should for being one of the most important players in the club's history. That said, anyone with that nickname after playing English football in the '60s and '70s is an absolute must for inclusion on a list like this.
28-year old English writer with a borderline obsessive passion for films, videogames, Chelsea FC, incomprehensible words and indefensible puns. Follow me on Twitter if you like infrequent outbursts of absolute drivel.
