4. Who Has The Most Experience
Benfica go into tonight's final having played exactly twice as many European games as Chelsea, with 362 European appearances to the Blues' 181. The Portuguese outfit will also be taking part in their ninth major European final, but are on a run of six straight European final defeats since lifting the European Cup in 1962. Chelsea are relative newcomers to European football and aside from their Champions League triumph last May, their only experience has come by way of finishing runners up twice in the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup in 197071 and again in 199798, before winning the UEFA Super Cup later that year. But the Blues are no strangers when it comes to reaching the final of European competition and their win on penalties last year over Bayern Munich in Germany helped secure their first ever Champions League title, something they can definitely build on tonight by becoming the first team to win UEFAs top-two club competitions in reverse order in successive campaigns. Benfica have shown themselves up as serial bottlers by blowing their chances at glory in six successive European finals and maybe the pressure of the occasion will get to them again tonight.
Joseph Dempsey
Contributor
Joseph is an accredited football journalist and has interviewed nearly all of the current 20 Barclay's Premier League managers. He is also a correspondent for Bleacher Report and has written for Caught Offside and Give Me Football.
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