“Chelsea are firmly in the title race despite what their manager says,” wrote Will Nichols before Christmas. “But who was the last team to win the English top flight without a shirt sponsor? Has it been done more recently in another country?”
Chelsea’s conscious uncoupling from the title race doesn’t change the fact that this is a cracking question. Let’s start with the English top flight. Knowledge regular Dirk Maas has trawled the brilliant True Colours website – which, if you are the type of person who reads this column, is likely to be an endless source of serotonin – to find the answer: Aston Villa in 1980-81. Not content with using only 14 players (if you’re under the age of about 40, let that sink in) all season, they didn’t have a shirt sponsor either.
