Has to be North London Derby for me, as I am a Gunner, but Arsenal vs Man Utd comes really close. Lately our games with Man City is something that I cannot wait for as well. Which ones would be your favourites?
nld
Ebbsfleet Utd v Dartford Town
Proper naughty
Oldest domestic rivalry in the world Wolves - West Brom
Is this true
Yh
Ain’t the Sheffield / nottingham clubs older ?
Depending on the specific club yes, But they don’t have a rivalry.
Notts county oldest club in world football, Nottingham forest established before wolves. Surely this is older?
Arsenal v Spurs is the only local rivalry where both teams have been mostly evenly matched for the past decade or so. The other big local rivalries in England are actually pretty one-sided now. Liverpool v Everton is always a win for Liverpool. Man Utd v Man City is skewed to Man City. West Ham have been too inconsistent for the past decade to be considered a major rival of any of the London teams. Chelsea v Spurs and Chelsea v Arsenal are big games but from what I’ve seen, people aren’t really bothered about Chelsea because they are mostly seen as an artificially propped up team (rightly or wrongly).
I think the biggest games of the calendar are still Man Utd v Liverpool and Arsenal v Man Utd. Those games still have a lot of needle in them irrespective of form and league position.
Thanks. As a Brentford fan I was fearing you’d call Brentford v Fulham close but of course it’s pretty one sided with Fulham getting battered everywhere they go.
As a west ham fan yes we are inconsistent overall but if we look at the past all games starting from 19/20 season for west ham v Chelsea, spurs, and arsenal:
West Ham v Chelsea:
West ham 4 wins, Chelsea 4 wins 1 draw
West Ham v arsenal:
West Ham 1 win, arsenal 6 wins 2 draws
West Ham v Spurs:
West ham
West ham 2 wins, Spurs 4 wins 2 draws
Yes we (West ham) don’t have an overall winning record agasint any of these teams but I think it shows we cannot be ignored for these London derbies. They are usually pretty close matches with very few 3-0 sort of wins.
There will always be tension when we play these three teams. Never use to with arsenal was more friendly but since the whole rice saga it’s become a bit more spicy.
Well said ⚒️⚒️⚒️
Who would you guys generally say it’s ranked in order of hatred? Millwall,then?
Yes Millwall traditionally but its weird. If we were to play them tomorrow yes there would be alot of hype about the game, the history, the violence etc. And there probably would be some violence.
Men who in their youth got up to no good and want one more scrap. Or now there are some younger “hooligans” who would want to start something because they’ve heard about the history etc etc.
But normal fans, fans who go to the game for the sport, and fans like me 1000s of miles away who get up at 4:30am to watch them I don’t think we’d be THAT bothered. We don’t really have that recent history or recent knowledge about the weight of the rivalry. Yes it would be cool to see that match and we’d know about the bad blood but that’s about it.
Where as with Chelsea and spurs because we play each other, at minimum, twice a year there is alot of recent history, story lines, great wins, close losses etc that all add to the importance of the game and the desire to win. Plus we interact with those fan bases more whether in person or via social media that adds that layer of competition.
TLDR: Millwall historically our biggest rival but if you asked many west ham fans my age (28) or younger if they’d rather beat millwall in a cup competition or spurs/Chelsea I think most would pick spurs/Chelsea bc millwall are kinda irrelevant to us in the past 20 years.
As a Liverpool fan, ignoring the ones involving us, I used to live the Newcastle Sunderland ones. Always seemed to have drama and upsets and proper old school niggles between the players.
That said even if it ever came back it wouldn’t be the same with Newcastle now mega rich…
Even when Newcastle were decent(ish) in the 2010s, Sunderland would always turn up and win more often than not. Quality derby
Yep the likes of Borini taking a week off being bang average to run them ragged. Always seemed like, for a neutral, your surest bet for a good watch.
But yeah Saudi play toy means those days will never return.
Everton fans vs Everton players
Real derby vibes shit.
Or more recently, Everton players vs Everton managers.
Chelsea vs Tottenham ( the animosity is unreal lol )
Liverpool v City is exciting for me. Outside the prem though i love the Rangers v Celtics days
Is Liverpool and city actually considered a derby? Haven’t really heard that before
Cardiff v Swansea
As a city fan, I gotta go with the Manchester derby
Merseyside Derby.
Burnley v Bastards
North London Derby for my own bias, but a fascinating one is Portsmouth vs Southampton
no one said Millwall West Ham?
As a Chelsea fan obviously our London derbys especially Tottenham, but I also love our rivalry with Liverpool, especially two years ago where we played them 4 times in a season and all the games were close, and historically watching Lampard Vs Gerrard, Drogba Vs Carragher/Kuyt, and Terry Vs Torres was a brilliant show. The other fixture I love is when we play Barcelona, it historically has multiple times been a critical match for us in Europe and always seemed the draw that was unbeatable and a death sentence in the knockout stages but I loved them nonetheless (especially 2012).