Manager: A quiet, shy and unknown character by the name of Jose 'The Special One' Mourinho.
Last season: Third
Major signings: Cesc Fabregas (£30m, Barcelona), Diego Costa (£32m, Atletico Madrid), Mario Pasalic (undisclosed, Hajduk Split), Filipe Luís (undisclosed, Atletico Madrid), Didier Drogba (free, Galatasaray)
Players out: Tomás Kalas (Koln, loan), David Luiz (£50m, PSG), Wallace (loan, Vitesse Arnhem), Sam Hutchinson (free, Sheffield Wednesday),Samuel Eto'o, Hilario, Milan Lalkovic, Adam Nditi, Daniel Pappoe, Jhon Pirez (released), Thorgan Hazard (loan, Borussia Monchengladbach), Ashley Cole (free, Roma), Bertrand Traore (loan, Vitesse), Demba Ba (£4.7m, Besiktas), Frank Lampard (free, New York City FC)
Expectations? Extremely high, this is Roman Abramovich that we are talking about after all. Failure to win a major trophy this season and the billionaire might be thinking about dusting off that managerial guillotine he loves so much.
It's time for the little horses to leave the paddock and win the Grand National. The usually brash Mourinho went out of his way during his first season back at the Bridge to play down his sides chance of winning the title. He won't be able to do that this season.
Last year was a peculiar one for the Blues because they were totally dominant against the big sides but unconvincing against the so called 'smaller' ones.
In their matches against Liverpool, Man Utd and Man City they won 4, drew 2 and lost none.
Their problem was that they threw away some vital points against poorer teams, losing to Newcastle, Stoke and drawing with West Brom.
All of these results occurred before the January signing of their midfield monster, Nemanja Matic, whose impact on the team cannot be underestimated.
Previous Chelsea teams could rely on the vast experience in their ranks to see out games but this side dropped points to Aston Villa, Crystal Palace, Sunderland and Norwich in the title run-in which showed us that they were probably just a year short of peaking.
This shouldn't be the case now, especially since they have a striker who Mourinho obviously rates.
A large part of Chelsea's inability to win games last year was due to their their obvious lack of a world class striker. Between Eto'o, Torres and Ba they only managed 19 league goals in the whole season. Compare this to Eden Hazard, their top scorer domestically with 14.
Diego Costa has all the attributes to excel in England and it's easy to see why Mourinho has stumped up the cash to bring him from Atletico Madrid.
The Spanish striker's power and ability to fight/bully defenders will win him admirers amongst Chelsea fans but JOE wonders if he has the technical nous to link up with Hazard et all.
Also as Atletico fans will know, Costa has really only had one fully prolific season in Spain.
Costa faces competition though from the returning King of the Bridge. Didier Drogba's last kick as a Chelsea player won them the Champions League and he should provide adequate cover.
You will have noticed that JOE doesn't even mention Fernando Torres as a realistic first team starter.
The fact that Chelsea used brilliant negotiation tactics, magic or chloroform to persuade PSG to sign David Luiz for £50m has meant that they have had some money to spend and Jose has done so perfectly.
Ashley Cole was a great servant but Filipe Luis offers a steady, solid and deceptively good attacking replacement while their key arrival, Cesc Fabregas, already knows the ins and outs of the Premier League.
This team looks absolutely formidable: Courtois, Azpilicueta , Ivanovic, Cahill, Filipe, Matic, Fabregas, Willian, Hazard, Schürrle, Costa.
Ominously for the rest of the Premier League, Mourinho's teams always peak in their 2nd season. At Porto he won the Champions League and domestic league, Chelsea the league, Inter Milan the treble and at Real Madrid he managed to wrestle La Liga away from Barcelona.
Irish angle… The Ivory Coast flag is the Irish one in reverse so we can claim Didier Drogba as our own whenever he does something backwards, mad or odd.
If they were a fictional character... they'd be Mr Burns. A football empire that is bankrolled by a billionaire but despite their colossal riches they will never be universally liked. Chelsea don't care though because like Mr Burns they would rather be feared.
Where will they end up? If anyone finishes above Chelsea then they'll win the league.
