Today’s match against Aston Villa in Abu Dhabi is just our latest overseas friendly against an English side, coming just a few months after our last in Florida against Arsenal.

Although the Blues faced Southampton in a post-season match in Denmark after our inaugural league campaign in May 1906, matches abroad against our regular league foes were a rare occurrence in the 20th Century. The notable exceptions were a five-game series against Wolves in the Caribbean in 1964 and two post-season friendlies against Southampton in El Salvador and Trinidad in 1971.

Following those clashes against the Saints, more than three decades passed before we next faced English opponents abroad in the inaugural Premier League Asia Trophy in Malaysia in July 2003.

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Just a matter of weeks after Roman Abramovich had arrived as our new owner, we travelled to Kuala Lumpur for the pre-season tournament and secured our place in the final against Newcastle United by thumping hosts Malaysia 4-1.

Claudio Ranieri’s side dominated the final at the Bukit Jalil National Stadium but we were unable to find a way past Magpies goalkeeper Shay Given with the game ending goalless and going to a penalty shoot-out.

Experienced spot-kick takers Alan Shearer and Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink surprisingly missed their attempts as the shoot-out went seven rounds before Jermaine Jenas attempted a cheeky Panenka chip which flew over the crossbar and handed the trophy to the Blues.

Given was again in goal for our opponents when we made our next appearance in the competition in 2011. However, after preventing the Blues from scoring eight years earlier, the new Aston Villa goalkeeper was beaten after only 34 seconds in the final at the Hong Kong Stadium as Josh McEachran tucked the ball away at the third attempt after Given had done well to deny Nicolas Anelka and Florent Malouda.

Fernando Torres added a second shortly after his Introduction as a substitute early in the second half as he deflected in Malouda’s scuffed attempt to seal a 2-0 win as we won the pre-season tournament for a second time.

Following our gruelling 69-game campaign in 2012/13, the Blues had to summon up a bit more energy for a couple of friendlies in the United States against Manchester City.

However, the tremendous exertion which had gone into securing a top-three finish in the Premier League and a dramatic late victory over Benfica in the Europa League final finally appeared to catch up with the Blues as we were beaten 4-3 in St Louis and 5-3 in New York by our Premier League rivals.

In the build-up to the 2016/17 season, Chelsea travelled to the west coast of the United States for a pre-season showdown against Liverpool at the Rose Bowl, the venue for the 1994 World Cup final.

It proved to be a tight affair which was settled by an early goal by Gary Cahill who headed in Victor Moses’ corner after 10 minutes. Although the Blues had to play the final 20 minutes with 10 players after Cesc Fabregas was shown a red card, we held on for a 1-0 win which would prove a good omen as we went on to regain the Premier League title under Antonio Conte.

Prior to this weekend’s match against Villa, our last three overseas friendlies against England opponents have been against Arsenal.

The Gunners may have got the better of us in Orlando in July and rescued a 1-1 draw in Dublin in 2018 but we did enjoy a resounding win against them in Beijing in 2017 when an opening strike by Willian and two goals by Michy Batshuayi delivered a resounding 3-0 victory in the Chinese capital.