Author and Chelsea fan Stephen Rea recalls some of his favourite memories from the eight USA tours he has attended, including helping a former fans' favourite chase down a pair of thieves...

I had already been a Chelsea fan for three decades when I emigrated to America from the UK. Only six weeks after moving, the Blues played here for the first time in the modern era. I saw it as a divine intervention that I’d made the right decision.

I’ve seen eight tours in the 20 years since relocating from drizzly Belfast to baking New Orleans in 2004. All brought great times with supporters from around the country, some of whom were older expats, others who were newer Stateside converts to the Londoners.

I’ve spent a small fortune and flown thousands of miles crisscrossing the continent. But every dollar on my credit card, every predawn departure, every late-night redeye, was worth it.

I’ve seen us win, lose and draw. I’ve been to matches against MLS teams, and I’ve seen us take on football royalty like Paris St Germain and Inter Milan. I’ve hit gritty cities like Pittsburgh, attended contests stuffed with Hollywood razzamatazz in LA, travelled to the suburban heartlands of St Louis and Charlotte. I’ve watched us christen brand new state-of-the-art NFL stadiums in Dallas and Minneapolis before either the Cowboys or the Vikings even had a chance to play there.

I’ve been lucky enough to have a few special experiences as well. Such as meeting the legendary manager and captain from our first title-winning team in half a century.

In 2006, I was working with a semi-professional football club in Louisiana. I knew Dave Beasant, our former goalkeeper, from his time on the coaching staff of Northern Ireland, and his son Nick came over to play for the team.

Hurricane Katrina hit the previous year, a disaster that killed an estimated 1,400 people and caused billions of dollars’ worth of damage, and there was widespread sympathy for the region.

So Dave put me in touch with his old teammate and Chelsea assistant coach Steve Clark (now Scotland manager of course), and he arranged for us to meet some of the squad to present them with shirts from the New Orleans side.

We chatted with Jose Mourinho and stars of that all-conquering team, including captain John Terry, whom Nick knew as they had spent time together at Nottingham Forest.

Nine years later, I shared a car for six hours with Bobby Tambling, the striker who has scored more goals for our team than any player in history apart from Frank Lampard. I cadged a lift from North Carolina with him and his wife Val on our way to attend the match against Barcelona in Washington DC. He was an absolute joy to listen to, telling me stories about his playing career at the Bridge, and signing George Best in his managerial stint in the Republic of Ireland.

But neither of those are my most memorable moment from my time on tour with the Blues on this side of the Pond. That was the surreal experience of chasing robbers through the back alleys of an American city at 2am - alongside one of the heroes from our 1997 FA Cup-winning team.

The summer trip in 2012 was glorious, only two months after the fantastic night in Munich when we won the European Champions Cup for the first time. I skipped the game in Seattle but caught up with the party when I flew to New York City for the game at the iconic Yankee Stadium against Paris St Germain.

Back then, the Chelsea in America supporters group sponsored a couple of ex-players to come on tour. They paid their expenses and gave them a stipend, and in return, the former pros mingled with the fans, giving talks in each city, and hung out with fans in bars.

I was introduced to our former defender Frank Sinclair in Manhattan by a mutual friend. We got on great, and by the time we took the train to Pennsylvania for the match against the Major League Soccer All-Stars, we were best buds. I had a friend in Philly and she took the day off work to drive us around sightseeing.

The night after the contest we were sitting at a four-top in a downtown Irish bar in the wee small hours. Our friend had thrown his backpack underneath it and came back to grab something from it. He asked us if we had seen it - it had disappeared. Frank slapped the table and jumped up.

‘I know exactly what happened to it. There was a shifty-looking couple in here three minutes ago, they were poking around down there, then they jumped up and scarpered. They stole it.’ He grabbed me by the arm and pulled me up. ‘C’mon, let’s go! I saw which way they went.’

Frank sped outside with me stumbling and bumbling behind. We raced through a landscape from a film noir: dark alleyways, rotting rubbish, glimpses of flickering neon lights as steam billowed in our faces, our feet sliding along the slick concrete where restaurants had hosed down the cement at their backdoors.

We never saw the couple, but remarkably, we found the bag, discarded in an entryway. The cash and phone were gone, but our mate’s passport and everything else were still there. We retreated back to the pub, me clutching it like an ancient relic, staggering and puffing from the exertion. It is fair to say it is a night I will never forget.

In two decades of watching Chelsea in the States, it’s the relationships I’ve made with fellow supporters that mean the most. From the Pacific to the Atlantic, from the Mexican border to the Canadian frontier, I’ve made friends from every walk of life and myriad backgrounds, all of us united by our love for the Blues.

So go see us play this summer and make new mates in the pub. Who knows - one late night, you might find yourself running through a scary dark alley with the unlikeliest of companions…

Chelsea’s USA Tour 2024

Don't miss your chance to make your own unforgettable memories when Chelsea visit the USA this summer.