LAUGHING OMID THE CROWD

Omid Djalili will entertain at this year's CPO Annual Lunch in November, and the comedian met chelseafc.com at the stadium where he learnt his trade.

Omid Djalili, self-proclaimed greatest British-Iranian comedian ever, actor extraordinaire and star of the Edinburgh festival and terrestrial television, is, most importantly of all, a life-long Blue.

Raised in a small flat in Kensington, son of an English mother and Iranian father, the west Londoner grew up a mere stones throw from our ancestral home, and considered himself a true Blue from the age of five.

A record breaker at the Edinburgh Festival's box office, with 16,500 tickets sold in one year, Djalili is a house-hold name in British comedy.

But the star of BBC One's Omid Djalili Show and several Hollywood blockbusters including Gladiator, The Mummy and Pirates of the Caribbean III believes he owes his comedic career path to one place, Stamford Bridge.

'The first laughs I ever had were here. Every time you go to Chelsea games, the wit of the fans is unparalleled,' explained Djalili.

'I know there is a chant that I have never heard anyone else but Chelsea fans sing.

'I was in the Shed End, and it was in the Chelsea-Sheffield Wednesday trilogy, and we all thought David Speedie had scored and we were cheering for about a minute.

'But then the goalkeeper got up with the ball and they carried on playing, and an immediate chant came up with everyone singing, 'we thought we had scored, we were wrong, we were wrong'.

'At the time I remember thinking that's very witty; and there is something naturally witty about Chelsea fans.

'There was a definite sense of humour around me as a Chelsea fan.

'I also saw an incident when a black Arsenal hooligan wanted to attack Chelsea fans and someone shouted "have you ever thought about joining the NF?" and he said yeah.

'So they asked if he had got anywhere and he said no, they asked why and he said "because I'm black" and everybody just laughed.

'The violence completely dissipated and everybody walked off.

'I remember thinking that we can live in peace, through humour, and that was probably the beginnings of me becoming a comedian.'

With such career credentials as Djalili's, anyone would expect his strangest stories to revolve around Hollywood actors, mad-cap comedy fans or from star-studded occasions.

But out of all the weird and wonderful things to have played a role in his life, there is one occasion that stands out, and for such a devoted fan, Chelsea was always going to be part of it.

'The strangest thing that has ever happened was Peter Bonetti throwing me off the pitch,' exclaimed the comedian.

'We won 3-0 against Oldham and we all thought we'd been promoted but we hadn't, so I ran onto the pitch and Peter Bonetti said 'Oi, you, get off' and threw me off.

'But I was so excited that Peter Bonetti had touched me, it was just really funny.'

After watching our FA Cup Final in 1970, the hilarious Blue went on to support Chelsea at the Bridge during the Seventies, until he was old enough to follow Chelsea around the country throughout the Eighties.

But, despite his background, the young fan was a stranger to racism, something the football era of those decades would soon alert him to.

'The time when I went the most games was when Paul Canoville made his debut in the Eighties, and I have read his autobiography as well.

'I was really shocked at the time, because you always heard things about racism, but I was the only non-white face that never got any trouble.

'But that was the time when I started to go to home and away games, when Chelsea were struggling.

'And I used to go by myself. A 10-year-old going by himself! I would see the most appalling things but I never felt in danger.'

Djalili will be regaling fans with more fantastic stories from his days as a fan when he hosts the CPO Annual Lunch on 28 November, and there are still some tickets left for the yearly event.

Hosted by Sky Sports' Matt Lorenzo, the ever-popular CPO Annual Lunch marks the beginning of Christmas at Chelsea with more than 50 past players in attendance, who will take part in Q & As and an auction of exclusive Chelsea memorabilia.