Chelsea pay tribute to Terry Venables with their matchday programme for Brighton clash following the death of their former player aged 80 last weekend

Chelsea have paid tribute to their former player Terry Venables in their matchday programme for Sunday's game at home to Brighton.

Venables, who started his playing career at Chelsea, died last weekend at the age of 80.

After joining Chelsea as a youth player in 1958, Venables went on to play over 200 senior games for the Blues and scored 31 goals.

He won the League Cup with Chelsea in 1965 and also helped the club to earn promotion to the top tier of English football.

Chelsea included a picture of Venables on the cover of their matchday programme and reflected on the contribution that he made to the club.

As reported by the club's official website, Dominic Bliss wrote: ‘Before El Tel, before the Three Lions, before any of the above, he was Venners and he was the jewel in the crown of a Chelsea youth setup that produced a generation of household names. This was his first footballing home, and he never forgot it.’

Chelsea also re-published an interview with Venables in which he spoke fondly of him time at Stamford Bridge and revealed that he didn't want to leave.

Venables said: ‘I didn’t want to leave Chelsea, I would have been happy to stay there always because of the closeness of the players.

'We all got on so great then, it was wonderful. There was hardly ever a bad word said between us and the players were very close. I think we all would have liked to have gone on and on, but that wasn’t to be as is often the case, and things had to change. But I’ve got wonderful memories, I would think that my best memory of football was playing at Chelsea.’ 

Venables departed for Tottenham in 1966 and also went on to play for QPR and Crystal Palace, while he earned two caps for England.

During a lengthy and varied managerial career Venables had spells in charge of England, Barcelona and Tottenham. 

Tributes were paid to Venables last weekend following his death.

Tottenham and Aston Villa players wore black armbands, with a minute's applause taking place at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium prior to kick off. 

Tottenham fans also sang Venables' his name during the applause s a picture of him at Spurs was displayed on the big screen inside the stadium.

In a statement, Tottenham said: 'The Club is extremely saddened to learn of the passing of former player and manager Terry Venables.

'Our deepest condolences are with Terry's friends and family at this incredibly difficult time.'

Spanish newspapers also paid tribute to Venables, who won LaLiga with Barcelona in 1985.

Mundo Deportivo and Sport printed large pictures of Venables on their back pages for their Monday editions with both captioning the pictures: 'Adios, mister'.

The images depicted him during his time in management with Barcelona, with Venables joining Barcelona in 1984, before leaving the Spanish giants to manage Tottenham in 1987.