London, May 23 (ANI): Statistics have revealed that the Chelsea team of the 2005-06 season is the best ever team in English football, answering the long running debate in pubs throughout the world about which is the best football team of all time.

Statistician Ian McHale at the University of Salford, UK said that the whole point of sport is to work out who the best is and the most natural question likely to be asked is who has been the best football team of all time.

The statistician created a statistical model of team strengths along with his colleague Rose Baker and used it to analyze goal data from 2,00,000 matches in England and Wales that occurred between 1888, when the Football League was founded and 2012, the New Scientist reported.

Each team in the model scores goals at a rate that is determined by its attack ability divided by the opposite team's defensive skills, with an extra boost for the home team to model home advantage.

McHale and Baker reportedly worked out the most likely outcome of any English football match played over the duration spanning 124 years and used the results to calculate the all-time greatest team and came to the conclusion that the team is Chelsea.

Chelsea team of the 2005-06 topped the stats, followed by Manchester United team of 2007-08 and Arsenal's 2003-04 squad of 'invincibles', which was unbeaten in the league, the report added. (ANI)

Bro do you got any link where that model is? Would like to read about it more :)

Sadly, the only way to read the full report is to buy it. If you can buy it online, here is the link:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/rssa.12060/abstract

For me, it's 2003-2004 Arsenal.

IMO the best Chelsea team was the 09-10 under Ancelotti. Beating United, Arsenal and Liverpool both home and away was no easy feat but they managed to get it done. The 07-08 United team has to be the best PL of all time though. The trio of Rooney, Tevez and C. Ronaldo along with Vidic and Ferdinand in their prime that led to European glory and subsequent European final the next year is the proof. Statistics is all about input and output. Just taking into account defense and attack, like this study did, is too reductionist IMO.

guys guys, come on now. We all know there is only one team that ever won a golden premier league trophy. The invincible arsenal team is the best english team ever. 49 league games unbeaten.

^yes, that was a fantastic team and many have different opinions on what was the best English team ever. But statistically speaking, Chelsea's team of 2005-06 is the best team and would be the favorite against any other English team ever.