Pubs stayed open late to celebrate VE Day, and Chelsea fans flowed out of Stamford Bridge to mark their straightforward progress into the Conference League final.
However, young Reggie Walsh couldn`t join them. At just 16 years and 200 days old, the midfielder was too young to be served alcohol.
But the Year 11 schoolboy was already excited enough simply by becoming Chelsea`s youngest starter in almost 60 years last night. He didn`t need a drink to feel light-headed.
Walsh`s appearance in the starting lineup for a European semi-final was a surprise, given he only made his debut for the club`s Under 18s this football season.
It`s also exam season, and most boys Walsh`s age would be busy revising or worrying about sitting silently in a test hall for their GCSEs.
Chelsea`s newest academy prospect was likely more worried about a misplaced pass or finding the big night challenging.
Fortunately, his more experienced teammates took care of business, with Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall scoring seven minutes before halftime, further worsening the situation for the poor Swedish side.
Chelsea is now heading to Wroclaw, a picturesque part of Poland, aiming to make history by becoming the first team to win all current UEFA trophies: Champions League, Europa League, Super Cup, and Conference League.
The Butcher’s Hook pub opposite the ground where Chelsea was founded 120 years ago was permitted to stay open until 1 AM to commemorate a different victory in Europe from 1945.
Walsh is unlikely to play in the final on May 28, but he is considered an intelligent and composed character on the ball. He has already represented England at various youth levels.
It`s a credit to Chelsea that you don`t need to be physically imposing to get your chance, with Billy Gilmour being a prime example of this.
Walsh became the youngest player to feature for the first team since Ian ‘Chico’ Hamilton in 1967 when he came off the bench in the first leg in Sweden last week.
With this tie effectively over due to manager Enzo Maresca`s team holding a comfortable 4-1 lead going into the second leg against truly poor opposition, it was a chance to relax and take Chelsea`s well-known youth policy to a new, even younger level.
Maresca has managed the youngest squad in the Premier League this season, with an average age of just 23 and a half years old.
That average age seems positively old compared to young rookie Walsh.
The evening had a strange feel to it. Despite being one game away from a final in a competition Chelsea has never won, the substitute bench was much stronger than the starting eleven.
In addition to Walsh in midfield, 19-year-old Josh Acheampong was also included in the heavily rotated lineup.
It wasn`t that Maresca disrespected the tournament, but rather that the level of competition Chelsea has faced in this third-tier competition has been, at best, like England`s League One, and at worst, non-League quality.
It`s arguable that despite the loud support from the Swedish fans who filled parts of Stamford Bridge, their team was one of the weakest to reach the semi-finals.
So much so, that Marc Cucurella was the only player who started last night`s game having also started against the new Premier League champions, Liverpool, at the weekend.
What a contrast a few days can make in football.
Maresca was clearly convinced that the tie was won and had his mind on more pressing matters.
That priority is securing Champions League qualification for next season so they can leave behind less prestigious European competitions like this.
An upcoming trip to fourth-placed Newcastle on Sunday, with both teams level on points, presents a far tougher challenge than last night`s routine progression, even though it led to a final.
Chelsea`s main players were kept in reserve on the bench to keep them fresh.
Cole Palmer, Enzo Fernandez, newly crowned Player of the Year Moises Caicedo, and Nicolas Jackson were all watching and ready to come on if needed.
At halftime, Maresca brought on forward Shumaira Mheuka, who had been Chelsea`s youngest starter until recently, having played in Copenhagen in the round of 16.
Still only 17, he held that record for barely two months until Walsh took it from him. Chelsea are truly boys in blue in every sense.
