Morning all.
Five Premier League titles, two Champions League trophies, five FA Cups, three League Cups and two Europa League Cups. That’s what Roman Abramovich and his vast amounts of money have bought during his twenty years as Chelsea owner. Managers have come and gone, 13 of them to be precise, as have many multi million pound players – over £2bn worth according to reports but I’m sure the club’s fans have loved every minute of his reign.
Chelsea’s women’s team have done well too since the Russian oligarch took ownership of the club as they’ve reeled in the trophies – four Women’s Super League titles and three Women’s FA Cup trophies.
What would happen to Chelsea if he sold up, has been a question posed on here more than once over the last twelve years. Well, we’ll soon find out. I say soon, but I suspect it’ll be a while before someone pays the amount Abramovich is selling Chelsea for.
Abramovich changed English football and not for the better in my opinion. His arrival kicked off an influx of foreign ownership of our clubs and the FA/Premier League let it happen.
Manchester City – owned by Sheikh Mansour, the half-brother of the Sheikh Khalifa, ruler of the United Arab Emirates. Human rights? I don’t think so. LGBGT+? You’re having a laugh!
The consortium who now own Newcastle Utd is, according to Wikipedia, made up of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, RB Sports & Media and PCP Capital Partners. Need I say more?
Arsenal, along with Burnley, Liverpool and Manchester United are all American owned. Aston Villa are 50% American owned (the other half being Egyptian) and West Ham 10% (English majority).
Other Premier League clubs under foreign ownership are: Everton (Iranian), Southampton and Wolves (Chinese), Leicester (Thai), Watford and Leeds (Italian) and others.
Do football fans care who owns their club though as long as that owner brings success to the club? I can’t answer that because as far as our own owner goes, Stan Kroenke hasn’t brought much success since he invested in Arsenal FC. Admittedly, he’s only become sole owner in recent years but in comparison to those mentioned previously, he’s a right old Scrooge. Last summer hinted at change as far as spending money goes but Arsenal as a club will never spend money as freely, perhaps even recklessly, as the likes of City, Chelsea and Utd have. Or Newcastle are likely to in the future.
I’ll hold my hands up and admit that during the ownership battle between Stan Kroenke and Alisher Usmanov, I hoped the latter would win, but I was wrong and I’m so glad that he didn’t. At the time though, anyone seemed better than KSE Holdings. Even now I often wish Arsenal FC was owned by someone with more ambition, someone who employs the best to make the club one of the best. But, would I, you, want that owner to be someone, or a group whose own country has very different rules/laws to those here in England? No, it’s not for me.
As for Chelsea, unless they have a takeover similar to that at Man City and Newcastle Utd, finding another owner who’ll invest as much as Abramovich has over the years will be tough I’d have thought and it’d be good for English football if they can’t, and don’t.
See you in the comments.
Cheers for that Rico, apparently Abramovitch doesn’t want any of his recent loans to Chelsea repaid, if true then that’s great for them, it would be like KSE writing off our recent lossses of £107m.
Therefore once a new buyer pays the asking price Roman asks Chelsea will be ready to continue as they currently are as one of the dominant clubs in England and Europe.
Of course the new owners might not be so free with the financial doping and therefore we could see Chelsea slide for their current perch as reality bites? Balancing the books would be a new item for the Board, a Board that has done a good job up till now, but how many of them will survive the change even if they want to stay?
It’s going to be fascinating watching how the Chavs adapt to the world of ‘you can only spend what you earn’ which is inhabited by everyone else except Man City and Newcastle.
I’m not laughing too much, too soon because Arsenal could learn a few lessons from the Chavs in terms of business, as a club Arsenal still don’t generate the funds they should from sponsorships considering the size of the club and it footprint across the world.
Then there is the money Chelsea generate from their transfer business and the many players they have out on loan, quality players who increase in value as opposed to our who seem to bleed value.
Chelsea poached a few of the best people Arsenal had running its academy, to their benefit and our detriment and that’s when we were strong, maybe we can reverse that trend?
A changing of the guard in London perhaps?
Much depends on who he sells to and whether there are wholesale changes in boardroom personnel
Hopefully if this is an escape act the authorities will subject the deal to great scutiny to prevent jumping from the frying pan so to speak..
It may bring them back to earth but as the door opens in London it slams shut in Newcastle . Efectively moving the deckchairs.
Or maybe this is Chelsea’s David Dein moment?
Morning Rico and all
It’s not only Chelsea, according to reports in Australia Usmanov may have to cancel his major sponsorship of 2 epl stadiums I believe one of them is Everton but not sure who the other club is
Morning all.
I’m not laughing either, not just yet but what I do hope is that the off field stuff has an impact on the team and we chase down third.
Good day all.
Geoff Everton have pre-empted any action likely to be taken against Usmanov, they have unilaterally “suspended” all sponsorship deals with him. I understand that they had an agreement in place for a £30 million naming rights deal for their new stadium. It now seems likely that construction may be delayed for a while.
Rumours abound that Arsenal are preparing a bid to sign Robert Lewandowski, this summer, as his Bayern Munich contract nears it’s end.
Israeli citizen Roman Abramovich is hurriedly making desperate efforts to white-wash his reputation and hide his friendship and collaboration with the Russian war criminal Vladimir Putin. Selling Chelsea FC will ensure that his financial losses should the authorities sanction him and seize his assets.
…his financial losses will be reduced should…
That’d be a risky move Cicero. I’d rather M’bappe, he’s free too. 😂
Perhaps both Rico. 😁
Hasn’t Lewandoski been mentioned the last few transfer season and always turned us down
He would be 34 when he joined us , Having just shot Auba out , do we really want to go down that street again ?
I hope the days of signing old has beens are over Cicero.
No Potter, absolutely not.
I was in no way advocating the signing of Lewandowski, merely repeating a rumour.
There is no way Arsenal could afford to sign M’bappe and I doubt he would be interested in joining us anyway.
R.I.P Shane Warne.
Terrible news.
Awful news.
Never liked the look of either Kroenke or Usmanov. Looks like we dodged a bullet with Usmanov.
Have to question David Dein’s judgement inviting Kroenke in and selling some shares to him then selling the rest to Usmanov. If he really had the good intentions of the Club in mind he would not have gone near these two. His real motivation was the tens of millions he made from the Club. Custodian of the Club, my ar$e.
There’s no reason why a Club of Arsenal’s size can’t exist and compete without an Oligarch or a Billionaire owner.
First Rodney Marsh and now Shane Warne , Australian cricket must be in mourning .RIP to the two of them .
No doubt Roman is getting out as quick as possible and will take the lion’s share with him . His comments are somewhat open ended about where the nett proceeds will go .Quote :- ‘The foundation will be for the benefit of all victims of the war in Ukraine. unquote . This doesn’t specify which side the money will go to. and does the word “”all”” imply it will be split both ways ????
I never was particularly in favour of Kroenke but always felt that Usmanov was best kept at arms length although for a few years his presence kept Kroenke at bay he had his uses.
But billionaires don’t stay as minority partners they want the lot and he didn’t get it and he headed up tio Everton with his mate Moshiri.
Maybe the wind will change at Chelsea and maybe they will fall back into the pack but it still wont clear the Arab influence so the fight logically will only move to third if the Toon gets it’s act together.
I look forward to a return to the days of ‘Save the Bridge’ at Chelsea.
I remember Dickie Attenborough and Seb Coe being rolled out to get fans to throw money into a bucket to try to pay off the debts that had been run up building the east stand. Parts of the terracing were fenced off with bushes growing on them; the ‘shed’ stand was an old corrugated garage roof; the stands were 50 yards from the pitch. What a toilet that ground was.
I repeat my earlier sentiment: Horrible club and a Horrible set of fans. Deserve everything that comes their way.
Don’t forget the dog track and the invalid cars
RIP Warnie, you legend… Such terribly sad news.
The best pace bowler I ever saw was Michael Holding, the best bowler I ever saw overall was Shane Warne.
Hi All
A couple of sad days for Aussie cricket fans, both taken far too young, may they rest in peace.
Story in Australian news paper is that a Turkish billion air is very close to buying Chelsea and that Newcastle are going to sell at least 6 / 7 players as they start to rebuild.
Morning all.
Holding was brilliant Kev, Garner too. Bishop wasn’t bad either. 😂
Imo, there’ll never be a spinner who’ll be as good as Warnie, he was a freak of nature.
New post up now