Chelsea Owner,Roman Abramovich has been placed on Sanction as one of the steps in the EU’s support of the Ukranian People It was announced on March 10. The sanction was issued with an asset freeze and travel ban. This is an unprecedented period for the football club as the running of the club becomes directly linked to geopolitics. The sanction casts a shadow over Chelsea’s many commercial agreements including itd $52.5 and it’s $72m kit deal with Nike according to Globaldata analysis Company’s head of Sport,Conrad Windek. While Chelsea has a sporting License to keep trading as a soccer club,many brands will beware of guilt by association despite Chelsea being one of the biggest club in the world whose on-field success still makes it an attractive commercial partner.
It is currently not clear when the sanction will be lifted especially since it relates directly to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s activity and the invasions of Ukraine.Santions will be reviewed in May but there are further risks of a nine-point deduction should Chelsea go into administration.
Chelsea have also withdrawn their request to play Saturday’s FA cup quarter final against Middleborough behind closed doors after wide spread criticism. The reason for their request to play the match behind closed doors is because they only sold 650 tickets out of their initial allocation of 4,620 for the game at Riverside leaving them at a sporting disadvantage. However sports Minister, Nigel Huddlestone gave evidence that the department of Media, Culture and sport select committee that the government may ammend it’s license to allow Chelsea sell tickets so long as Abramovich does not profit from it. The Premier league side handed them a temporary license to operate till May 31, 2022 but the license has severe restrictions and this means the club cannot generate any revenue from March tickets,club Merchandise and cannot offer new contracts to players or buy and sell Players hence Chelsea now operates on a resricted License.The UK government is willing to grant Chelsea a new operating License if a new buyer is found under the condition that Roman Abramovich does not receive a single penny from the sale of the club. This is a wake up call for football to see the need for an independent regulator to come in to oversee the sale of clubs in future.
Who is in the running to buy Chelsea?
The Raine Group who handles the sale of chelsea previously stated that over 200 enquiries have been made to buy the club. There is no shortage of interest from those trying to secure the future of They have asked for all bids to be tabled by Friday,March 18. Some of the promising bidders are listed below:
1) Saudi Arabian consortium has reportedly made a bid of $3 .5 billion for Chelsea.Report has it that Mohammed Alkhereiji is leading the bid which is not linked to the Saudi Arabian government. He is the chairman of Saudi Telecom company(STC).
2)London based luxury property developer and Chelsea supporter Nick candy is putting together a consortium to buy the club.
3)Todd Boehly,Hangjorg Wyss and Jonathan Goldstein form a Consortim which has made an offer in the region of £2 billion. LA Dodgers part owner, Boehly tried to buy Chelsea in a £2.2 billion deal 3 years ago with Jonathan Goldstein.
4) Philadelphian, Josh Harris who already owns a minority stake in crystal palace which he would need to sell if he buys Chelsea.
5) Former British Airways and Liverpool Chairman,Martin Broughton is in talks about forming a consortium to buy the club.