Chelsea 2021-22 - Reigning Champions of Europe, and the World!

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Sunny von Bulow
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Jan 10, 2004
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The 718
But seriously, to avoid the one liner- TT has shown to be a top defensive coach, and having such quality attacking fullbacks is awesome, but Chelsea’s attack is less than the sum of its very expensive and talented parts imo. It’s not fair to pigeonhole Lukaku as a classic 9 who only gets on the end of things, but he needs a steady supply. I just don’t know if Chelsea’s midfield is set up to give him that- because i don’t know generally how Chelsea’s attacking mids and forwards set up to best effect. Maybe I don’t watch enough of them to know, but it’s not like watching LFC where it’s clear how the pieces fit together.
 

HowBoutDemSox

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Statement from Abramovich:
During my nearly 20-year ownership of Chelsea FC, I have always viewed my role as a custodian of the Club, whose job it is ensuring that we are as successful as we can be today, as well as build for the future, while also playing a positive role in our communities. I have always taken decisions with the Club’s best interest at heart. I remain committed to these values. That is why I am today giving trustees of Chelsea’s charitable Foundation the stewardship and care of Chelsea FC.

I believe that currently they are in the best position to look after the interests of the Club, players, staff, and fans.
https://www.chelseafc.com/en/news/2022/02/26/statement-from-club-owner-roman-abramovich
 

Ale Xander

Hamilton
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Oct 31, 2013
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Does the Chelsea Charitable Foundation have the same structure as the Red Sox Foundation (Tom Werner and Linda Pizzuti Henry on the BOD)?
 

Philip Jeff Frye

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Oct 23, 2001
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Even if he agreed to sell today, it would still be several months before the sale closed, wouldn't it? You don't just sell a multi billion dollar asset in an afternoon. Kind of hard to see how he avoids the UK government if it decides it wants to punish him.
 

nayrbrey

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Jul 20, 2005
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Even if he agreed to sell today, it would still be several months before the sale closed, wouldn't it? You don't just sell a multi billion dollar asset in an afternoon. Kind of hard to see how he avoids the UK government if it decides it wants to punish him.
Right, the whole approval process is lengthy, and the UK will probably act on Roman given the various sales.
IIRC the FA took several months to ok the purchase of the Magpies by the Saudis.
 

67YAZ

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Possibly, but if Roman is looking to leave and, even better, sell to an English owner to satisfy the nationalist/nativist crowd, things will move smoothly.
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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Everything really depends on what kind of pressure is being exerted on Abramovitch behind the scenes.

All we really know is that (a) he was not put on the list of sanctioned oligarchs by the UK or EU and (b) there are stories about other parties bidding.

For me, there are two most plausible scenarios. The first is that he made some kind of quiet deal with the UK government by which he would agree to sell the club if the government held off on sanctioning him. This would make some sense if the sanctions would impede a sale or draw it out.

As a cynic, however, I feel the more likely scenario is that he is not on the sanctioned list precisely because he has sportwashed his reputation and spread his money so far in London. As such, he is floating the idea of selling the club largely as a PR move to deflect public calls for him to be sanctioned. My guess is that Abramovitch just wants to buy time until perhaps there is a peace deal in the Ukraine that involves an easing of sanctions on Putin-linked individuals, which will then allow him to go back to running the club as he did beforehand.

I hope I'm wrong as getting this fuckwad out of the sport would be an unalloyed good.
 

Time to Mo Vaughn

RIP Dernell
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Mar 24, 2008
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I'm willing to buy them for 5B pounds. Just sign over the club, Roman, and I'll have a transfer over to you shortly via SWIFT.
 

coremiller

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Jul 14, 2005
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Roman, my offer is this: nothing. Not even the fee for the gaming SWIFT license, which I'd appreciate if you would put up personally,
 

Ale Xander

Hamilton
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"The sale of the Club will not be fast-tracked but will follow due process. I will not be asking for any loans to be repaid. This has never been about business nor money for me, but about pure passion for the game and Club. Moreover, I have instructed my team to set up a charitable foundation where all net proceeds from the sale will be donated. The foundation will be for the benefit of all victims of the war in Ukraine."
 

67YAZ

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"The sale of the Club will not be fast-tracked but will follow due process. I will not be asking for any loans to be repaid. This has never been about business nor money for me, but about pure passion for the game and Club. Moreover, I have instructed my team to set up a charitable foundation where all net proceeds from the sale will be donated. The foundation will be for the benefit of all victims of the war in Ukraine."
Let me be a little cynical here - reporting is that Roman has loaned Chelsea £1.5b over the years. The "net proceeds" from a sale would have to be the sale price of the club minus these liabilities, no?

And then foundation to benefit of "all victims" of the war has a real "all lives matter" ring to it.

This is all PR for today. When the sale eventually goes through, we'll get some insight into how the funds actually end up getting spent.

Nonetheless, Roman has been a transformational owner for the club and the EPL. It will be a profound and complicated legacy he leaves behind.
 

teddykgb

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Jul 16, 2005
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I don’t say this from a competitive standpoint at all — how the hell do you account for a billion dollars in unpaid loans from a FFP perspective? It’s such an unexpected scenario
 

Vinho Tinto

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Dec 9, 2003
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Let me be a little cynical here - reporting is that Roman has loaned Chelsea £1.5b over the years. The "net proceeds" from a sale would have to be the sale price of the club minus these liabilities, no?
If he’s writing off the loans, then he would be eating the loss. I agree we won’t really know if it matters until the sale is finalized; but I can easily see the club selling for 2 billion above their valuation (2.5 billion) if the sale was structured to elicit the highest bidder that will get approval. However, everything swirling around him will prevent that.
 

OCST

Sunny von Bulow
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Jan 10, 2004
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The 718
They're currently losing in their FA Cup match to Luton Town, so he better sell before they take a hit in value.
 

Philip Jeff Frye

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If he’s writing off the loans, then he would be eating the loss. I agree we won’t really know if it matters until the sale is finalized; but I can easily see the club selling for 2 billion above their valuation (2.5 billion) if the sale was structured to elicit the highest bidder that will get approval. However, everything swirling around him will prevent that.
If the loans are from him, does it matter if he's writing them off? If he sells the club for £2 billion without writing off the loans, he gets £500 million, but he also gets his £1.5 billion in loans back, which is a total of £2 billion. If he sells for £2 billion after writing off the loans, he gets £2 billion. Its the same either way.

I guess it changes the optics of how much money is supposedly going to the charity. Maybe there's some tax dodge involved to.
 

SoxFanInCali

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California. Duh.
If he's willing to eat 1.5 Billion GBP in loans and give away the couple billion the club could sell for, that tells you how much more money he's got stashed away that he's trying to make sure isn't frozen.
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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The devil will be in the details.

It will be very interesting to see how much the club actually sells for. There are obviously complicated issues related to the debt the club owes on paper to Roman. But there are also some serious questions about how much the club is actually worth. They have a world class training ground but a stadium that by the last plans needed about a billion dollars invested to expand the capacity to 60k and bring it up to par with the facilities of rivals. Their global fan base is large by social media follower metrics but there are questions about whether they have nearly the same number of truly passionate (and more wealthy) core supporters as longer established clubs like Liverpool, Arsenal, or even Spurs. At the end of the day, the price isn't going to be about the trophy cabinet, its going to be about assets, facilities, commercial revenue projections, etc.

My guess is that its valued somewhere between 2-2.5 billion, which is the rough ballpark that Daniel Ek was bidding (unsuccessfully) for Arsenal last summer.

If he sold for 2 billion then took out the 1.5b in loans plus the amount he originally paid, you could end up with only about 350m going to charity for a guy who until recently (who knows right now) had a net worth in the 11b range.
 

Kliq

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Mar 31, 2013
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The devil will be in the details.

It will be very interesting to see how much the club actually sells for. There are obviously complicated issues related to the debt the club owes on paper to Roman. But there are also some serious questions about how much the club is actually worth. They have a world class training ground but a stadium that by the last plans needed about a billion dollars invested to expand the capacity to 60k and bring it up to par with the facilities of rivals. Their global fan base is large by social media follower metrics but there are questions about whether they have nearly the same number of truly passionate (and more wealthy) core supporters as longer established clubs like Liverpool, Arsenal, or even Spurs. At the end of the day, the price isn't going to be about the trophy cabinet, its going to be about assets, facilities, commercial revenue projections, etc.

My guess is that its valued somewhere between 2-2.5 billion, which is the rough ballpark that Daniel Ek was bidding (unsuccessfully) for Arsenal last summer.

If he sold for 2 billion then took out the 1.5b in loans plus the amount he originally paid, you could end up with only about 350m going to charity for a guy who until recently (who knows right now) had a net worth in the 11b range.
Yeah, it will be interesting to see what happens with how this impacts Chelsea from a competitive standpoint. Under Roman they were a heavyweight club that could spend with anybody. 20 years of having that seat at that table will certainly create some long-term stability for the club as a power beyond Abramovich's wealth, but as you said, it's unclear if they have the global appeal to sustain themselves the way United, Real Madrid, Barca, etc. have.

Of course, they could get bought by another foreign sugar daddy. I'll say this; Newcastle are lucky that the world doesn't care as much about Yemen as much as they seem to care about Ukraine.
 

Morgan's Magic Snowplow

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Yeah, it will be interesting to see what happens with how this impacts Chelsea from a competitive standpoint. Under Roman they were a heavyweight club that could spend with anybody. 20 years of having that seat at that table will certainly create some long-term stability for the club as a power beyond Abramovich's wealth, but as you said, it's unclear if they have the global appeal to sustain themselves the way United, Real Madrid, Barca, etc. have.

Of course, they could get bought by another foreign sugar daddy. I'll say this; Newcastle are lucky that the world doesn't care as much about Yemen as much as they seem to care about Ukraine.
Assuming the club gets sold to some consortium of rich people who appreciate the investment but aren't interested in losing huge amounts of money, I think Chelsea are going to be on a pretty similar financial playing field as Arsenal and Spurs. Their commercial revenues are in the same ballpark and they haven't redeveloped their stadium. Their roster is worth more currently as a set of assets but that can change quickly.

I'm also curious whether Marina Granovskaia and other close associates of Roman remain with the club or leave with him. There could be a lot of organizational turnover very quickly.
 
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tmracht

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Aug 19, 2009
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Assuming the club gets sold to some consortium of rich people who appreciate the investment but aren't interested in losing huge amounts of money, I think Chelsea are going to be on a pretty similar financial playing field as Arsenal and Spurs. Their commercial revenues are in the same ballpark and they haven't redeveloped their stadium. Their roster is worth more currently as a set of assets but that can change quickly.

I'm also curious whether Marina Granovskaia and other close associates of Roman remain with the club or leave with him. There could be a lot of organizational turnover very quickly.
Yes and no real ability to expand as well.
 

tmracht

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Indeed much like I play FM they did well to max the training and youth facilities with Cobham.
 

67YAZ

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Also need to add that Chelsea have been the club driving the English women’s game forward. Roman’s legacy is going to be complicated.
 

Zososoxfan

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Assuming the club gets sold to some consortium of rich people who appreciate the investment but aren't interested in losing huge amounts of money, I think Chelsea are going to be on a pretty similar financial playing field as Arsenal and Spurs. Their commercial revenues are in the same ballpark and they haven't redeveloped their stadium. Their roster is worth more currently as a set of assets but that can change quickly.

I'm also curious whether Marina Granovskaia and other close associates of Roman remain with the club or leave with him. There could be a lot of organizational turnover very quickly.
She's one of the best executives in the game. I'd love to have her at Inter, Barca, or Spurs, but I think Inter is the only one with any real possibility.
 

67YAZ

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View: https://twitter.com/samjcharles/status/1500523169005846528

The Ricketts family is weighing an offer to buy Chelsea Football Club
Wow. Having married in to a family of Cubs fans, I’m very confident saying that the Ricketts would take a similar approach to FSG (maybe even hiring Mike Edwards after Liverpool is done with him…).

Roman has put the club on an excellent footing and it can definitely compete for trophies on a spend-what-you-make approach.

the one aspect of the club that would likely draw major investment by the Ricketts - the stadium - sounds like a tricky proposition. Now, the Ricketts have totally transformed the blocks around Wrigley and hugely improved the stadium experience. That’s largely been paid for with tax subsides and aggressive ticket price hikes, but the opportunity was there because of relatively cheap and underdeveloped commercial land around Wrigley. My understanding is that it’s the opposite situation for Chelsea - few tax incentives available, fans will be militant against ticket price hikes, and there’s little room to expand.

I’m just riffing here. The Ricketts would likely be solid, steady owners - maybe more if they could luck into their own Klopp.
 

Kliq

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Mar 31, 2013
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It got me thinking; who would be the funniest American sports owner to buy Chelsea? Imagine if it was Daniel Snyder? James Dolan? Donald Sterling?

I haven't heard Kraft mentioned at all, but he is close friends with Roman.
 

tmracht

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Aug 19, 2009
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Well this is a shit show. 20,000K travel for European matches seems low. Not being able to put pen to paper on a new contract may cause additional issues with the defenders. Wonderful.