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Roman Abramovich hands over ‘stewardship and care’ of Chelsea football club
- Thread starter Sassy Colombian
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davek
Player Valuation: £150m
Good article there from Peter Oborne. Basically underlining how the Tories and right wing Labour figures played ball with the oligarchs and politically attacked the likes of Corbyn who had targeted them.
Now the scumbags are pointing the finger at everyone else over Putin and destroying the football clubs and punishing the working class people who devote their lives to them.
Now the scumbags are pointing the finger at everyone else over Putin and destroying the football clubs and punishing the working class people who devote their lives to them.
davek
Player Valuation: £150m
Maybe so, but he conveniently turns a blind eye to any of his own party that have done favours for oligarchs and have sat on boards of directors of their companies.
detonator7
Player Valuation: £750k
So who gets the money from the Chelsea sale? Who sets the price, and who accepts it? Surely it sets a dangerous precedent that the government can seize a company, then sell it to who they want for a few billion and keep the money.
Isn't that what Putin did? Seized companies and sold/gave them to his mates.
Isn't that what Putin did? Seized companies and sold/gave them to his mates.
summerisle
The rain, it raineth every day
The government I bet. But to be honest to me thats no different to Abramovic having it. That money wont be used for any good or to help people. It will get siphoned off to the Tory club.
catcherintherye
Player Valuation: £80m
Yes some thoughtful points in the post.
It looks as if Abramovich made a big investment a couple of years back of circa £250m which tilts the picture a bit. I suppose in a relative sense, his influence has waned as inflation has grown in football, and a lot of his focus has been to create a great football club from top to bottom. I think he has done that really. They have great commercial people, make a lot of profits on player transfers and have (oddly along with City) the best academy in the country. So I suppose they are now less reliant on him than they were in 2003/4/5 when they were spending 100m + when most teams were operating on budgets of between 10-20m.
As for the 2nd point, I agree, but with an important cavaet. Basically owning a football club is to my mind essentially pouring money down a drain. Warren Buffet used to say it about owning airlines, it was just a sure fire way to throw money away. I think it's even more so with football teams. Very few regularly make money, even the very well run ones. As a sector it is very badly run, and in honesty desperately needs some external, independent governance to fight against these tendencies. I'm not sure many clubs survive without heavy investments from owners. I mean even Liverpool, who I happen to think are well run (relatively so within football) had to have a hefty 9 figure investment into the balance sheet by FSG during Covid. Essentially the businesses don't stack up. There are varying degrees of how this is true, but that's the continuum.
My own theory is that it's a bi-product of an arrogance around football, linked to a very long bull market it's enjoyed. In bull markets all sorts of nonsense gets normalised. And for football the idea that clubs don't need to make profits, don't need to be sustainable and ultimately don't need independent, external regulation seems to be one of the fallacies.
As for who takes them over, I reject the concept of Sportswashing (for reasons I've previously mentioned) but using the basis of the term- wealthy foreign investors from countries outside of the US, I don't see that either. One pattern seems to be they like to buy depressed assets and build them up. For whatever reason it appears more fun. They also seem to want to avoid buying off American, or even British people, as to not give them the pleasure of having their money. I'm not sure Chelsea fit that criteria. Someone will buy them, and they have success running through their DNA as a club, 5 league titles over the last 20 years. A top draw academy etc. It will be interesting to see how far that culture of excellence remains when the ownership goes.
As for Qatar, I have no idea. If you subscribe to the SportsWashing world view (which I don't) then it would not really be possible, as there is not going to suddenly be the need for them to not sportswash. If that's their motivation, they will keep doing it, and the World Cup will just be a launchpad. I doubt they overly worry about what round PSG go out in. They have got very far in European competitions, and won multiple leagues. My brother has just got back off a business trip, and noted there was a PSG shop in New York. They are one of the biggest clubs in the world. I'm not sure they want to junk it, but honestly who knows. As American power continues to wane, maybe their owners become less interested in football? Who knows.
What I'd like to see, is a 50+1 rule for fans to run clubs and proper, independent regulation sitting above football. That would do more to curb the power of wealthy individuals. I think fans should have equity in clubs, and now the government has shown it can essentially steal assets from owners, there's no reason they can't take 51% of equity from each club.
It's funny here, if Moshiri sold, I'd genuinely hope the fans bought him out. That would give me more pride than anything, to actually own the football club I support. Or have an ownership stake. I hope that can happen.
catcherintherye
Player Valuation: £80m
I think the government entirely as they now own it. It makes it far more complicated.
YoboCopter
Player Valuation: £50m
Feel like tuchels come out of this well hes spoke very decent
Definitely the right decision, but it’s a bit contradictory when you have Newcastle essentially directly owned by a state which has been carrying out genocide in Yemen without any punishment.
In my opinion anyone who has had involvement in murderous regimes shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near football, regardless of how wealthy they are
In my opinion anyone who has had involvement in murderous regimes shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near football, regardless of how wealthy they are
magicjuan
Player Valuation: £60m
There are little, if any, innocents in the Premier League. Across a range of dodgy practices.
I've commented in the past, only partly tongue in cheek, that Everton is a slush fund for Moshiri such are our excessive financial failings. How else do you explain some of the players we've bought?
JimmyJeffers
Player Valuation: £70m
Premier league got too big too quick and with too much money floating around was always going to be a magnet for all sorts of underhand dealing.
The likes of Chelsea (and probably ourselves if given a chance) buying up youngsters then loaning them all out whilst other local teams struggle financially has damaged the game and the lower leagues as much as anything else. Personally, i feel no sympathy for them or their fans. At worst they’ll likely become a mid table Prem club or similar to arsenal.
Everyone knew how Abramovich made his cash so little point crying about it now.
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