Naturally Arsenal are one of the clubs who could benefit from Chelsea having their assets frozen.
For two decades Gooners had to watch with envy as our London rivals were able to outbid the majority of clubs in terms of transfer fees and wages.
Believing in the concept of Financial Fair play , our whole business plan when building the Emirates was to be a self-sustained model.
We had to sell our best talent most seasons, often to the teams we were trying to compete with.
Van Persie and Sanchez picked Man United over us we essentially became a feeder club for Man City, academy graduate Ashley Cole defected to the bridge. Once our captain, Fabregas would one day don a blue shirt.
So, you can understand why not many of their peers will have too much sympathy for Chelsea currently only being able to operate on a special licence.
Sanctions against Roman Abramovich from the government means Chelsea have to pay a wage bill of 28 million pound a month with the majority of revenue streams now stopped.
The only fans who can now attend a game at Stamford Bridge are those who purchased their tickets before 10-3-22.
Only 400 tickets were bought for the FA cup tie at Middlesborough before that date. Any other time the away allocation would have been 4,000.
Those who can still go to Stamford Bridge, can no longer make any transactions at the club shop, buy a programme, purchase food inside the ground, etc.
Sponsors such as Three suspending their contract to have their names on merchandise is worth approx. 120 million.
The idea of course is to prevent Mr Abramovich from making any money in Britain.
This is part of the majority of the EU response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
The current license ensures Chelsea can afford to fulfil their obligations for the season, with the Premier League funding them money till the 31st of May.
It leaves the European and World Club Champions stuck.
They can’t afford, long term, to be run by a Billionaire who has all of his assets frozen.
Yet the only way to protect Chelsea is by essentially agreeing that a man believed to have close connections to Vladimir Putin makes a sale that will be worth Billions, although he won’t see a penny of it.
While many would see the irony of Chelsea, of all teams, becoming poor you have to take the emotion away and judge Chelsea for what it is.
It’s a successful business in the UK that brings a lot of economy to the capital city of England.
Football is our national sport. The Premier League is one of Britain’s greatest brands that is marketed around the world.
Hurting one of the biggest clubs in Europe, who have existed for 117 years, would be our government cutting their nose off to spite their face .
Worth 12.3 billion, Abramovich can survive whatever happens to Chelsea. The men and women who work in the shop, canteen, on the stalls, cannot.
Then there are the fans who, banter aside, do not deserve to lose the club they love just because they were unlucky enough for their owner to be Russian.
Yes, there are strong doubts about how the 55-year-old made his fortune and the majority of Chelsea fans didn’t care about those rumours when it benefited them .
Yet those allegations are not fresh. They have existed since 2003 and Football chose to look the other way.
Chelsea are not viewed as a very likeable club by the neutrals. I do feel if this were Man United or Liverpool who were being affected by essentially the origin of their boss then there would be more empathy?
Do not get me wrong, Chelsea fans would struggle with a straight face to feel sorry for themselves.
A club who took advantage of being financially superior to others can’t now play the underdog if the same were to happen in reverse.
Only Man City’s owners have done the equivalent of Mr Abramovich’s business model so on the law of averages Chelsea won’t find another backer like the one they had.
They might have to accept the majority of clubs being controlled by someone who wants to only spend what they make.
That makes Chelsea less powerful and easier for Arsenal to catch up.
It increases the chances of them falling outside of top 4 contention, making it easier for us each year.
Banter aside though, the Government can’t let Chelsea drown.
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Dan
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