Cashless Chelsea: Club could run out of money in weeks

Cashless Chelsea: Club could run out of money in weeks.

CHELSEA Football Club faces the serious prospect of running out of money and could be cashless within weeks, following sanctions to Russian billionaire owner, Roman Abramovic.

According to the Daily Mail, the Stamford Bridge side could only have 17 days left until the money runs out, due to the high wages of their star players.

Faced with the prospect of not being able to generate income through ticket and merchandise sales, which were banned following Abramovic’s sanctions, the club could burn through their £16 million (€19 million) reserves, the news outlet reports.

Furthermore, the loss of major sponsorships from Three, Nike, Hyundai and Zapp mean that the end could sadly be in sight for the London Club.

However, despite sanctions against their owner and the predicament they find themselves in, some of the club’s fans continued to chant the Russians name during Chelsea’s 3-1 victory over Norwich on Thursday, March 10.

Technology minister Chris Philp criticised those fans in an interview with Times Radio.

“I’m a football fan myself, I’m a Palace fan, in south London. So, I understand why fans are very attached to their football clubs. But Roman Abramovich is someone who has been sanctioned now, yesterday morning, for his very close links to Vladimir Putin and the Putin regime,” he said.

“I just say respectfully to the Chelsea fans, I know he’s done a lot for the club, but the humanitarian situation in Ukraine and what the Russian regime are doing to civilians – shelling maternity hospitals and shooting civilians who are fleeing down humanitarian corridors – and that is more important than football’. He added that anyone who wants to buy the club can ‘approach the Government”.

He said: “No proposal would be accepted which saw the money, the proceeds of any sale, ending up in an unrestricted bank account owned by Abramovich. He can’t benefit from the proceeds of any sale.”

Stephen Taylor Heath, Head of Sports Law at JMW Solicitors, reiterate this by stating: “It may be possible, with Government involvement, for the club to be sold without Abramovich’s involvement.

“That would be similar to a sale of a club in administration where the administrator deals with the buyer and the club liaises with the governing body. If this were to happen though, the ‘administrator’ would need to have sufficient legal authority to sell the club. The administrator’s ability to do so is normally part of the administration process but they may need to be granted this authority by the Government. This may be subject to legal challenge”.

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