Storm clouds are hovering over the American ownership project at Chelsea that has swung from being regarded as bold and exciting to now being considered reckless and damaging.
Reaching the FA Cup final on Sunday likely will do little to change that.
What should be an exciting weekend for Chelsea and its fans — another trip to Wembley Stadium, this time for a semifinal against Leeds — is backdropped by a growing crisis at a club that so often resembles a soap opera.
Anger is rising to the surface among fans and disillusionment among players after a humiliating exit from the Champions League — 8-2 on aggregate to Paris Saint-Germain — and a goalless streak amid five straight losses in the Premier League that marks the team’s worst run of league results in 114 years.
Liam Rosenior, an inexperienced 41-year-old coach, bore the brunt of the ire and was duly fired on Wednesday, four months into a reign that veered badly off course over the last few weeks.
During the 3-0 loss at Brighton on Tuesday, match-going supporters chanted — in no uncertain terms — for Rosenior’s departure and the coach himself called out his players in media interviews when he criticized their “lack of spirit” and “unacceptable” performance. He was always unlikely to survive after such an outburst.
Bubbling under the surface, meanwhile, is growing tension about the direction the U.S. owners have taken Chelsea and the massive financial concerns that come with it.
Since the 2022 purchase of Chelsea by a consortium fronted by Los Angeles Dodgers part-owner Todd Boehly and largely funded by private equity company Clearlake Capital, the club’s leadership has spent around $2.5 billion on new, mostly young and unproven players on long contracts and taken on a debt approaching $2 billion, according to figures compiled by The Athletic. Chelsea’s most recent financial results revealed the club made pre-tax losses of $350 million, a record high in the Premier League era.
Concerns over future financial turmoil have been exacerbated by the fact that Chelsea has dropped to eighth place in the league and looks highly unlikely to finish in the top five to guarantee qualification to the lucrative Champions League.
If they aren’t playing in Europe’s top competition next season, will the team’s top stars — Cole Palmer and Enzo Fernandez, to name two — become disillusioned? Fernandez has already spoken publicly about wanting to live in Madrid, courting controversy and earning him a suspension.
With a background in private equity and venture capital, Chelsea’s leadership has come at soccer ownership very differently — as shown by the vast sums spent on dozens of players over the past four years that has left the squad bloated yet still, somehow, unbalanced.
Add to that the misguided treatment (Thomas Tuchel and Enzo Maresca) or poor choice (Graham Potter and Rosenior) of the permanent coaches — there have been five already — who have been in post in the current regime and there are huge question marks over the strategy and decision-making of Chelsea’s owners in a sport they don’t know well. They almost acknowledged that themselves, saying after firing Rosenior they will “undertake a process of self-reflection to make the right long-term appointment.”
“I sit here worrying tonight of what’s going to happen with our football club,” former Chelsea captain John Terry said on his official TikTok account.
“Is,” he posed, ”a real top manager going to come to Chelsea Football Club at the moment in the position we’re in?”
By winning two trophies last season, notably the Club World Cup, the ownership could point to tangible success to justify its unique approach, even if soccer finance experts said it should come with a “health warning.”
Any goodwill appears to have gone, with Chelsea fans — and those of Strasbourg, a French team that is part of the American ownership’s multi-club model — having taken to the streets outside Stamford Bridge to protest last weekend.
A win in the FA Cup semifinals would be welcome, but just masking deeper-lying problems at a club in disarray.
Key matchups
The other FA Cup semifinal sees Manchester City play second-tier Southampton on Saturday. City has already won the English League Cup and, on Wednesday, rose to the top of the Premier League on goals scored ahead of long-time leader Arsenal.
That could be short-lived, with Arsenal able to return to first place by avoiding defeat at home to Newcastle in one of seven league matches over the weekend.
At the other end of the standings, third-to-last Tottenham visits already-relegated Wolverhampton on Saturday. Spurs are two points adrift of West Ham, which hosts Everton at the same time.
Off the field
After four-and-a-half years in charge, Eddie Howe could be in his final days at Newcastle.
The team has lost three straight league games and has plummeted to 14th place, with even Howe seemingly perplexed and struggling for a solution.
There is uncertainty in general at Newcastle, given the doubts around the future spending of Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund — the club’s majority owner.
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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer
