Lord Sebastian Coe, a member of one of the consortiums bidding to buy Chelsea, has reiterated that a takeover must be completed quickly or the club’s future could be in danger.
Roman Abramovich’s sale appears to have hit a major obstacle amid fears the billionaire was preparing to U-turn on his pledge to write off £1.6bn in debt that he had loaned the club over the course of his 19-year tenure as owner.
Abramovich was sanctioned by the UK government in March due to his alleged links to Vladimir Putin’s regime, which he has denied. With his assets frozen, he is not permitted to benefit financially from the sale of the club.
However, according to reports on Tuesday evening, there has been an attempt to restructure the sale of the club which would involve payments to a company – Camberley International Investments – which appears to be linked to Abramovich.
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As i reported on 3 May, that has led to fears within government that the takeover will be further delayed. Chelsea have just 27 days left on a special license granted to them by the government which allows them to continue operating under specific restrictions.
There is growing anxiety about the deadline, with the Premier League meeting on 8 June ahead of the 2022-23 season, for which Chelsea would need to have a new license in place to be allowed to play in the Premier League.
Lord Coe, who is involved in former Liverpool chairman Sir Martin Broughton’s bid (though their party is not the preferred bidder – that is LA Dodgers co-owner Todd Boehly), said it is essential Chelsea “end up with a swift set of solutions.”
In a radio interview with LBC, Lord Coe said: “I joined Martin’s bid with one simple proposition – I’m a Chelsea fan of more than 50 years. I was in the ground in 1967, I was born near the ground and still have a house there.
“For me it was always about the club having the best possible ownership, one that was recognising one very simple fact – that is you don’t really own a club, you’re the stewards of a community sports organisation. At this moment the one thing I hope we end up with is a swift set of solutions to this.
“As someone who’s been involved in sport, there is a vacuum here if we’re not careful, which is going to impact on the players – it’s certainly going to impact on the coaching. To be sitting in a stadium where you’re regularly 10,000 fans down because you can’t sell seats – there is a problem here.
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“The rest of the decisions have to be made properly, there is a process and this is a one-off. You don’t see clubs being sold in these circumstances so government will have to be really clear what it wants out of this.”
The government will have discretion as to where the proceeds of the sale go; it is possible they will be diverted towards charitable causes, while it has also been reported that Prime Minister Boris Johnson is keen for the money – likely to be in excess of £2bn – to be invested in grassroots football.
“Fans like me want a resolution to this but they want to make sure the club lands in the right hands and that the club isn’t lumbered with debt for the next 50 years,” Coe added.
The Raine Group had earlier given the go-ahead to Boehly’s consortium as preferred buyers, though it has since emerged that British businessman Sir Jim Ratcliffe is also ready to make a late bid.
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