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Kieran Maguire: Chelsea 'desperate' to close £40m gap to rivals as new deal agreed
The Chelsea owners are ‘desperate’ to improve the club’s matchday revenue to catch up to their rivals financially.
That is the view of finance expert Kieran Maguire, who spoke exclusively to Football Insider about Chelsea’s desire to increase matchday revenue.
The Blues reported losses of £121.3million in their latest 2021/22 accounts, with the club citing increased operating expenses and matchday costs.
Chelsea have the smallest capacity stadium out of the ‘Big Six’ in the Premier League, with Stamford Bridge boasting a capacity of 40,341.
Expanding the stadium has been on the agenda of the club’s new owners since their takeover last year, and the club is also striking new deals to help improve revenue.
Chelsea has signed a seven-year agreement with California-based technology company Tempus Ex Machina, who plan to offer digital and mobile fan engagement and in-stadium fan enhancements.
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Maguire believes the London club are pushing to close a gap of around £30-40million in revenue between them and their rivals.
“There is no doubt that Chelsea’s ownership are desperate to make the club competitive in terms of revenue generation,” Maguire told Football Insider.
“We’ve seen a variety of approaches taken by other clubs to achieve this – for example, Fulham now have a swimming pool on top of one of their stands.
“Chelsea now realise that they are substantially behind other clubs who have capacities of 60,000 or more to bring in income.
“There are also clubs such as Spurs which have state-of-the-art facilities which were built with the intention of emptying wallets – Chelsea have a lot of catching up to do.
“If we move domestically towards financial sustainability rules which will introduce a soft wage gap, then Chelsea are starting the season generating £30-40m less than their rivals then you are looking at a huge impact on the ability to pay wages.“
In other news, Kieran Maguire: ‘Chelsea face disaster’ after shattering new development