‘There are black holes’ – Kieran Maguire drops shattering Chelsea-Abramovich reveal
Chelsea are comfortably within Financial Fair Play limits thanks to their ‘excellent’ player sales over the last five years.
That is the view of finance expert Kieran Maguire, who spoke exclusively to Football Insider about Chelsea’s FFP situation after spending heavily under Todd Boehly.
The Blues spent a staggering £585million in the first two transfer windows under Boehly, bringing in 16 new players to Stamford Bridge.
This summer, the Londoners have focused on trimming their oversized squad with the likes of Kai Havertz, Mateo Kovacic and Mason Mount put up for sale.
Chelsea have also agreed a number of deals with Saudi Arabian clubs looking to bring Premier League stars over to their league ahead of the 2023/24 season.
Maguire believes Chelsea’s departures mean they have plenty of FFP ‘wiggle room’ after recording sales of £123million in 2022.
“I think it [Saudi sales] will certainly be of assistance,” Maguire told Football Insider’s Sean Fisher.
“We’ve seen Chelsea already go into the market and sign a striker [Christopher Nkunku], although that deal officially doesn’t kick in until July 1, which means that it won’t impact upon Chelsea’s 2022/23 accounts.
“If you take a look at Chelsea over the course of the last five years, in 2018, they had player profits of £113million.
“It was £143million in 2020.
“It was £123million in 2022.
“Chelsea are excellent at generating money from player sales and that has always contributed towards them being in compliance with Financial Fair Play.
“I think there are a couple of black holes in Chelsea’s financial fair play position relating to the freezing of Roman Abramovich’s assets.
“If you combine the impact of Covid-19 and Abramovich leaving, I think Chelsea have probably got more wiggle room than people give them credit for.“
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