Roman Abramovich Thread

[Pizy 17,861]

Really hope something can be sorted within the next week and that Newcastle is the last game we have to play with this all swirling around the club. Really not fair on everyone employed at the club to have this hanging over their heads long term.

I would think Roman wants this to be as painless as he can do. So it’s probably all going to come down to how smoothly this bent government can allow things to go forward.

Getting a new owner or ownership group in next week would lift the mood in a major way.

[Diceflix 207]

Pat Nevin says the club has started partially laying off some of the staffs

https://www.express.co.uk/sport/football/1578859/Chelsea-news-Roman-Abramovich-sanctions-staff

Now if this true, this sanctions officially has brought more negative impact to an English Football club, English football fans, and Brits workers/citizens rather than affecting anyone in Ukraine or Russia itself. What a joke!

Edited March 11, 2022 by Diceflix

[Blues Forever 1,232]

 

[Arlen Correa 153]

Refuse, resist.

[Diceflix 207]

1 minute ago, Arlen Correa said:

Refuse, resist.

Riot!

[Vesper 27,393]

I hope my 4 year long track record here on this (plus my educational and professional background) lends some gravitas to what I am about to say.

There is a chance, not a great one, but a chance nonetheless, that this is nearing the end of the road for us.

There is a group of MPs, not huge in number, but growing with every Putin horror story, who want to see the club rolled up, dismantled.

As it stands, IF no further changes occur to the special license, we are indeed going to go into administration on June 1 (or shortly thereafter) and be liquidated, as our ability to spend any money (including paying all salaries) ends on May 31.

IF the government feels the heat (dog knows they are fucking corrumpetent, ie a combo of corrupt AND incompetent) to a certain level (and Putin is likely to start using mass chemical weapons on civilians, just as he extremely likely did in Chechnya, Georgia, and Syria), they may not modify the licence.

I am NOT saying this is inevitable, but it is a looming possibility, hopefully one that never, ever sees the light of day.

Edited March 11, 2022 by Vesper

[Strike 6,986]

1 hour ago, Vesper said:

I hope my 4 year long track record here on this (plus my educational and professional background) lends some gravitas to what I am about to say.

There is a chance, not a great one, but a chance nonetheless, that this is nearing the end of the road for us.

There is a group of MPs, not huge in number, but growing with every Putin horror story, who want to see the club rolled up, dismantled.

As it stands, IF no further changes occur to the special license, we are indeed going to go into administration on June 1 (or shortly thereafter) and be liquidated, as our ability to spend any money (including paying all salaries) ends on May 31.

IF the government feels the heat (dog knows the are fucking corrumpetent, ie a combo of corrupt AND incompetent) to a certain level (and Putin is likely to start using mass chemical weapons on civilians, just as he extremely likely did in Chechnya, Georgia, and Syria), they may not modify the licence.

I am NOT saying this is inevitable, but it is a looming possibility, hopefully one that never, ever sees the light of day.

I don't think the license is the biggest concern. The government will be seen as vindictive if they are wilful in blocking the sale of the club to new ownership.

The bigger worry is if Roman digs his heels in because he's losing a 2 billion asset and this period of uncertainty goes on longer. In that case, we'd lose much of what we consider Chelsea today. We'd lose our core players and we probably go out of the top level for years.

 

[coolhead23 1,146]

59 minutes ago, Vesper said:

I hope my 4 year long track record here on this (plus my educational and professional background) lends some gravitas to what I am about to say.

There is a chance, not a great one, but a chance nonetheless, that this is nearing the end of the road for us.

There is a group of MPs, not huge in number, but growing with every Putin horror story, who want to see the club rolled up, dismantled.

As it stands, IF no further changes occur to the special license, we are indeed going to go into administration on June 1 (or shortly thereafter) and be liquidated, as our ability to spend any money (including paying all salaries) ends on May 31.

IF the government feels the heat (dog knows the are fucking corrumpetent, ie a combo of corrupt AND incompetent) to a certain level (and Putin is likely to start using mass chemical weapons on civilians, just as he extremely likely did in Chechnya, Georgia, and Syria), they may not modify the licence.

I am NOT saying this is inevitable, but it is a looming possibility, hopefully one that never, ever sees the light of day.

I echo the same possibility. 

I also believe maybe our days of being as an elite club might be over. With these sanctions Roman would be forced to sell within the time frame allocated and as what is said that Roman wants someone who can take the club forward. We might have owners who might get the club at a cut price which would have impacted on us being on top. 

With every passing day future not looking good ... 

 

[Bernie Finkle 6]

Everything is on a knife edge . Ethically I'm struggling explaining to my daughter's why this mess has happened and justifying our past years ownership when deep down we all knew the financial position of the club was built on tainted money. Relentless coverage, discussion at school has made it very hard . I think understandably mentally we all brushed it under the table .

My golden days are Osgood , Harris , Bonetti , etc , even Mickey Droy , Walker . Personally give me purity over controversy.

Just my take .

 

 

Edited March 11, 2022 by Bernie Finkle

[gdlk 263]

Show me a club which isnt finances with tainted money and you call him world top club, which is in top 20 in Europe. 

[Superblue 6,331]

23 minutes ago, Bernie Finkle said:

Everything is on a knife edge . Ethically I'm struggling explaining to my daughter's why this mess has happened and justifying our past years ownership when deep down we all knew the financial position of the club was built on tainted money. Relentless coverage, discussion at school has made it very hard . I think understandably mentally we all brushed it under the table .

My golden days are Osgood , Harris , Bonetti , etc , even Mickey Droy , Walker . Personally give me purity over controversy.

Just my take .

Personally I think the morality issue extends far beyond Chelsea Football Club. This has been something building and bubbling for years and has been further scrutinised in recent times with newer Premier League investors, the Super League, etc.

The facts are the Premier League need to learn lessons from this with regards to whom it allows to purchase the club. We've already had Newcastle purchased this season so it's clear there's still a blind eye being turned to where money is coming from so long as it flows into the league.

Just like in the Government right now, there needs to be a big question mark over morals running right through the football system - from owners, to players, to PL and FA exec's and even journalists who are more than happy to be dined and looked after by clubs (and many more than likely had no problem going to report the world cup in Russia at the time, or to report the next world cup in Qatar). Chelsea are firmly in the crossfires right now, but it'll be another team down the line.

[Fulham Broadway 16,432]

Will the £4m Tory MPs and Johnson have gladly accepted from London based oligarchs in the last 10 months be frozen/given to Ukraine ?

Of course it fucking wont. 

[Superblue 6,331]

1 hour ago, coolhead23 said:

I also believe maybe our days of being as an elite club might be over. With these sanctions Roman would be forced to sell within the time frame allocated and as what is said that Roman wants someone who can take the club forward. We might have owners who might get the club at a cut price which would have impacted on us being on top. 

If things can be resolved as soon as possible no matter who our owners are, I don't think we'll see a dramatic drop off.

Yes the transfer spending may not be as extravagant but it possibly doesn't need to be. A number of Premier League clubs in recent years have higher net spend than us, and United have about double. Everton have spent fortunes and could get relegated. Throwing money at problems won't always solve it. As a result of Roman, we've been able to rectify and absorb bad signings and poor managerial appointments to operate in a very short term way.

What we'll probably need to move towards is longer term planning and just operating in a more shrewd manner in the transfer market. Fortunately if we can come out of this relatively unscathed in terms of the squad, we've already got a strong squad and top manager. We have some more academy players on the verge of being part of our squad next season too. If Broja and Gallagher come back next season as you'd expect, possibly Colwill too depending on the situation regarding our defenders, we'll have over a third of our squad from the academy. If that conveyor belt can continue for the forseeable then I'm not concerned about our status, because we're then in a position where the squad may only need fine tuning and tweaking with one or two moves a summer which we should still be more than capable of doing.

We're comfortably in the top 3 teams in the country and have two of the hottest young prospects in the Premier League this season to be added to it. It's far from doom and gloom so long as we can get out of the position we're currently in asap.

[cosmicway 1,262]

11 hours ago, Superblue_1986 said:

If things can be resolved as soon as possible no matter who our owners are, I don't think we'll see a dramatic drop off.

Yes the transfer spending may not be as extravagant but it possibly doesn't need to be. A number of Premier League clubs in recent years have higher net spend than us, and United have about double. Everton have spent fortunes and could get relegated. Throwing money at problems won't always solve it. As a result of Roman, we've been able to rectify and absorb bad signings and poor managerial appointments to operate in a very short term way.

What we'll probably need to move towards is longer term planning and just operating in a more shrewd manner in the transfer market. Fortunately if we can come out of this relatively unscathed in terms of the squad, we've already got a strong squad and top manager. We have some more academy players on the verge of being part of our squad next season too. If Broja and Gallagher come back next season as you'd expect, possibly Colwill too depending on the situation regarding our defenders, we'll have over a third of our squad from the academy. If that conveyor belt can continue for the forseeable then I'm not concerned about our status, because we're then in a position where the squad may only need fine tuning and tweaking with one or two moves a summer which we should still be more than capable of doing.

We're comfortably in the top 3 teams in the country and have two of the hottest young prospects in the Premier League this season to be added to it. It's far from doom and gloom so long as we can get out of the position we're currently in asap.

Re. transfers it depends who the next owner is, how soon ad what are his aspirations.

In 1987 the club of Olympiakos Piraeus was in dire straits. Enter George Koskotas a young bankster and during the January transfer window only he manages to stun the world with some super players. Lajos Detari and Juan Alberto Funes were just two of them.
The rest of the story was sad however. Koskotas was found to be defrauding his bank, made a spectacular escape to Brazil, expelled, had to land on US territory then extradited to Greece. His brother Stavro disappeared and was never seen again (believed to be hiding in a jungle in Colombia).
However George Koskotas is rightfully regarded as a hero by Olympiakos Piraeus fans.
Their next prez went to prison too. He was the one who gave his Lear jet to Koskotas to make it to Brazil but later he was accused of other economic misdemeanours.
The next one was Sokrates Kokkalis. The company of Sokrates is the one who manufactures the betting shop terminals in many countries of the world. Those were computers with keyboards initially, now with screen sensors.
But Kokkalis was an East German spy. In his early years he used to send a report to Stazi every day and his reward was 65 US dollars for each report. His Stazi nicknames were "crocus" and "cascadeur".
But in the case of Kokkalis the file stayed dormant in the offices of the Justice department for years and years and meanwhile Olympiakos were winning championships. A little while before the statute of limitations expired an opposition mp stormed the building and demanded the case to proceed. But they locked the drawers and ushered him out (that mp is now a pro-Putin ex mp but anyway).
The reports sent by Kokkalis to the Stazi were nothing spectacular really, but most of the time he kept writing stuff to get his 65 bucks.
In one of them he said "hot meeting between the prime minister and the archbishop over church properties today - clash is expected".
Incidentally the father of said Kokkalis was the doctor of the communist mountain guerillas in 1949. The socialist party of Greece (PASOK) gave the street behind the US embassy his name.

The current president is something of a mystery too. He 's a ship owner and one of his vessels, the Noor1, sailed from Malaysia to Piraeus full of stuff. Midseas the interpol warns Greece about it. So they allow the ship to dock and watch who comes to collect the stuff.
It was hidden inside hollow pieces of marble and it was collected by a close friend of the Olympiakos president. So the police arrests this guy and confiscates the narcs.
But the Olympiakos prez says "what do I know ? he used my ship supposedly to bring marble and I had no idea". Is he telling us the truth or not ? Who knows.

Edited March 11, 2022 by cosmicway

[Blues Forever 1,232]

 

[Milan 17,836]

Who is this Nick Candy, how is he perceived by the general public? All I know about him is he is a Chelsea fan which can be both good and bad.

[Pizy 17,861]

4 minutes ago, Milan said:

Who is this Nick Candy, how is he perceived by the general public? All I know about him is he is a Chelsea fan which can be both good and bad.

I know nothing about Nick but as someone who’s into real estate I know about his brother who developed probably the most expensive condo building in central London amongst other developments. He doesn’t seem to be that rich, though. So he’d have to be a part of a large consortium and I doubt he’d be the main decision maker if his group took over.

Honestly, the best case for us at this point seems to be the Boehly/Wyss group. At least Boehly has plenty of experience in elite sport and will know about building teams.

Getting an amateur who knows fuck all about football in a time of chaos and crisis like this doesn’t sound like a good idea. We need a calming, steady handover. 

[Blues Forever 1,232]