Soccer Practice Games

With an outstanding recent record in domestic soccer, a squad of highly-paid and talented international stars and despite being one of the world’s richest men, Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich still faces a major task over the next few seasons. Debt is the spectre which follows Chelsea at the end of every season and despite the club owners generosity in writing off large chunks of the clubs overdraft, fixing the problem will be the key issue for the club’s owner.

Maintaining Chelsea’s involvment in it’s younger squads, signing new players as well as the huge amounts paid to existing players in the team as part of their contract agreements are expenses which cannot be completely offset by the selling of soccer merchandise, ticket sales, player transfers and sponsorship deals. With UEFA adopting stringent new rules by 2012, meaning that all participating teams in their competitions must be run within stringent financial guidelines, Chelsea must find a way to reduce their debt while staying in European soccer’s elite.

Addressing this little issue began last summer when several first grade players were allowed to leave the club. Michael Ballack left for Leverkusen, Deco and Juliano Belletti joined Fluminense, Joe Cole moved North to Liverpool and Ricardo Carvalho rejoined former manager Jose Mourinho at Real Madrid. This cutting of staff successfully had the effect of minimising the wage bill, but even these player cuts have not fully resolved the issue of club debt.

Chelsea’s owner has spent alot of cash in the past aimed to help the club achieve his goal of the Londoners being regarded as not only the best club in England, but the entire world. Depending on your opinion, this title is currently held by either of the Spanish giants Real Madrid or Barcelona, or Chelsea’s Premier League rivals Manchester United, and the reason why Chelsea have been unable to compete with these three giants of the beautiful game is due to two main reasons:

• The gate receipts generated by the relatively modest Stamford Bridge.
• The appeal of the clubs merchandise worldwide.

resolving the issue with the stadium capacity and income generating capabilities of Stamford Bridge is something which Roman Abramovich may be reviewing sooner, rather than later. Rumour has it that Stamford Bridge may soon be condemned to being part of Chelsea’s history, rather than the cornerstone of their future. While no firm details have been confirmed by any sources at the club, rumours are circulating that Mr Abramovich has been considering moving the club into a purpose built new stadium, with a capacity of atleast 60,000, and such a move is required if Chelsea are realistically hoping to claim the title of the world’s biggest club.

The proposed new ground and its larger capacity will have a positive, instantaneous effect on improving Chelsea’s financial problems. The bigger stadium, provided spectators fill the additional seats, will provide Chelsea with a much bigger return on their gate income for home games. This increased generated will put the club in a better position to adhere to the new UEFA guidelines, which are slated to be begin in 2012, by seriously increasing the amount of cash the club generates each season from their home games. Another bonus financially will be that Chelsea could choose to sell the naming rights to their biggest sponsor, as neighbours Arsenal did when they named Emirates stadium.

A new ground would also have an effect on increasing the merchandising sales that the club makes as the new ground would give the club increased publicity, especially in the far larger customer markets in Asia and the USA.

If Chelsea is to achieve their long term goals, now is the right time to spend their owners cash on the club’s infrastructure, instead of on player wages and overpriced transfer fees. If Mr Abramovich is ready to move Chelsea onto the equal level as Real Madrid, Barcelona and Manchester United, then he needs to invest his money in a new stadium as that is the next step that this great London team must take in order to achieve the levels of greatness to which they aspire.