FOOTBALL IS NOT A SPREADSHEET

The starting point is almost provocative.

Todd Boehly and Mark Walter are leaving Chelsea. Clearlake Capital is acquiring their interests in a transaction worth approximately £950 million, while the club’s total valuation, including debt, has risen to around £5 billion.

At the same time, the four years since the 2022 takeover have produced an extraordinary amount of spending, repeated changes of managers and executives, an overcrowded squad and a sporting strategy that has been revised several times.

Can an ownership group manage a football team badly and still make a successful financial investment?

That is the central paradox of modern football.

A recent article in La Gazzetta dello Sport provided the starting point for examining the Boehly era. But Chelsea becomes far more interesting when used to explore a wider question: why do American billionaires, private-equity firms, credit funds and sports-investment platforms continue to buy European football clubs?

This is an industry characterised by fragile margins, rising debt, costs that are difficult to control and sporting results that nobody can guarantee.

The most immediate answer — that they buy football clubs because they want to win — is no longer sufficient.

Many investors are not merely buying a team. They are buying a scarce asset, a global brand, a remarkably loyal consumer community, media rights, real estate, data, players, digital content and the opportunity to sell the entire package later at a higher valuation.

The point is not that Americans do not understand football.

The point is that many American investors understand finance perfectly well and apply objectives to football that do not necessarily coincide with those of supporters.

Chelsea, the €1.69 Billion Laboratory

According to FootballTransfers, Chelsea spent approximately €1.69 billion on players between the 2022 takeover and March 2026.

During the same period, the club reportedly received around €910 million from player sales, leaving net expenditure close to €790 million.

Purchases exceeded €612 million in the 2022/23 season alone.

Enzo Fernández, Moisés Caicedo, Wesley Fofana, Mykhailo Mudryk and Marc Cucurella cost more than €450 million between them, without including wages, agents’ commissions, performance bonuses and financing costs.

High expenditure is not, in itself, proof of incompetence. Roman Abramovich spent enormous sums and won almost everything.

The difference lies in the relationship between capital, organisation and time.

Chelsea’s new owners changed managers, executives and decision-making structures while simultaneously assembling an exceptionally large squad. They bought numerous young players, often at high prices, and placed many of them on unusually long contracts.

There was a clear financial logic behind this strategy.

The cost of a player’s transfer fee is not normally recorded entirely in the year of acquisition. It is spread over the duration of the contract through amortisation. A longer contract therefore reduced the annual accounting charge in the early years.

In simplified terms, a player bought for €80 million and given an eight-year contract could generate an annual amortisation charge of €10 million. On a five-year contract, that charge would have been €16 million.

It was a form of accounting arbitrage.

UEFA subsequently intervened by limiting the maximum amortisation period recognised under its financial regulations to five years.

The market had identified an opportunity. The regulator closed it.

But Chelsea’s deeper problem was never purely accounting-related.

A football team is not a static financial portfolio. Every player needs minutes, a position in the hierarchy, trust, learning and continuity. A manager needs time to create collective mechanisms and a shared culture.

A squad can possess an enormous theoretical value and still function badly as a team.

The Risk Hidden Inside Long Contracts

Long contracts do not eliminate risk. They move it into the future.

When a signing succeeds, the club controls an appreciating asset for many years. When a signing fails, the wages, remaining book value and difficulty of finding a buyer all remain.

Chelsea effectively constructed a portfolio of options on young players.

Some of those options, such as Cole Palmer, produced exceptional sporting and economic returns. Others became immobilised capital.

The strategy therefore cannot be judged simply by counting the number of players purchased. A serious assessment must consider:

• total acquisition costs;

• guaranteed salaries;

• agents’ commissions;

• remaining book values;

• proceeds from player sales;

• sporting performance;

• the cost of missed opportunities;

• organisational stability.

It is on this final point that Chelsea experienced some of its greatest difficulties.

Capital was repeatedly used as a substitute for accumulated knowledge.

When one decision failed, the answer was another transaction: a new manager, a different executive, another signing or a revised organisational structure.

In football, however, transaction speed cannot replace continuity.

Chelsea’s Financial Results

Chelsea’s published accounts for 2024/25 show revenue of £490.9 million, the second-highest figure in the club’s history.

Matchday revenue reached £86.8 million, while profits from player disposals amounted to £57.9 million.

Nevertheless, the club recorded a pre-tax loss of £262.4 million, compared with a profit of £128.4 million in the previous financial year. That earlier profit had been heavily influenced by the sale of a subsidiary.

Separate UEFA data reported by the British press indicated an economic loss of approximately £355 million, calculated using a different reporting perimeter.

The two figures should not be confused or presented as though they were interchangeable. They were calculated according to different definitions.

They nevertheless point towards the same conclusion: cost growth significantly exceeded revenue growth.

Chelsea did achieve important sporting results. The club won the UEFA Conference League and the FIFA Club World Cup and returned to the Champions League.

It would therefore be inaccurate to describe the entire project as a failure.

The more relevant question concerns the price paid to reach an initial level of stability: too many transactions, too many changes and an unnecessarily complicated organisational structure.

The Valuation That Forgives Almost Everything

In 2022, the consortium led by Boehly and Clearlake acquired Chelsea for approximately £2.5 billion and committed to invest a further £1.75 billion.

By 2026, the purchase of Boehly and Walter’s interests implied a total club valuation of roughly £5 billion, including debt.

The £2.5 billion acquisition price and £5 billion valuation cannot be compared directly without considering debt, capital injections, investment commitments and transaction structure.

Even after allowing for those differences, the appreciation remains remarkable.

This is where the supporter’s judgment and the investor’s judgment separate.

The supporter sees:

• €1.69 billion spent on players;

• net expenditure approaching €790 million;

• disappointing seasons;

• repeated managerial changes;

• an overcrowded squad;

• a confused sporting identity;

• increasingly expensive access to the club.

The investor sees:

• a unique and irreplaceable asset;

• membership of the wealthiest domestic league in football;

• long-term broadcasting contracts;

• a global brand;

• an extremely limited supply of elite clubs;

• real-estate opportunities;

• an international consumer base;

• the possibility of selling at a higher multiple.

If the equity value rises by more than the capital committed and costs incurred, the financial thesis can survive sporting disorder.

This does not mean that wasted money is irrelevant.

It means something more disturbing: in a market composed of extremely scarce assets and extraordinarily wealthy buyers, an owner may be financially rewarded even after allocating a substantial amount of operating capital badly.

Rising valuations can conceal mistakes that would destroy value in an ordinary industry.

Why American Funds Invest in European Football

European football offers a combination of characteristics that is almost irresistible to American capital.

1. Scarcity

It is impossible to manufacture another Chelsea, Milan, Inter, Liverpool or Manchester United with more than a century of history.

Major football clubs are culturally irreplaceable assets.

2. Underdeveloped Global Revenues

Premium seating, hospitality, merchandising, international tours, digital content, sponsorship and direct-to-consumer services offer monetisation opportunities that many investors believe European clubs have not fully exploited.

3. Broadcasting Rights

The Premier League, Champions League and expanded Club World Cup provide global visibility that very few entertainment products can replicate.

4. Stadiums and Real Estate

A modern stadium can operate seven days a week through concerts, events, museums, restaurants, retail, hospitality and naming rights.

Tottenham has demonstrated how infrastructure can transform a club’s economic model.

5. Players as Tradable Assets

Academies, recruitment networks and player trading create opportunities to acquire, develop and sell talent at a profit.

6. Multi-Club Ownership

A network of clubs can share data, scouting, personnel, commercial strategies and development pathways for young players.

7. Valuation Arbitrage

An important European club may cost less than an NFL or NBA franchise while possessing a far more international audience.

8. Emotional Loyalty

An ordinary consumer can change brands. A supporter rarely changes clubs after a bad season.

It is a form of customer loyalty that almost no conventional business could build from nothing.

An Industry That Grows Without Producing Reliable Profits

UEFA expected the revenues of European top-division clubs to exceed €30 billion in 2025.

During that year, it identified 111 investment transactions in European football, including 29 acquisitions of controlling interests in top-division clubs and nine new American majority investors.

The same UEFA research also revealed the other side of the story.

Non-wage operating costs now absorb approximately 36 per cent of club revenues, the highest proportion recorded in fifteen years.

Financing costs have risen by more than 50 per cent compared with the pre-pandemic period.

Aggregate pre-tax losses among Europe’s top-division clubs remain close to €1.2 billion.

European football is growing, but it continues to struggle to convert that growth into dependable profit.

This is particularly attractive to investors who are not seeking annual dividends but capital appreciation, interest income, secured lending, real-estate development and future resale opportunities.

Not All Funds Are the Same

Public discussion often uses the word “fund” as though it described a single type of owner.

That is a mistake.

A patron primarily uses personal wealth and may seek trophies, prestige, political influence or emotional satisfaction.

A private-equity firm invests money raised from external investors and is expected to generate a return within a defined period.

A credit fund lends capital and seeks interest, repayment and protection through collateral.

A sports holding company may retain a club for a very long time and integrate it with other sports and entertainment businesses.

A sovereign wealth fund deploys state capital and may pursue financial returns, international influence and soft power at the same time.

Clearlake is a private-equity firm.

Oaktree is principally a credit and opportunistic-investment specialist.

RedBird is building a platform across sport, media and entertainment.

Fenway Sports Group and Kroenke Sports & Entertainment operate more like permanent sports holding companies.

Newcastle United owner PIF is a sovereign wealth fund.

Placing all these investors under the same definition prevents us from understanding their incentives and behaviour.

Inter: From Moratti’s Patronage to Oaktree’s Credit

I write this section as an Inter supporter.

I can recognise the achievements of modern, disciplined management and still miss Massimo Moratti’s patronage.

This is not nostalgia for financial losses.

It is nostalgia for an owner whose most important return was a night such as Madrid in 2010.

According to Calcio e Finanza, Moratti injected approximately €1.17 billion into Inter over eighteen years, an average of about €58 million per year.

The club’s cumulative losses during that period reportedly reached approximately €1.4 billion, against total revenues of €3.6 billion.

The Moratti era delivered sixteen trophies, including the Treble.

When Moratti finally left Inter, his proceeds were incomparable with the capital he had invested. In 2016, he received approximately €60 million for his remaining 29.49 per cent interest.

From a purely financial perspective, it was a terrible investment.

From a sporting, emotional and cultural perspective, it was patronage.

Oaktree reached Inter through an entirely different route.

In May 2021, it provided financing to the holding companies through which Suning controlled the club.

When the loan was not repaid by 21 May 2024, the total balance due had reached approximately €395 million.

The following day, funds managed by Oaktree assumed ownership of Inter.

Oaktree had not originally acquired the position because it was emotionally attached to the black and blue colours. It had financed a borrower, obtained security and enforced its contractual rights after non-payment.

That does not mean Oaktree must be a bad owner.

On the contrary, management continuity, financial discipline and sporting competitiveness may create a more stable Inter.

A fund can administer a football club more competently than a patron.

Its economic purpose nevertheless remains different: stabilise the club, increase its value, address the stadium and debt questions and eventually consider a profitable exit when market conditions permit.

The supporter’s emotional horizon is infinite.

Capital has a target return.

Milan: Elliott Proves That the Model Can Work

AC Milan is the necessary counterexample to any simplistic criticism of investment funds.

Elliott assumed control in 2018 after Li Yonghong failed to repay financing of approximately €300 million.

The fund restructured Milan, reduced its financial vulnerability and helped return the club to the top of Italian football. That recovery culminated in the 2021/22 Serie A title.

In 2022, Elliott sold Milan to RedBird for €1.2 billion. Part of the acquisition was financed by the seller through a vendor loan of approximately €550 million, which was subsequently refinanced.

For Elliott, this was a highly successful distressed investment:

• enter through credit;

• take control following default;

• restructure the business;

• improve its value;

• sell to a new investor.

For Milan, it was also a period of sporting recovery.

The example demonstrates that finance and victory are not necessarily incompatible.

It also confirms the central argument: the club becomes an asset to acquire, restructure, appreciate and ultimately transfer.

RedBird’s strategy includes a new stadium, commercial expansion, content development and synergies with its wider sports and media portfolio.

Success on the pitch remains essential, but it also functions as a lever for increasing the value of the asset.

American Capital Across Europe’s Major Leagues

American ownership has become a structural part of the Premier League.

Arsenal belongs to Kroenke Sports & Entertainment.

Liverpool is controlled by Fenway Sports Group.

Manchester United remains under the Glazer family, with INEOS exercising significant influence over football operations.

Chelsea is controlled by Clearlake.

Bournemouth belongs to Bill Foley.

Aston Villa is controlled by Nassef Sawiris and American billionaire Wes Edens.

Crystal Palace has also had a significant presence of American investors.

The outcomes have been very different.

FSG built one of the most successful football projects of recent decades at Liverpool. Kroenke eventually oversaw Arsenal’s revival after years of supporter criticism. The Glazer family continues to face protests over debt and the management of Manchester United.

There is no single American model.

There is, however, a shared belief that European football can be monetised far more aggressively than it has been in the past.

Serie A includes Oaktree at Inter, RedBird at Milan, the Friedkin family at Roma, Kyle Krause at Parma, Rocco Commisso at Fiorentina and Stephen Pagliuca alongside the Percassi family at Atalanta.

Some are institutional investors. Others are families or individual billionaires.

Pagliuca’s capital arrived at an Atalanta organisation that was already exceptionally competent.

The Friedkins have invested heavily in Roma and won the Conference League, but the club continues to search for technical stability and financial sustainability.

The lesson is clear: capital can amplify existing competence, or it can amplify confusion.

France has provided some of the most serious warnings.

John Textor’s Eagle multi-club structure came under intense financial pressure. In 2025, the DNCG initially ordered Lyon’s administrative relegation in a context where reported debt stood at approximately €540 million.

Bordeaux, following its experience with King Street and years of financial crisis, is another example of the risks created by leverage, ambitious promises and subsequent withdrawal.

BlueCo also owns Strasbourg.

For the investor, it is a network of football assets. For many supporters in Alsace, it raises the fear that their club may become a development platform serving Chelsea.

In Spain, Atlético Madrid has opened its capital to North American and institutional investors. Girona is part of City Football Group.

LaLiga offers global brands, but it also imposes stricter financial controls and operates with revenues heavily concentrated among its largest clubs.

In Germany, the 50+1 rule restricts external control and protects the influence of club members, despite exceptions and continuing controversy.

The rule may reduce capital inflows, but it also creates a barrier against the complete privatisation of a club’s cultural inheritance.

Multi-Club Ownership: Efficiency or Assembly Line?

City Football Group, Red Bull, BlueCo, Eagle and other platforms promise efficiency.

A club network can share:

• scouting;

• databases;

• coaching methodology;

• personnel;

• medical services;

• sponsorship;

• commercial strategy;

• player-development pathways.

The model can genuinely improve smaller clubs that previously lacked capital, technology and international expertise.

But an unavoidable sporting and political question remains.

Who receives priority when two clubs in the same network have conflicting interests?

Does a talented player remain at Strasbourg because Strasbourg needs him, or is he transferred to Chelsea because the flagship club wants him?

Is a sponsorship agreement allocated according to genuine market value, or is it structured to optimise the group’s overall accounts?

UEFA imposes separation measures intended to protect the integrity of its competitions. Ownership structures, however, continue to become more sophisticated.

Multi-club ownership transforms smaller clubs into real options. The group can acquire talent earlier, develop players internally, reduce information costs and retain the resulting capital gain inside the network.

It is economically rational.

But if every club becomes a department of a holding company, the league risks losing its character as a competition between genuinely independent institutions.

What Investors Actually Want

A football fund does not necessarily expect annual dividends.

It normally seeks a combination of five types of return.

Capital Appreciation

Buy today and sell in the future at a higher multiple.

Chelsea is the clearest example. Despite extraordinarily expensive sporting operations, the value attributed to the club has increased.

Credit Returns

Interest, fees, collateral and the possibility of assuming control after non-payment.

The routes taken by Oaktree at Inter and Elliott at Milan demonstrate how financing can ultimately become ownership.

Real-Estate Appreciation

Stadiums, land, commercial districts, hospitality and naming rights can become as valuable as a major transfer campaign while producing more predictable cash flow.

Player Trading

Acquire young players, develop them and sell them at a profit.

It is a legitimate industrial strategy until it completely replaces sporting ambition.

Media and Data Platforms

The club becomes global content, a digital community, an e-commerce operation, a customer database and an access point to an audience that would be extremely difficult to recreate.

What Is a Fund’s Time Horizon?

A conventional private-equity fund often works within a period of approximately five to ten years.

That horizon can be extended through:

• continuation funds;

• refinancing;

• permanent-capital vehicles;

• sales between related entities;

• new investors;

• disposals of minority stakes.

A credit fund thinks primarily in terms of loan maturity, interest and recovery.

A sports holding company may have no predetermined exit date.

A sovereign wealth fund may operate over several decades.

Before asking when an owner intends to sell, we must first understand what type of capital actually owns the club.

Why the American Model Often Fails

The model fails when it imports three major illusions from the American franchise system.

The first is that more individual talent automatically produces more victories.

In football, interactions, balance and collective mechanisms matter more than the sum of player valuations.

The second illusion is that the manager is a replaceable middle manager whose departure carries no cultural cost.

Every managerial change alters methods, hierarchies, technical demands and the identity of the team.

The third illusion is that risks can be controlled as they are in a closed league.

European football contains relegation, failure to qualify for international competitions, extreme revenue volatility and unpredictable changes in player value.

An American franchise can finish last without losing its place in the league.

A European club can see its economic position transformed by one unsuccessful season.

When the American Model Works

The model can succeed when it imports genuine expertise:

• data analysis;

• process control;

• commercial development;

• stadium planning;

• capital allocation;

• governance;

• international marketing;

• financial discipline.

Liverpool did not win because its ownership was American.

It won because patient capital, intelligent recruitment, managerial quality and technical organisation moved in the same direction.

Arsenal eventually benefited from sustained investment and continuity.

Atalanta was able to use new capital productively because the club already possessed a strong sporting culture.

The nationality of the investor matters less than the structure of the capital and the humility with which a new owner enters an unfamiliar ecosystem.

The Invisible Cost Is Identity

Patron-owned football was never pure.

Moratti, Berlusconi, Agnelli, Cragnotti, Tanzi and Abramovich produced victories, but they also produced losses, debt, collapses or concentrations of power.

Patrons often made too many decisions and frequently made the wrong ones.

We should not romanticise financial irresponsibility.

Patronage did, however, recognise something that a spreadsheet struggles to measure: a football club is a promise between generations.

It is not an ordinary asset because its customers are not merely customers.

They are emotional custodians who pass belonging to their children.

A fund can acquire the shares.

It cannot acquire the collective memory.

As an Inter supporter, I miss Moratti not because he ignored economics, but because he accepted that Inter’s return could take the form of a shared memory.

His billion did not come back.

It returned as Ronaldo, Zanetti, tears, mistakes, years of waiting and, ultimately, the Treble.

It was a financially irrational use of capital.

That is precisely what made that football different.

We Should Not Have to Choose Between Nostalgia and Solvency

The solution is not to expel American capital.

Without new investment, many European clubs could not finance stadiums, academies, women’s football, technology or existing debt.

What football needs is a stricter bargain between capital and community.

That should include:

• clear publication of club debt;

• transparency concerning related-party transactions;

• disclosure of fees paid to owners and affiliated companies;

• limits on debt placed on a club to finance its own acquisition;

• supporter vetoes over the name, colours, stadium and relocation;

• stronger multi-club ownership regulations;

• transparent pricing for transfers between related clubs;

• ten-year plans for stadiums, academies and local communities;

• stress tests based on failure to qualify for European competitions;

• independent representation on club boards;

• mandatory consultation with recognised supporter organisations.

Capital must be allowed to earn a return.

It should not be allowed to transfer every risk to the club and every cost to the community that made the asset valuable.

Conclusion

Chelsea does not simply demonstrate that American billionaires waste money in football.

It demonstrates something more complex and more important: money can be wasted in sporting operations while the underlying asset continues to appreciate.

The club has moved from Abramovich, a patron prepared to finance victory, to a consortium in which institutional capital evaluates every decision partly through its effect on future value.

Funds invest in European football because the industry possesses what finance loves:

• scarcity;

• global growth;

• consumer loyalty;

• exclusive rights;

• real estate;

• data;

• consolidation opportunities;

• potential capital appreciation.

They leave when the valuation multiple, loan maturity or pressure elsewhere in the portfolio suggests that they should.

During the period in between, they may professionalise a club, rescue it and help it win.

They may also increase its debt, extract value and reduce a community to a line in an investment portfolio.

A serious judgment should be neither reflexively anti-American nor blindly nostalgic.

It should ask precise questions:

Who provided the capital?

How much debt was used?

What return is required?

Over what period?

Who absorbs the losses if the strategy fails?

What will remain at the club after the investor has left?

Old-fashioned patronage bought trophies and often destroyed balance sheets.

Modern financial capitalism promises sustainability and frequently monetises somebody else’s love.

Between these two models, football has yet to invent an owner capable of respecting the balance sheet, sporting competition and the soul of a club at the same time.

Methodological Note

Transfer figures are market estimates and may vary according to bonuses, loans, exchange rates and accounting treatment.

Chelsea’s reported losses of £262.4 million and approximately £355 million were calculated using different reporting perimeters and should not be treated as interchangeable.

Information updated to 17 September 2026.

Principal Sources

La Gazzetta dello Sport; Chelsea FC Financial Results 2024/25; Financial Times; UEFA European Club Finance and Investment Landscape; FootballTransfers; Oaktree Capital Management; AC Milan; Calcio e Finanza; PitchBook; Norton Rose Fulbright.