While Roman Abramovich was forced to sell Chelsea, he still managed to get around £4.25 billion for the club, 19 years after purchasing the team. But how much did Abramovich buy Chelsea for?
How much was Chelsea sold to Abramovich? In 2003, Chelsea was sold to Roman Abramovich for £140 million, with Abramovich paying £60 million to the previous owner and taking care of the club’s £80 million debt at the time.
Chelsea was being put up for sale in 2003 because there were worries about the future of the team due to an £80 million debt accumulation which was a real danger to the team. So whoever was going to purchase the team needed to cover that debt as well as paying off the previous owners.
So that is what Abramovich did. He used £140 million of his oil money to purchase the team and paid off the debt that Chelsea had accumulated. So in total Abramovich paid £140 million to purchase Chelsea back in 2003.
Who did Roman Abramovich buy Chelsea from?
While Roman Abramovich is definitely the most famous owner of Chelsea, he purchased the club from a fan who was arguably more important to the team than Abramovich was. Ken Bates was the man that Abramovich purchased the team from. Bates is a British businessman who is very familiar with football ownership.
Who is Ken Bates?
Ken Bates is most commonly known as the former owner and chairman of Chelsea but his career in football began long before that. Bates was born in Ealing in 1931 and his young life was very chaotic. Bates’ mother died shortly after his birth and his father left so he was raised by his grandparents.
Despite this difficult childhood, Bates made a very large fortune through the haulage industry before eventually moving into quarrying and dairy farming. This personal fortune helped him quickly become involved in football. Bates began by being the chairman of Oldham Athletic for five years in the 1960s.
Bates first major purchase into football came in 1980 when he became co-owner of Wigan Athletic alongside his business partner Freddie Pye. Bates put in some serious investment to the side which helped them get promoted two years after he purchased the team. But Bates was always looking for a bigger opportunity.
In 1982, Bates purchased Chelsea for £1. This may seem like a ridiculously low price to pay for a football club but there was a reason behind it. At the time of Chelsea being purchased the team were in serious financial trouble and Bates had to pay off some outstanding debt that the club owed.
They were down in the Second Division, a long way from the success that the team had in 1955 to 1971 when they won multiple trophies. During his time with Chelsea, the club really progressed to become a lot closer to what it is today.
Chelsea spent only two seasons outside of the top flight during the time that Bates owned the team. He was very important in developing the team and the stadium. Bates was able to gain full ownership of the stadium and it helped Chelsea to develop Stamford Bridge into a stadium with a capacity of 42,000 by 2001.
Particularly in the 1990s, Chelsea were starting to become a success, winning the FA cup in 1997 and 2000 as well as winning the EFL Cup in 1998. They were continuously winning trophies and making an impact on the continent. Chelsea won the UEFA Cup Winners Cup in 1998 and would win the Super Cup later in the same year.
Chelsea were consistently in the top six as the 20th century was coming to an end. All of this success had come at a cost and Chelsea had accumulated over £80 million of debt and needed someone to come in to buy the team who had a significant financial investment that they could put into the club.
So Bates decided to sell the team to Russian oil billionaire Roman Abramovich as he was able to cover the team’s debts. Despite leaving the club in a poor state financially, this was not the last time that Bates would go into football ownership.
Two years after selling Chelsea, Bates became the principal owner of Leeds United. It was not a massively successful period as owner of the team for Bates. Two years after the purchase Leeds went into administration and were relegated to League One. Bates was able to buy the club back from administrators.
His time with the team was quite short-lived as Bates quickly became disliked by the fans for moving through managers quickly and not bringing a massive amount of success to the team. In November of 2012, Bates agreed to sell 100% of the club to Middle East-based equity group GFH Capital and was sacked as honorary president less than a year later.
Who is Todd Boehly?
There will have been quite a few Chelsea fans who would not have heard of Todd Boehly before he purchased the club from Roman Abramovich earlier this year.
Boehly was always focused on economics and finance and began by working at Credit Suisse First Boston. He joined Guggenheim Partners in 2001 and his very smart credit investing business made massive profits.
The money that Boehly was earning from the company eventually meant Boehly could make some very large investments of his own and it meant he became a billionaire while in his 40s. This also allowed Boehly to begin making investments in different sports teams.
Being based in California his investments began in the region. Boehly owns 20% of the Los Angeles Dodgers as well as being a part owner in the Los Angeles Sparks. Boehly made another big investment in 2021 when he purchased 27% of the Los Angeles Lakers alongside Guggenheim Partners CEO Mark Walter.
Boehly actually made a bid to purchase Chelsea back in 2019 for around $3 billion but this was at a time when Abramovich was not prepared to sell. Once Abramovich was forced to sell three years later, Boehly put in a bid alongside Walter and Hansjorg Wyss which turned out to be successful.