Osborne advises on Chelsea bid
Manager’s plea to bidders as ex-Chancellor Osborne joins the Boehly takeover team
GEORGE Osborne has been drafted in to boost a £2.5billion bid to buy Chelsea FC, it emerged last night.
The former Chancellor is advising a US group competing to buy the club from Roman Abramovich, with the successful bidder likely to be announced as soon as this week.
The Premier League club was hastily put up for sale last month after oligarch Abramovich was sanctioned by the Government after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Chelsea fan Mr Osborne is advising a consortium fronted by American billionaire Todd Boehly after the City firm he joined last year, Robey Warshaw, signed up as an adviser. Mr Osborne is also a friend of Lord Finkelstein, the Tory peer who has agreed to join Chelsea’s board if Mr Boehly is successful.
There are two rival bids – one headed by former Liverpool FC chairman Sir Martin Broughton, the other by the Boston Celtics basketball team co-owner Steve Pagliuca and National Basketball Association chairman Larry Tanenbaum. Final offers had to be lodged by last Thursday.
CHELSEA’S new owners could be revealed this week with Roman Abramovich and the Raine Group set to decide a preferred bidder from the three consortiums left standing at the end of a prolonged process, with the winner likely to be either the Todd Boehly/Jonathan Goldstein group or the Josh Harris/David Blitzer combination.
Former Chancellor of the Exchequer and Chelsea fan, George Osborne, was yesterday revealed as an adviser to the Boehly bid and a potential board member if they win. Osborne is a Chelsea fan and a season-ticket holder at Stamford Bridge. He works for the investment bank Robey Warshaw — and they have been brought on board to advise the consortium.
With Chelsea facing Crystal Palace in the FA Cup semi-final today, Blitzer and Harris are in the unusual position of watching the team they part own take on the team they are bidding to own, which means they would have to divest their shares, thought to be 22 per cent, in Palace before completing any deal for Chelsea.
With the dramatic withdrawal of the troubled Ricketts bid on Friday, only three groups have made it to the end of the process. Stephen Pagliuca, 55 per cent owner of Serie A side Atalanta, is considered the outsider given that he would have to sell shares in his Italian club and was the last of the group to contact fans, though he is backed by John Terry and a group of wealthy supporters.
Manager Thomas Tuchel has stayed out of the process, allowing him to focus on the FA Cup semifinal and securing qualification for next season’s Champions League. But he has made a plea that the new owners continue to invest in the Chelsea academy, which after 19 years is now bearing impressive fruit, with the likes of Mason Mount, Reece James. Callum Hudson-Odoi and Ruben Loftus-Cheek all first-team regulars, while the sales of Tammy Abraham and Marc Guehi, playing for Crystal Palace today, have funded transfer spending. Conor Gallagher, the latest starlet from the Chelsea academy, is on loan at Palace and can’t play today due to the terms of his loan.
Tuchel said: ‘I hope for them [the new owners], the academy is as important as it is for us and the supporters. It’s what makes any team special if you have the mix between players from abroad and players from the academy.
‘I can force nobody to do what from my point is necessary. Chelsea academy is a big part of this club and is a huge investment by Roman Abramovich, and the women are as well. Chelsea are much more than only the first team, so I can only think that everybody sees that and takes care of it. I think there is a lot of other investment needed and I personally think it is worth it and I think the board will tell anybody who buys this club the same thing.’
Boehly and Blitzer/Harris have been assiduous in courting fans. Boehly, owner of the LA Dodgers, would be chair of a board that includes Daniel Finkelstein, a Chelsea season-ticket holder and adviser to Tracey Crouch’s government-commissioned fan-led review, and Barbara Charone, a legendary music executive and long-standing Chelsea fan. The Blitzer/Harris bid is fronted by former British American Tobacco chairman Martin Broughton, also a long-standing Chelsea fan, and World Athletics president Seb Coe, whose support of Chelsea has been well-known since he became Olympic 1500m champion in 1980.
Local MP Greg Hands, who is also the Government Minister for Business, has encouraged the groups to coordinate with fans and said: ‘I have spoken to all the bidders in the last two weeks, I think all of them responded to my request to talk about community, fans and the stadium. Which is very important to all of us in Chelsea and Fulham.
‘Chelsea Football Club is a big stakeholder and big facility in the community. Residents will want to know what the implications of the new owner are for the site and the stadium redevelopment and my position has always been for Chelsea to stay where they are and be open-minded on stadium expansion.’
The Chelsea Supporters’ Trust have called for fans to be offered a golden share in the club, so as to have a veto over controversial decisions, the creation of a supporters’ advisory board and continued investment in the women’s team. It is understood that the Boehly and Harris/Blitzer bids have committed to golden shares, a step which
was recommended by the Crouch Review. Pagliuca insists that he would never change key elements such as the club logo, kit or name. All three bidders have pledged not to join a European Super League.
The Government’s only role in the process will be to issue a variation on the terms of the licence by which Abramovich is sanctioned to allow the sale. Raine Group and Abramovich will select the successful bidder.
However, the fact that the fan-led review has so recently been published has meant that for the first time prospective bidders for a Premier League club have effectively been forced to engage with fans and meet their concerns.