Is Todd Boehly era Chelsea FC the best team that money can buy? Well, we’ll have to wait and see, and let you know, once they finally start winning again. On Friday August 25, Chelsea met Luton Town in a match that was extremely historical, even before a single ball was kicked.
In accumulating the total fees for the players registered in their 2023-24 Premier League rosters (via Transfermarkt), as ESPN FC did, the media outlet concluded that this is the biggest mismatch, from a transfer spend perspective, in league history.
This Chelsea side cost €1,059.7 billion to put together while the roster assembled by Luton Town totaled only €21.97m.
Then you have the difference in the roster paygrades too. When it comes to Chelsea wages, Raheem Sterling is the highest-paid player, at a sum of £330,000 per week. For Luton Town, the best paid individual player is Allan Campbell (Central Midfield) with a gross annual salary of £440,000, or £8,462 per week. How big of a discrepancy is that? Well, you’ll see that every single name on the Chelsea players salary list for the senior team makes more money Campbell. Chelsea are even paying a guy who will never feature again for them (and they’re desperately trying to get rid of) in Romelu Lukaku, more than £300,000 per week.
Crazy, huh? But this is what happens when you spend more money in this summer transfer window than any other club in Europe.
Wait, there’s more, Chelsea have already broken 2019 Real Madrid’s summer spending record, and they’re still not done. We have a few days left before the window closes, and Chelsea manager Mauricio Pochettino said on Wednesday that he wants two more signing before deadline day.
This supplements the southwest London club absolutely shattering the January transfer window record (for any club, anywhere) earlier this year, with an outlay higher than all the clubs in Italy, Spain, Germany and France combined. Yes combined!
The Moises Caicedo signing last week brough the Todd Boehly era total transfer spend north of one $1 billion. Yes, it only took the American multi-billionaire and leader of the Clearlake Capital consortium three transfer windows to surpass that mark.
Caicedo, the most expensive player ever bought by a British club (€121m from Brighton), slots in right next to Enzo Fernandez, who previously held that record, from when he came over in January from Benfica for €121m. So when is the Return on Investment going to start kicking in?
Chelsea finished 12th last season, their worst showing since 1994. They have no European football to speak of this season and they’re winless through their first two league fixtures. It’s an understatement to say that this is very bad ROI.