It is not just the British record £107million fee Todd Boehly has paid for Enzo Fernandez, who has played just 29 times for Benfica, which gives the impression that Chelsea‘s owner views the transfer market as a gaming exercise.
The Football Manager computer game actually has an amortisation facility — the accounting device that Boehly has used to spread vast transfer payments and avoid breaching spending rules. ‘Genius!’ states one of the gamers’ websites drawing players’ attention to it.
That is not the word many would choose to describe the American, who spent more cash on transfers last month than all the clubs of Serie A, the Bundesliga, La Liga and Ligue 1 combined.
One of the common conclusions on Wednesday, as the dust settled on Chelsea’s spending frenzy which followed last summer’s outlay of more than £250m, was that the club had bought big and sold cheap.
There was astonishment in some circles that Jorginho was picked up by Arsenal for £12m, even though he is out of contract this summer.
Chelsea owner Todd Boehly has splashed big money since his summer takeover of the club
The American has spent heavily on new players since his ownership takeover including Mykhaylo Mudryk who arrived for £88million
Chelsea’s January splurge concluded on deadline day with the £107m purchase of Enzo Fernandez
Arsenal were on the hook — desperate for a player of his calibre, given Mohamed Elneny’s extended injury lay-off — and at the very least, Chelsea could have weakened their rival by refusing to trade at anything less than double the price. But off across London this proven Premier League player went.
Madness. A metaphor for Chelsea’s lack of grasp on the market or their own priorities. They have spent £88m to buy Mykhailo Mudryk, who has appeared only 44 times for Shakhtar Donetsk, yet are still to resolve N’Golo Kante’s contract situation.
The club’s spending of more than £300m in January is historic, unprecedented and raises so many questions about where football goes from here.
If Fernandez is worth £107m, then what on earth is the value of Declan Rice? £200m? Chelsea’s way of accounting for it all certainly will not be the same for whoever is making that decision. The winter’s big spenders have made sure of that.
Just as the wild spending of the Roman Abramovich era — £50m Fernando Torres on a helicopter from Liverpool to London in 2011 — brought UEFA Financial Fair Play rules into play, so the creative…