Roman Abramovich set for Chelsea payment after Premier League sanction

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Roman Abramovich could land more money from Chelsea in the coming years despite the Blues' punishments

Roman Abramovich could yet see another hefty financial boost from the sale of Chelsea in 2022. The former Blues owner sold the club for a gigantic £2.5billion in 2022 to Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital, after sanctions were placed upon him by the UK government amid Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

From that figure, £150m was held back to cover the cost of any proceedings relating to events that happened before the takeover. That includes Chelsea's £10.75m fine from the Premier League earlier this week.

The club were handed a suspended transfer ban on first-team activity and a nine-month ban on signing academy players for breaching Premier League financial rules in relation to seven transfers.

The Football Association are set to hand out a similar punishment following an alleged 74 rule breaches. It appears the club will avoid a points deduction and pay another fine.

That comes after the west London side also had to pay an £8.6million fine to UEFA in 2023 as a result of partial financial information being submitted in historical transactions between 2012 and 2019. They had breached UEFA Club Licensing and Financial Fair Play Rules.

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Chelsea self-reported the financial irregularities in each instance after the new ownership took control of the club from Abramovich. But the £150million appears as if it will prove more than enough to cover the indiscretions, and the remaining pot of money will head towards Abramovich in May 2027.

However, the proceeds from the sale of the club remain outside of Abramovich's control for the moment. Fordstam, owned by Abramovich, received the £2.35bn in 2022, but the funds were frozen.

The proceeds from the sale of Chelsea were earmarked for the 'victims of the war in Ukraine'. In a statement before the sale, Abramovich said there would be a 'charitable foundation where all net proceeds from the sale will be donated'.

Prime minister Keir Starmer has previously called on Abramovich to do as he said. He told the House of Commons in December: "Honour the commitment you made and pay up now, and if you don’t, we are prepared to go to court so every penny reaches those whose lives have been torn apart by Putin’s illegal war."

The Russian's lawyers are not prepared to go down without a fight. They claim he is ‘fully committed’ to donating the money to charity and also attacked the government’s ‘politically charged’ handling of the issue.

"It is important to emphasise that the funds – although currently frozen – remain the property of Fordstam Limited, which is wholly owned by Mr Abramovich," they recently said.

"The proposal to donate these proceeds was initiated by Mr Abramovich prior to the imposition of sanctions, and he remains fully committed to ensuring that the funds are used for charitable purposes. As such, any donation will be made voluntarily by our clients."