Watching Chelsea get thrashed by a second-string Nottingham Forest on Monday, what stood out most of all was how out of his depth poor Callum McFarlane looked. He is hardly the first.
Chelsea travel to Anfield this weekend looking to avoid seven successive top-flight defeats for the first time since 1953. Judging by their total disarray on the field and off it that fate looks unavoidable, as does the bottom-half finish that should follow.
When BlueCo first bought Chelsea and began their spending frenzy, all the while trumpeting an amortisation philosophy they believed would turn world football on its head, a lot of people scoffed at their recklessness and predicted it would end in tears.
But nobody thought it could possibly go this badly wrong. The spectacular failure of Todd Boehly and BlueCo is Chelsea’s loss and football’s gain, because at a time of vampiric private equity investors and nation-state ownership it is just the kind of humbling the industry needed; hubris punished, football rejecting non-football people, and billionaires seeing their riches evaporate.
According to The Athletic Chelsea’s net spend on transfers accounts for around half of the £2 billion invested into the project so far. According to Forbes the club is worth around half of the £4 billion BlueCo paid for it back in 2022. Since then Chelsea have finished 12th, 6th, 4th, and, maybe by the end of the season, back to 12th again.
It is almost impossible to spend so much money and move so far backwards, but somehow Boehly and his tech bros have achieved the unthinkable. They bought a recent Champions League winner, sunk two billion, and broke it.
‘Broke’ feels an appropriate word, because Chelsea look beyond fixing. There comes a point in any failing business when hopes of turning things around give way to an acceptance of terminal decline and Chelsea look close to that. The issue this summer, compared with the crisis of any of the last three summers, is that the next manager and next batch of new signings won’t necessarily believe it is possible to un-break what they find.
Perceptions of Chelsea have shifted significantly over the last few months. Last summer anyone headhunted by the club could take the money and sell to themselves the mirage that the BlueCo project was about to come good. Now, Chelsea face the same disillusion and vicious cycle that plagued Manchester United for so long: anyone smart enough to be worth hiring will be too smart to go there; anyone willing to join will be motivated by the wrong things.
The only possible route out for Chelsea is a dramatic change of tack, although this pathway demands humility from the owners; full-scale acceptance that they got it completely wrong. It is hard to believe these executives - the same lot who swaggered into Stamford Bridge with no knowledge of football and assumed they could Mark Zuckerberg this thing – will admit they have failed, are failures.
Next Chelsea manager odds (via Sky Bet)
- Xabi Alonso - 2/1
- Andoni Iraola - 3/1
- Marco Silva - 6/1
- Xavi - 7/1
- Cesc Fabregas - 9/1
- 12/1 bar
Odds correct at 20:30 (5/5/26)
Nevertheless a window of opportunity might be opening. Rumours of Xabi Alonso’s availability have grown to the extent that he is currently the bookies’ favourite, although reportedly his interested is on condition of getting full control over transfers.
That looks like a stumbling block, when really it ought to be seen as a golden opportunity, not just to hire the most exciting coach in the game but to unshackle themselves from a failed idea without having to lose face.
Chelsea are in their death throes, on a downwards spiral that will prove fatal unless and until they do something truly radical: ditch the entire idea.
So, give Alonso the keys. It is the only way to hard reset and climb back up the pyramid. Every other way lies ruin.
Odds correct at 15:50 BST (4/5/26)
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