Chelsea u18 vs Harimau Muda B, 31 july 9.45pm

Chelsea Football Club has often been lambasted by people outside of the club for failing to take into consideration the Financial Fair Play rulings.

The spending in the current window has already reached a dizzying figure close to the £60 million mark. If we assume the words of the hierarchy and the press to be true, we're set to cap our spending with a £20 million splash on Wigan's Victor Moses and Marseille's Cesar Azpilicueta.

So before we start to look dispirited and wonder whether the club have a direction in mind for their financial forays, let`s take a look at how exactly the Financial Fair Play regulations operate. The basic ruling is that starting from the sporting year 2011/12 up to the end of the 2014/15 season, Chelsea will be allowed to report a loss of €45million for the period which amounts to roughly £40million.

Now let's look at the trend the club has taken at various points of Mr. Abramovich's tenure, to see whether the club is headed in the right direction, and whether there is some sense to the mass spending taking place this summer after all.

For the year 2009 Chelsea Football club made a loss of reportedly around £75 million, which was reduced to around £71 million for the year 2010 and came down further to £68 million after Gourlay's appointment in the year 2011, this after a £73 million mega splash on the signings of Torres and Luiz, a rare January foray for the club to add to the £61million spent in June the same year.

Sorry for raining in with the numbers, but my point is simply that the club showed a reduction in losses despite a spending on player transfers which is more than double that of the previous two years combined. The reason was a record turnover for the club in ticket sales, almost a £20 million improvement, added to several new sponsorship deals signed.

So where does that leave us for this season. Even if we take our spending up to the £80million mark this year, and add to it the £20million spent this january, we'll still have spend some £30million less than the previous year when we recorded the £68million loss.

If we factor in the record revenue from the Champions League success and the future income increase as a result, as well as all the new bumper deals that we have signed, our losses this term should be significantly less than the one in the previous year. Maybe even close to £40-50 million less. If we maintain that sum for the coming 2 seasons, we'll be well clear of the hammer that strikes the over-spenders when the regulations come into effect.

But can we sustain it? Well having 7 competitions potentially to win this season will certainly help. Depending on our success, our revenue is only likely to increase.

Moreover, the last time Chelsea spent big to formulate a new squad, with the spending being somewhat similar to that of the last few windows, was the 04/05 and 05/06 seasons after which, the next 4 seasons saw a net spend of only £10.4 million taking into account the buys and sales. This is the period from 2006-2010. So if the current young and hungry buys turn out to actually be as talented as they are reputed to be, then we do have our spine for the future, and any chops and changes will be of a minor nature at best. Even if they aren't, I doubt, that the spending will reach such heights again.

There's a further technicality that will please quite a few too. None of the players signed before 2010 count in the FFP evaluation in terms of wages. That's Cech, Terry, Ivanovic, Cole, Lampard, Mikel, Drogba, Kalou and many others whose wages may have factored into expenses, won't be done so. Meaning that's quite a few million more saved.

All in all, an expensive summer spending including the signings of Marin, The Hazard Brothers, Oscar and potentially Moses and Azpi still leaves us well on course for conformity with FFP from what little knowledge I've gathered. In fact, even if we throw a wrench like say Cavani in, as long as we stay on course with the trends the club has followed, with the improvements shown recently, FFP is not a worry for us for now. Eventually though, those Youth products will play a key role because there's still the one problem with the trends... and that's the massive overhaul after every generation costing a fortune... which FFP won't allow in future.

Read more: http://www.chelsea.vitalfootball.co.uk/art...5#ixzz22BOYLp00

nice read, but we don't need the Cavani+Hulk after all. So lets stop the hunt list with Cesar & Mosses = 20mil.

Behind closed door. FAM dont allow people to go and watch the game

lol wisma FAM is not like military place or something.

it's just an office building. with football field.

NEVER ever heard FAM dont allow people to watch football there in my entire life. dont worry mate

I heard from the secretary of the chelsea fan club in malaysia says that they held a talk about the match and FAM is the one didnt allow anyone to watch and they didnt mention where exactly are they playing tonight.

KUALA LUMPUR, July 31 (Bernama) -- The Chelsea FC Youth Team will meet Malaysia's Under-19 team in a closed-door friendly match at the Wisma FAM field in Kelana Jaya, near here, Tuesday night.

it's an open space to begin with. u can still watch it practically anywhere from the outside  hahaha

but i've been there to watch national team closed door training/ frenly for so many times.
hmm dunno they suddenly become efficient because of foreign team? 

i myself might gamble to go tonite,  all the way from Shah Alam


match is at wisma FAM, kelana jaya. not sure the secretary 'really' met the FAM guy o not. it's not even the biggest secret