Chelsea feel the blues over loss

Chelsea made a loss of almost £100 million last year despite owner Roman Abramovich pouring nearly a quarter of a billion pounds into the Premier League club, their figures for 2018/19 released yesterday show. Amongst their expenditure was yet another payout to a sacked manager -- this time £26.6 million to Italian Antonio Conte. “Exceptional items in the current year of £26.6million relate to changes in respect of the men’s team management and coaching staff, together with associated legal costs,” read Chelsea’s latest set of published accounts, for the year ending June 30, 2019. The club has spent £90 million in compensation to Conte and his predecessors since Abramovich took over in 2004. The club also invested £280.6m in their playing squad during 2018-19, with the acquisitions of Kepa Arrizabalaga, Christian Pulisic, Mateo Kovacic and Jorginho all included in their latest figures. In all Abramovich, who has at times been rumoured to be disenchanted and looking to sell, put in £247 million of his own money over the course of the year -- ending in June 2019 -- with the club still ending £96.6m in the red.