The constant leaks about Paris Saint Germain and Manchester City’s finances should come of interest to Chelsea who played by the rules.
Many saw Paris Saint Germain and Manchester City’s massive spending sprees in the last decade and asked “why is Roman Abramovich not doing that?”. The answer came in the form of the recent leaks which state that the two clubs allegedly moved money around and had help concealing it to continue to spend big.
It should be noted that little will probably actually come of these leaks. Manchester City, especially with Pep Guardiola at the helm, will be seen as too big to fail. PSG, the sole juggernaut from France, will also escape punishment most likely simply because their caving might sink the league.
But what if punishments do occur? What if PSG and City are fined back to a level within reason? If that were to happen, a club like Chelsea would suddenly gain pole position to take control of the Premier League in the same way Juventus has a hold on Serie A and Bayern Munich has a hold on the Bundesliga.
Assuming that a punishment causes City to return to Financial Fair Play levels, they would need to massively cut their wage bill and sell quite a few players. Guardiola, genius that he is, is also likely to jump ship as someone less illustrious replaces him. Suddenly the league’s biggest spender would not be able to spend and they would likely tumble down the table.
Morning Leicester City’s miracle, the only other club to win the title in recent years has been Chelsea. Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur have made a go of it on and off, but only Chelsea has actually pulled over the line to deny City. And if City could not spend as freely as they could before and had to sell players (and possibly lose Guardiola along the way), then Chelsea would be in a great spot to take control.
Spurs, even if they do move into a new stadium eventually, would struggle to match Chelsea’s spending. Arsenal possibly could but has only opened the purse strings in spurts. Liverpool would be in a similar position as Arsenal. Only Manchester United could spend more than Chelsea and they have a lot more to get in order before they can look like a title challenger again.
So in the event FIFA actually does something, Chelsea would suddenly be the team with money and capability again. Used correctly, that could see the Blues take control of the Premier League just as Juventus did in Italy and Bayern Munich did in Germany.
And it would all come down to Chelsea playing by the rules even when teams like City openly defied them. The policy would work out in the end if FIFA decides to level things out for City (and PSG).
Of course, FIFA being FIFA, they are likely to let City and PSG off with little to no punishment. They may slap a transfer ban on them for a year, but nothing equal to how much they have broken the rules (again, allegedly). But it is nice to dream of a world where FIFA is not corrupt, actually does something about rule breakers, and Chelsea then takes advantage to take control of England in a way not seen since Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United.