Mason Mount could be first of many Chelsea departures as spectre of FFP breaches weighs heavily

It’s fair to say that things haven’t probably worked out the way that Chelsea owner, Todd Boehly, had hoped during his first year in charge, with potential FFP breaches now seemingly forcing a fire sale at Stamford Bridge over the summer.

According to transfermarkt, the west Londoners spent €611.49m (£541.14m) over the last couple of transfer windows.

That’s an astronomical figure by anyone’s reckoning, and without the sale of certain key players, there was always going to be a point where spending that kind of money wasn’t sustainable.

It seems as if that point may be coming sooner rather than later too.

According to The Times (subscription required), the Blues will have to consider significant player sales to avoid falling foul of FFP rules.

This raises the prospect of not just Mason Mount leaving the club, but a handful of other stars too, giving Graham Potter, if he’s still in charge at the Bridge next season, a dilemma even before a ball is kicked in anger.

Todd Boehly’s spending hasn’t helped Graham Potter

Mount has been strongly linked with Liverpool, per talkSPORT, who quote sources close to the player as suggesting a switch to the Reds is ‘highly likely.’

The Telegraph (subscription required) also noted that Man City are interested in acquiring the services of Mateo Kovacic, and there are likely to be others.

It’s not the best of situations for the club to find themselves in, although football finance expert, Kieran Maguire, being quoted by The Times, suggests that there is a way out of potential Financial Fair Play breaches.

“The one thing Chelsea have in their favour is that they have a very large squad so they are in a position to raise money by selling players in the summer,” he said.

“We have already seen speculation about Mason Mount and Conor Gallagher being sold.”

Clearly, Boehly’s rate of spending can’t continue at the rate it has since he took over.

Whilst he might want to hoover up the game’s best talent, that comes at potentially more cost than an initial financial outlay.

If he wants to bring in some of the world’s best exponents of the beautiful game, then he either needs to get creative with company accounts, or accept that there may regularly be a higher turnover of players which doesn’t really benefit anyone in the long run.

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