The endless checkbook of Todd Boehly, the new owner of Chelsea: from the Bruce Springsteen catalog to the long process to buy the club

A single British club has spent more money in January on transfers than all the teams in the League, the Bundesliga, Ligue 1 and Serie A combined.

With an estimated investment of 325 million euros, Chelsea has monopolized 39% of the Premier's cake and has broken the winter market thanks to the endless checkbook of its new owner, the North American billionaire Todd Boehly, willing to

in megalomania to his predecessor, the Russian oligarch

.

The final bell was put by the signing of the Argentine

, who struck down the Premier record with 118 million euros, days after securing the Ukrainian

for 99 million in a tough fight with Arsenal, plus the reinforcements of the Frenchman

in the rear and of the British with Nigerian blood

, and of course the unpayable loan of

, who showed with his goal against West Ham what he can give of himself.

With all its new potential, Chelsea returns to the Champions League this Wednesday.

He will do so by facing Borussia in Dortmund in the round of 16 first leg, with the impossible mission of satisfying his ambitious owner and emulating the success of 2021, when he was proclaimed European champion under the baton of Thomas

.

The German coach, however, fell out of favor at the beginning of the season and was ousted by Todd Boehly himself, who seems to have also inherited another of his qualities from Abramovich: impatience.

The change of Tuchel for

, responsible for Brighton's irresistible rise, has not yet had the desired effect: Chelsea is lost in the middle of the table in the Premier, in ninth place and with just 23 goals in 22 games, which says a lot about his desperate lack of a nine, despite the expense that has not stopped since the summer (the London club rescued

from Barcelona after a remarkable performance by the Gabonese striker at the Camp Nou, but he has not even managed to make the cut to be registered in the Champions League).

Far away and any remote aspiration in the Premier, Todd Boehly has put all the meat on the grill of the Champions League.

Graham Potter has his backing for the moment, but he knows that his future may depend on the European success of the blues with its millionaire squad.

Abramovich's romance and breakup with his talismanic coach, José Mourinho, can serve as a reference to know how they spend it at the club.

IAN KINGTONAFP

Anyone would say that Todd Boehly has followed Abramovich's manual to the letter, who refounded Chelsea in his own way in 2003 and won 21 titles (including the only two Champions Leagues in the entity's history in 2012 and 2021, and five Premiers) after spending up to 2.2 billion euros on transfers and dispatching up to 15 coaches in the two decades he was in charge of the club.

Todd Boehly actually starred in a first attempt to take ownership of Chelsea in 2019, but Abramovich clipped his wings.

The American tycoon, CEO of Eldridge Industries, with ramifications in sectors such as banking, insurance, technology, entertainment and sports (co-owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers of Major League Baseball and shareholder of the Los Angeles Lakers of the NBA) , had been planning his very personal assault on European football for some time.

The opportunity came to him in 2022, when the sanctions against Russia for the war in Ukraine forced Abramovich to leave through the back door, forced to sell the club last March.

From wrestling to music

Stamford Bridge suspended ticket sales to fans for three months, the club tightened its belt and the future seemed more uncertain than ever.

However, in the end there were up to 250 bidders, 12 "credible" offers and three finalists, among which the consortium created by Todd Boehly with

and Clearlake Capital stood out.

The sale was closed in the end for 4,250 million pounds (about 5,000 million euros).

Todd Boehly's fortune is estimated at around 5,100 million, as published by Forbes magazine, which ranks him number 637 on the list of the richest in the world.

Through Eldridge Industries he manages a vast investment "empire" estimated at 36 billion euros.

Born in 1973, with one foot in California and the other in Connecticut, Boehly is a descendant of German immigrants who fled during World War II.

Sport is in his blood: he was a youth wrestling champion.

He spent time in the UK, studied at the London School of Economics (LSE) and took his first steps in the world of finance at Citibank.

Boehly is married with three children, and has always been heavily involved in the world of information and entertainment.

Among his many occupations is that of president of the Hollywood Foreign Journalists Association, which awards the Golden Globes every year. He is a great rock fan and has bought, among others, the catalogs of The Killers and Bruce Springsteen.

"I've spent my entire life following a mantra that simple: if I say I'm going to get something, I get it," Boehly himself recently declared on the Yahoo News portal.

"And when you have a reputation for being able to make things happen, it's amazing what comes to your locker."

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