Chelsea are said to be looking into buying a club in Portugal as part of Todd Boehly’s efforts to overhaul the way the Blues are structured.
Boehly has been integral to the running of Chelsea since the takeover this year and has been serving in multiple roles such as interim sporting director until people can be put in place at the club.
The American billionaire and his co-owner Behdad Eghbali are now in the process of hiring a new sporting director and there are many big names on the list for the key position at the London club, which will also free up Boehly to do his job as owner.
Aside from the in-house clean-up, Chelsea are also keen to follow a big current trend in football, made popular by the Red Bull and City Football Group, by becoming a multi-ownership model.
According to The Telegraph, Boehly met with academy manager Neil Bath and super agent Jorge Mendes in Portugal in June to discuss the possibility of buying a Portuguese club.
Bath is now reportedly scouting around for the best fit in Portugal and, once found, Chelsea could then lean on Mendes’ links in the country to get a deal over the line.
The Chelsea owner spoke about the trend at the SALT conference in New York this week, where he said: “I think there’s different countries where there’s advantages to having a club. Red Bull have Salzburg and Leipzig in the Champions League.”
As part of the same chat, Boehly also stated:
“I want to continue building out the footprint. I think there’s different countries where there’s advantages to having a club. We know people and human capital. We understand game plans and strategies. We’re not expecting to be the football experts to find the best talent, we are going to put those people in place.
“The challenge that Chelsea has, when you have 18, 19, 20-year-old superstars, you can loan them out to clubs, but you put their development in someone else’s hands. Our goal is to make sure we can show pathways for our young superstars to get onto the Chelsea pitch while getting them real game time. The way to do that is through another club in a really competitive league in Europe.”
#?????? has got a bit of everything. #ChelseaFC chairman Todd Boehly offers a fascinating glimpse into his global vision for the English Premier League club. pic.twitter.com/wa9aBHuGKe
— SALT ?? (@SALTConference) September 13, 2022