Culture
Chelsea Soccer Fans Hold on to Their Team, For Now
Fans-turned-shareholders vote down initial plan to sell their stock for a larger stadium
Fans of the Chelsea Football Club saved it back in the 1990s, when they teamed up as shareholders and purchased the financially strapped team’s London stadium, the 106-year-old Stamford Bridge. Now they don’t want to let their historic home go.
The team’s finances have dramatically reversed their downward trend, and now the club’s also-rich owner, Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, would like to buy back the stadium. Abramovich has dreams of building the team a newer, larger stadium elsewhere to boost its profitability. But he and other management within the organization claim they would need the expected $640 million in profits from selling the stadium and its land in order to build a new stadium in another part of town.