Chelsea's spending spree cut short

250 million pounds.
Taste it.
Swish it around in your mouth for a moment.

Now spit it out because that’s roughly the amount of money that Chelsea F.C, has spent on buying players since 2004. Now, the team that has become synonymous with major spending, at least before Real Madrid’s summer spending spree, is banned from buying anybody for the next two transfer windows. In an incredible ruling, FIFA has banned Chelsea from registering any new players for a year for the manner in which they acquired Gael Kakuta from Lens.



This decision will have massive ramifications for this season’s Premier league and Champions League. Chelsea were unusually quiet in this summer’s transfer opening, making only one major signing in Yuri Zhirkov. Now it looks like this lack of action will cost Chelsea both a shot at a premier league title and Champions league title.

Since we are heading into 2010, there is the idiotically scheduled African Cup of Nations taking place this winter. What genius decided that a continent’s title should be competed for in the middle of every major European season? Despite this absurdity, It continues every other two years. But I digress. For Chelsea, the African Cup of Nations will serve to end all of their title hopes.

Chelsea boasts the most talented group of Africans on any European club squad. With Michael Essien and Didier Drogba, they trot out two of the most talented African players if not the two most talented. Chelsea’s midfield will also John Obi MIkel while the attack will lose Salomon Kalou. The loss of these four players for most of the month of February will signal the end of Chelsea’s title hopes. Lets look at Chelsea’s attack and midfield without these players.

Attack: Without Didier Drogba and Salomon Kalou Chelsea only have one natural striker , Nicolas Anelka. This leaves Chelsea with few goal scoring options and would likely force Chelsea to play a three man front with Anelka between two wingers. These two wingers would likely be some combination of Zhirkov or Malouda on the left with the soon returning Joe Cole on the right. This would give Chelsea lots of creativity but leave them with very few goals.

Midfield: The midfield will also become a problem without Mikel and Essien. Essien is the stalwart of the Chelsea midfield with his strong tackling and passing skills allowing Lampard and Ballack to push forward. This leaves Chelsea with central midfield options of Frank Lampard, Deco and Michael Ballack. Where Chelsea has played with a three man midfield for many years, they would not be able to do this because of the necessity for a three man front. The first choice duo would almost certainly be Lampard and Ballack with Ballack playing in a more holding role and Lampard pushing forward as he likes to do. Lampard is usually good for some goals in a forward midfield role but with the added defensive responsibilities he will have it is likely that his goal scoring record would drop. Ballack is also not suited to playing a holding midfield role. There is no doubt in my mind that a player of his caliber can do it, but the position does not come naturally to him like it does to Essien. The ageing Deco would come off the bench to provide some attacking flair for the central midfield, but he has certainly fallen off from what he once was. Three central midfielrders is all that Chelsea will have for the month of February.

Looking at Chelsea’s fixture schedule we see the compounding of their troubles. With a visit from Arsenal, a visit to Everton and a home match against Manchester City, February presents a difficult fixture schedule. They also have a match at Wolverhampton, but I would imagine any form of a Chelsea team should be able to take the points at Wolverhampton. February is also the first knockout round for the Champions League. Chelsea will be unable to compete with the top sides in Europe and, barring a lucky draw, would most likely crash out of the Champions League. Without their full side and without being able to add reinforcements, I have trouble seeing Chelsea gaining more than four points from their February Premier League schedule. This will be a heavy setback in their chase for the title.

And this is assuming nobody gets injured. Add in the injuries that accompany ever Premier league campaign and Chelsea is really in trouble.

So now the title contenders change. Arsenal, Manchester United and Manchester City appear to be the front runners for the title with Liverpool and Chelsea trailing those top three. If Chelsea were to fail to finish in the top four it would not be absurd t say that some of their big name players will want to leave to play champions league football. Without the cash from competing in the Champions league and the loss of big name players, Chelsea could be in trouble in the next few years.

Oh, and Man Utd. are under investigation for the same thing.