Just read Matt Scott article on Chelsea on ESPN and they really are in the proverbial S***.
http://www.espn.com/soccer/club/che...-on-or-else-their-present-and-future-are-grim
The season they last won the league when they had no European football they had a operating cash flow of 10 million pounds.
They are still reliant on Abramovich propping them up and are no where near being a self sustaining club.
Look at the loans in this graph of Abramovich propping them up at the start of a season and taking money out at the end of the season.
View attachment 48001
Here's some alarming snippets in the article.
Abramovich has been pouring, on average, around £60 million a year into Chelsea. Technically, it has not been largesse but loans, and the most recent count, made in June last year, said the club owed its owner some £1.2 billion. This is repayable within 18 months of Abramovich calling it in -- a commitment Chelsea would naturally be unable to meet if he did -- although at that time he did not express any intention of demanding repayment
The problem for Chelsea is that, if Abramovich turns off the tap, they would need to become self-sustaining, and that could be hard to maintain. If they were to rely on the cash they generate themselves, Chelsea would be forced to operate at a different end of the transfer market.
Despite winning plaudits for canniness in the market, Chelsea spend tens of millions of pounds more on transfers than they generate in free cash flow. And more buying will be required in the years to come: The 11 players that manager Antonio Conte used most frequently this past season have an average age close to 27. Refreshment will be needed before too long.
In only two of the past six seasons have Chelsea had substantially more than £10m in cash left over after core expenditures on wages, travel, utility bills, insurance and the like. It is unthinkable that Conte, who has repeatedly complained during the season about what he perceives as a lack of financing for new players, or a new manager would be satisfied with a net transfer budget of less than £10m annually.
The picture may soon get worse before it gets better. Having failed to finish in the top four, Chelsea will be second-class citizens in Europe when they play in the far-less-lucrative Europa League next season. With that revenue stream falling and stadium income effectively remaining flat, this would be a hard time for the club to have to live within their means.
