Chelsea’s new economic model includes bodyshopping

Chelsea can start two full eleven’s with their loan army and then some

After earning a miniscule profit in 2012, Chelsea recorded a £54.852m loss the following year. Not exactly what they were looking for to live within the FFP starve the beast economics. To get ahead of the UEFA restrictions they’ve gone street smart luring a pool of global youth talent by dangling their name as bait. Most of them are 18 years and a bit more than that. At present their chances of getting to the first team is slim to none but some in the later stages of development could have that dream materialize. Between now and then, these ingenues are farmed off to other smaller clubs on loans with their wages paid for.

That club could then buy out the player’s contract after deeming them valuable to their fortunes, or Chelsea finally decides the player is ready to transition to the big time of first squad duty, or if these two scenarios don’t work, loan him out again. It’s a win-win situation. And it’s roots lie in the Y2K end times whereby big consultancies in the US and Europe fearing economic catastrophe contracted out IT workers mostly from India on a short term basis. The Indian tech companies became frontrunners in outsourcing and offshoring as trained engineers were sent out to the USA and Europe on temp workers visas for specific jobs. A small number of them had their contracts bought out by the hiring consultancy, many more with no work and expiring visas were put into a pool as a rapid response team and recycled to other companies when projects opened up. With CTO’s now pushing big data models, IT has become central to businesses innovating to maintain a competitive edge making bodyshopping even more lucrative. A derogatory term, to many, but it is a apt descriptor of what transpires in the IT world, and now increasingly in football, in teams such as Chelsea and AC Milan.

Chelsea has 26 players out on loan. Some are big names like Fernando Torres, unique in the annals as a player with the poorest ROI. But then there are others like Josh McEachran, a Chelsea Academy product touted as the next best thing, but now in his 5th season as a loan out, most recently at Vitesse. At 21 years he’s got age on his side but his work is cut out to make the grade at Chelsea with the likes of Eden Hazard, Oscar, Cesc Fabregas, Willian, and Ramires ahead of him. Or Gael Kakuta, whose controversial Chelsea transfer was investigated by FIFA for financial inducement to break his contract with Lens. He is now playing for his 6th club since his 2009 arrival. In fact, out of the 26, nineteen players are multiple loaners on their second loan with 11 on four or more. Ryan Bertrand whose star shone so brightly in the 2012 CL final, now finds himself in Southampton filling in for Luke Shaw, his Chelsea future presently untenable as Cesar Azpilicueta and summer transfer Luis Felipe, locked into that position.

For a combined £16m investment, these players loaned out are recouping Chelsea £9.1m in revenue. In addition, as Jake Cohen writes, Chelsea’s joy loan club include Romelu Lukaku, billed as the next Didier Drogba, finally sold to Everton after his third season out on loan for £21.6m, Patrick Van Aanholt now at Sunderland for £2.5m, George Saville at Wolves for £1m. That is a cool £25m in your pocket. And its not just the cash register going off, as some off the loans celebrate a homecoming after maturing to occupy crucial positions once they become available, as in Thibaut Courtois summoned from Atletico Madrid for Petr Cech, fading into the twilight of his vaunted career. Or Kurt Zouma, after his St Etienne stint, making the list of the 10 most desirable transfers.

The spin; Chelsea’s loan army is a result of Michael Emenalo’s feedforward vision developing all this youth talent to bolster the squad. In truth, this is just post millennial bodyshopping to circumvent the FFP by dangling Chelsea’s name to seduce talented recruits. Most of them will never wear Blues but that’s not the point. They add to a pool created by the sport’s most extensive and sophisticated scouting system to be shipped off to clubs with needs to fill. As in bodyshopping, its a network and in Chelsea’s case they’ve developed those with Middlesbrough, Vitesse, and a few others. The players get paid and in turn, Chelsea get paid. Then you dress it up in some nice solipsistic terms.