Chelsea have been handed a £10m fine by the Football Association after admitting to more than 70 charges of breaking financial rules over agent payments.
The breaches occurred under former owner Roman Abramovich and related to secret payments made to agents during transfer dealings involving Eden Hazard, Willian and Samuel Eto’o.
An independent commission initially imposed a suspended points deduction on the club, but Chelsea successfully challenged that decision on appeal.
As a result of the appeal, the points deduction was replaced with a suspended transfer ban, offering the club some relief ahead of the new season.
The latest fine brings Chelsea’s total financial punishment to more than £20m, following an earlier Premier League sanction over the same breaches.
Chelsea argued for leniency on the grounds that their new owners, a US consortium led by Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital, had self-reported the offences upon discovering them.
The Premier League had already faced criticism for agreeing to a settlement with Chelsea in March that did not include any sporting penalty whatsoever.
The initial FA commission was particularly damning in its assessment of the club’s conduct, describing it as spanning more than a decade of trophy-winning seasons.
The commission stated: “Nevertheless, that conduct was so egregious, so persistent and of such a duration that an overall sanction, whilst taking account of the mitigation which has rightly been described as ‘very powerful’, must reflect the fact that over a period of 13 years, one of the leading clubs under the umbrella and authority of the FA, if not in Europe, behaved in such a way that the integrity of football, and the competitions in which it was competing, was seriously compromised.”
Amid the financial penalties, Chelsea have received a significant boost with confirmation that winger Mykhailo Mudryk is free to play again following his doping ban.
Mudryk had been sidelined for more than 18 months after testing positive for the banned substance meldonium in a drug test carried out in late 2024.
The Ukraine international appealed his four-year ban and has agreed a deal with the FA and World Anti-Doping Agency that involved him admitting to the breaches.
Under the terms of the agreement, Mudryk’s suspension ended on 30 July, opening the door for his return to first-team football this season.
Chelsea signed Mudryk for £89m in January 2023, beating Arsenal to the signature of the highly-rated youngster in a high-profile transfer battle.
His career had already begun to stall before the drug ban was imposed, meaning he now faces a significant challenge to rebuild his reputation and reclaim a place in the squad.