If your club sells its soul like Chelsea, don't play the victim card over dirty money. Consider for one moment your entertainment ‘suffering’ versus loss of life, human suffering, loved ones, livelihoods, homes…take one moment to imagine.
Brian Reade-Daily Mirror:
The depressing thing is sportswashing works when the Premier League has an open-door policy for money from any source, but fans shouldn't be surprised when it ends badly
Mauricio Pochettino said it was sad hearing his fans boo Lionel Messi and Neymar at the weekend as a backlash to PSG failing once again in the Champions League.
Unsurprisingly, everyone outside of Paris found it so funny they needed to insert a Tena pad in their underwear. It’s not sad hearing a pair of mercenaries who left Barcelona for a lesser league to fatten already-bulging wallets being abused by spoiled fans who believe Qatari billions should automatically entitle them to be the best team in the world.
I’m guessing Chelsea followers who’ve been around for a while won’t be surprised to see Roman Abramovich’s demise being greeted joyously among rivals who looked on powerlessly, and enviously, as ill-gotten Russian gains bought them every trophy in sight.
And how placards at Stamford Bridge on Sunday saying “Don’t use Chelsea for your bulls**t politics” while tanks the government alleges are potentially made from steel manufactured by their beloved oligarch’s company fired on Ukrainian women and children, inspired contempt; a contempt that turned to disgust when Chelsea played the suffering victim card by demanding Saturday’s FA Cup tie at Middlesbrough be played behind closed doors for the sake of “sporting integrity.”
As the club’s former doctor, Eva Carneiro tweeted: “Consider for one moment your entertainment ‘suffering’ versus loss of life, human suffering, loved ones, livelihoods, homes…take one moment to imagine.”
I don’t blame supporters whose club has wallowed in years of mediocrity embracing owners who want to sportswash them to glory as the Qataris have done at PSG, Abramovich at Chelsea and the Abu Dhabi Group with Manchester City.
Before Sunday's game Newcastle fans were understandably mocking Chelsea’s current skint status which they so recently suffered. But how banal to chant about Abramovich being a “war offender” when the regime that finances their club wages an equally obscene war in Yemen?
Is it such a leap of imagination to understand your idols too are financed by blood money as your club’s precious name is exploited to present the human rights oppressing Saudis in a positive light? A country run by a brutal cabal who recently beheaded 81 opponents in one day.
Chelsea’s 'Roman Empire' banner and the Toon Army’s Saudi Arabian flags are not just equally offensive, but the most depressing proof that sportswashing works when the Premier League has an open-door policy on allowing dirty money to cleanse itself via our country’s national game.
Chelsea fans are now realising, as Newcastle’s and Manchester City’s may one day have to, the downside to their Faustian pact. It should serve as a warning to all clubs tempted to sell their souls to the devil.
Enjoy the ride with humility, relish the glory, the trophies and the global profile but never lose sight of who owns your club and why they want it. Don’t succumb, like PSG, to a sense of ludicrous over-entitlement. Don’t forget where you came from and may one day return to if chickens come home to roost. And when they do, don’t play the victim.
Expect gloating from rival fans who watched you buy all the best players and travel to the top in the first-class carriage with two fingers pushed up against the window while they stood on the platform waiting for a train that never came.
And when the ride ends, appreciate how exhilarating it was. Then get off and walk like the rest.
