A consortium led by the Ricketts family has withdrawn from the process of taking over the London club.
The American consortium led by the Ricketts family announced on Friday that it had withdrawn its offer to buy Chelsea, the day after the deadline for submitting applications for the takeover of the club put up for sale by its Russian owner Roman Abramovich.
In a statement, Tom and Laura Ricketts, owners of the Chicago Cubs baseball franchise, and their partners, American billionaires Ken Griffin and Dan Gilbert, say they have decided “not to submit a final offer for Chelsea FC” , due to a lack of agreement on the final composition of their proposal.
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In addition to this consortium, three candidates had expressed their desire to submit an offer to the New York investment bank Raine Group, before the deadline set for Thursday: Todd Boehly, co-owner of another baseball franchise – the Los Angeles Dodgers -, Martin Broughton, former chairman of Liverpool, and Steve Pagliuca, co-owner of the Boston Celtics basketball club.
The Ricketts’ takeover bid had been criticized by Chelsea supporters, who had blamed the family patriarch, Joe Ricketts, for being accused of Islamophobia in 2019 after some of his emails leaked.
The latter – not involved in the takeover proposal – had apologized for his comments and the family said in a statement last month that they “reject(reject) any form of hatred in the strongest possible terms”. But this controversy has nothing to do with the withdrawal of the takeover offer, according to British media.
Chelsea were put up for sale on March 2 by Abramovich, who had anticipated British government sanctions targeting oligarchs close to the Kremlin and Vladimir Putin since the invasion of Ukraine. The club obtained a special government license allowing it to continue its activities, but under strict conditions.