Three Premier League clubs copying Chelsea’s revolutionary transfer idea despite rule change | OneFootball

Chelsea’s ownership came in with a policy of handing out long contracts, and that has now become the norm with many top clubs.

A piece in the Athletic today has some interesting thoughts about Chelsea’s contract policy.

As part of their overhaul of the club, the new ownership instigated a policy of handing out monster deals, some as long as nine years. This has reduced a bit with the capping of amortisation of transfers to five years. But the club are still offering much longer contracts than they were under Romano Abramovich, and the piece notes that many clubs have followed suit.

A policy that got a lot of criticism at the time for breaking the norms of the league is now becoming common. It’s noted that Liverpool, Tottenham and West Ham have all given out six and seven year contracts in the last couple of seasons.

Deals longer than amortisation period shows how much clubs believe in long deals

Marc Cucurella looks sad. (Photo by Clive Mason/Getty Images)

The fact that they give out deals longer than the maximum amortisation period shows that they think the benefits are more than just spreading the cost of the transfer over more years on their books. Longer contracts on lower wages mean players are easier to resell, something Chelsea have taken advantage of in the last couple of years of churn, with incomings and outgoings made easier by the deals.

There are downsides, as we will see, but the resale element has been proved corerct.

In other news…

Estevao has named his “hardest challenge” since arriving at Chelsea, and it might not be what you expect…

Landon Emenalo is a rising star in the academy, and we’re keen to see his first team debut – it should be coming up very soon.

Check out the latest edition of Simon Phillips’ SPTC podcast here: