Chelsea Discussion

[Bluewolf]

It seems as though the potential Saudi deal may be fraught with complications as the Government and the Premier league need to be certain that there are no ties to either the Government or indeed the new Newcastle owners... The problem is proving there are no ties which would cause untold delays to the sale.. 

[OrangeKhrush]

19 minutes ago, Dr. Gonzo said:

He's had close ties to Boris Yeltsin and Roman Abramovich - it's naive to think a man with intensely close government relations no longer has close relationships with government. Particularly a man credited with introducing the first post-Soviet Russian president with the long-time autocrat in charge of Russia today.

it still is conjecture.   as Russell brand stated in his recent vlog on Trudaeu criticising Putin for for being authoritarian, but did very authoritarian things himself.   we can't pander western liberal values until we practice them ourselves.

 

I would like more than conflated conjecture.  beyond reasonable doubt before persecuting people or frankly the West is no better.

[Dr. Gonzo]

Just now, OrangeKhrush said:

it still is conjecture.   as Russell brand stated in his recent vlog on Trudaeu criticising Putin for for being authoritarian, but did very authoritarian things himself.   we can't pander western liberal values until we practice them ourselves.

 

I would like more than conflated conjecture.  beyond reasonable doubt before persecuting people or frankly the West is no better.

An authoritarian wouldn't have let a bunch of truckers humiliate him internationally  - Russell Brand should stick to doing drugs

[OrangeKhrush]

1 hour ago, Dr. Gonzo said:

An authoritarian wouldn't have let a bunch of truckers humiliate him internationally  - Russell Brand should stick to doing drugs

That is a big deflection,  discourse means exchange of views even if parties don't agree.  There is no moral obligation to agree,  yet the right to have different opinions, whether it is religious, political, socio-economic,  yet we live in times with the highest rate of censorship,  very similar to countries we accuse of censorship.  

20 years ago,  nobody would have turned their heads at the idea that a Islamic nation upholding its criminal justice system,  executed prisoners that were convicted of terrorism,  but we live in times where everyone is out for some kind of virtue grandstanding as "political power" or power in discourse is now deemed to be thee who is most virtuous. 

Persecuting people based on a prejudice without real cause is no different to what Adolf Hitler did.   It is perfectly acceptable to hold Russia accountable,  but individuals just because they are russian and rich is a gray area. 

In my opinion this could have all be prevented if the West was vigilant to its values and when it came to the fore that Russia was amassing troops,  the West should have amassed its troops on the Ukrainian and border states borders as a sign that any signs of aggression would be met with a show of unity.   but instead those that want to dictate virtue from their ivory towers are the ones with vested interests in this conflict,  more bent than the sickle.  

[RandoEFC+]

All I ever learn from this forum nowadays is that anyone who points at bad things and says "that's bad" is just virtue signalling/grandstanding/only doing it to make themselves look good.

[6666]

3 hours ago, Dr. Gonzo said:

Abramovich is meant to be separate from Putin too, yet we know that isn’t the case.

So that proves that any potential buyer from a non-western country must also be negatively involved with their government...? Huh? These people might turn out to be dodgy but you can't go "guilty until proven innocent" on people from countries you don't like.

And Roman might be a prick but him being targeted for this war still isn't something that I'd say makes sense. No doubt he is a dodgy bastard but all of that was seemingly fine a few weeks ago. This is just down to him being Russian rather than him having any deep links to this war happening. If he was any other nationality right now, it'd be business as usual.

I do wonder though, with people supposedly mad that he acquired his wealth in a questionable manner if the football authorities will strip Chelsea of the trophies they won under him. Although, if they haven't done it by now, they're probably unlikely to do it.

[Dr. Gonzo]

19 minutes ago, OrangeKhrush said:

That is a big deflection,  discourse means exchange of views even if parties don't agree.  There is no moral obligation to agree,  yet the right to have different opinions, whether it is religious, political, socio-economic,  yet we live in times with the highest rate of censorship,  very similar to countries we accuse of censorship.  

20 years ago,  nobody would have turned their heads at the idea that a Islamic nation upholding its criminal justice system,  executed prisoners that were convicted of terrorism,  but we live in times where everyone is out for some kind of virtue grandstanding as "political power" or power in discourse is now deemed to be thee who is most virtuous. 

Persecuting people based on a prejudice without real cause is no different to what Adolf Hitler did.   It is perfectly acceptable to hold Russia accountable,  but individuals just because they are russian and rich is a gray area. 

In my opinion this could have all be prevented if the West was vigilant to its values and when it came to the fore that Russia was amassing troops,  the West should have amassed its troops on the Ukrainian and border states borders as a sign that any signs of aggression would be met with a show of unity.   but instead those that want to dictate virtue from their ivory towers are the ones with vested interests in this conflict,  more bent than the sickle.  

How's that deflection?

You quoted some guy saying that Canada's PM had acted like a totalitarian. I meanwhile said a totalitarian wouldn't have allowed a protest to drag on for weeks before he even reacted - I know this is true, you can look at what a totalitarian government does with protesting by looking at what's happening in Russia right now. Or look at other parts of the world, like recently in Iran when farmers protested that there was not enough water to grow food... they got shot at. Those are better examples of a totalitarian reaction to when a protest ends up costing billions in trade. Not letting the issue drag for weeks before addressing it 

6 minutes ago, 6666 said:

So that proves that any potential buyer from a non-western country must also be negatively involved with their government...? Huh? These people might turn out to be dodgy but you can't go "guilty until proven innocent" on people from countries you don't like.

And Roman might be a prick but him being targeted for this war still isn't something that I'd say makes sense. No doubt he is a dodgy bastard but all of that was seemingly fine a few weeks ago. This is just down to him being Russian rather than him having any deep links to this war happening. If he was any other nationality right now, it'd be business as usual.

I do wonder though, with people supposedly mad that he acquired his wealth in a questionable manner if the football authorities will strip Chelsea of the trophies they won under him. Although, if they haven't done it by now, they're probably unlikely to do it.

I just don't know how you can say that re: Roman Abramovich. It's not a secret he's got close ties with Putin and Russia's government - his ties are so close he was even in Russian government fairly recently - and he's been suspected of acting as a financier for the Russian government after the 2014 sanctions.

Nobody's saying he should be targeted just because he's Russian. People are saying he should be targeted because as a Russian oligarch with his close ties to Putin, he's a "private citizen" in name only - his wealth and Russia's finances are connected.

Similarly, the Saudi Media Group is run by members of the Saudi elite who have close ties with MBS and his regime. Their ownership of the Independent indicates how they report on the Saudi government, considering their absence of coverage of Jamal Khashoggi's murder or the crisis in Yemen - and is a likely indication of that Chelsea (and Newcastle) would have a "trusted" western media outlet to help spread positive stories about why their respective Saudi ownership is a good thing for football, the UK, and Saudi Arabia.

And even if they're not as closely connected with MBS as they seem... they will always have the public pressure to kowtow to whatever MBS demands. High profile Saudis can't really get away with not falling in line with the dictatorship there. If you don't believe me: just ask Khashoggi's body parts.

It's far more nuanced than saying "people in the west are biased against owners from a particular part of the world" - Farhad Moshiri's a billionaire with dodgy ties to a Russian oligarch, but his family fled Iran in 1979 and his billions are completely unconnected with the corrupt and brutally oppressive regime from where he comes from. So while he's probably not a great person (no billionaire is) - he's not acting as the representative of a thuggish government that routinely steals from its people (and he's even taken steps to mitigate Everton's association with Usmanov and keep the club disconnected from the dodgy Russian oligarch).

So that's a non-Western club owner that's probably received a fair amount of criticism from his time owning a club... but that criticism happens to be based more around the bizarre decisions he's made as a club owner... rather than using his ownership interest in football to launder money for sanctioned oligarchs & wash a regime that has a rightfully tainted public perception clean in the eyes of sport fans.

I guess I just don't see what your issue is - Roman Abramovich is taking justifiable flak because the UK has been far too cozy with Russian oligarchs for too long and this invasion of Ukraine has changed public sentiment to where not even the Tories can turn a blind eye to it anymore. And that people would have similar concerns about the Saudis expanding their interest in British football, I think, can be justifiably have similar concerns.

[Waylander]

I find it very disappointing that tickets have been stopped for Chelsea fans against Boro in the cup.

Seems a massive overkill which diminishes the quarterfinal spectacle, I think Ken Bates recently said this is more about the govt grandstanding that it is being tough on Russia when it really is the ordinary fan and worker that pays the cost not Putin. 

[Stan]

24 minutes ago, Waylander said:

I find it very disappointing that tickets have been stopped for Chelsea fans against Boro in the cup.

Seems a massive overkill which diminishes the quarterfinal spectacle, I think Ken Bates recently said this is more about the govt grandstanding that it is being tough on Russia when it really is the ordinary fan and worker that pays the cost not Putin. 

Nothing from you about Chelsea's stupid request to have the game played behind closed doors? Is that not overkill and tough on Middlesbrough and their fans that would pay for Chelsea's wrongdoing, not Chelsea? 

[Spike]

Abramovic was one of the few oligarchs to survive the post-Yeltsin Russia. He threw his lot in with Putin to survive and he has done so to this day. The economic climate of Russia post USSR was a vacuum, state assets, and land was up for grab and swallowed by what was to become the oligarchs. In the early days the oligarch state was heavily supported by Boris Yeltsin and the USA but when Yeltsin was winding down and KGB supported Putin was gaining power there was a divide in the oligarchs, Abramovic was one that supported Putin, many of the others are dead or exiled, Khodorkovsky and Gusinky are exiled, while Berezovsky was assassinated in London with the assassination having ties to Abramovic. Saying these men  or Abramovic having political influence or proximity isn’t simply conjecture, it is a fact and it has been available to see since the Yeltsin era. Abramovic was the very first to endorse Putin for crying out loud. Denying this sort of transparent influence is like denying that Rupert Murdoch controls the papers, or that Comcast doesn’t control the cable networks, or that Amazon doesn’t control the delivery infrastructure. 

[Waylander]

1 hour ago, Stan said:

Nothing from you about Chelsea's stupid request to have the game played behind closed doors? Is that not overkill and tough on Middlesbrough and their fans that would pay for Chelsea's wrongdoing, not Chelsea? 

Didn't mention it as it had already been dismissed during the day and I agree a silly move.

[RandoEFC+]

I'm confused. Is Trudeau an authoritarian or an example of "liberal overreach"? Because I've read both in the past week and I'm not even convinced it was from two different posters.

[Dr. Gonzo]

16 minutes ago, Spike said:

Abramovic was one of the few oligarchs to survive the post-Yeltsin Russia. He threw his lot in with Putin to survive and he has done so to this day. The economic climate of Russia post USSR was a vacuum, state assets, and land was up for grab and swallowed by what was to become the oligarchs. In the early days the oligarch state was heavily supported by Boris Yeltsin and the USA but when Yeltsin was winding down and KGB supported Putin was gaining power there was a divide in the oligarchs, Abramovic was one that supported Putin, many of the others are dead or exiled, Khodorkovsky and Gusinky are exiled, while Berezovsky was assassinated in London with the assassination having ties to Abramovic. Saying these men  or Abramovic having political influence or proximity isn’t simply conjecture, it is a fact and it has been available to see since the Yeltsin era. Abramovic was the very first to endorse Putin for crying out loud. Denying this sort of transparent influence is like denying that Rupert Murdoch controls the papers, or that Comcast doesn’t control the cable networks, or that Amazon doesn’t control the delivery infrastructure. 

Yeah, anyone doubting Abramovich's connection with Putin really needs to look into the facts. He personally interviewed every single cabinet appointee in Putin's first cabinet & that's after recommending Putin to Yeltsin. He also recommended Medvedev to Putin as his "successor" in that brief period where he wasn't allowed to be president so he needed a puppet successor.

Abramovich is being targeted now because Putin has made his Russia a pariah state. Saying "well people used to not care" doesn't suddenly make Abramovich an innocent man - he's someone who's benefitted from Russia's corruption post USSR and is so closely tied to the most elite in Russia they're basically inseparable. The fact that some people used to not care should open peoples' eyes to what's happening in English football, not be used as an excuse to turn a blind eye to it for even longer.

8 minutes ago, RandoEFC said:

I'm confused. Is Trudeau an authoritarian or an example of "liberal overreach"? Because I've read both in the past week and I'm not even convinced it was from two different posters.

They probably think he's an "authoritarian" because of his "liberal overreach" - although I'm not sure the facts really paint a picture of authoritarian rule or overreach. Here's a world leader who let truckers converge on his capital and at US-Canada border crossings for weeks and bring a capital city to almost complete shutdown (while they attempted to prevent politicians from doing their jobs) and blocked imports/exports for several weeks costing over $21.1b in trade to be blocked.

Was he authoritarian in letting them protest for several weeks with pretty light penalties? Because I've got family that actually live under an authoritarian regime and they've attended protests and they usually don't get weeks before they face arrest... it's pretty instant that the threat of arrest comes in and it's coupled with the threat of imminent violence against the protestors. So from where I'm sitting, I don't think what Trudeau's done looks very authoritarian.

And is it liberal overreach to end a protest after weeks while it hurts businesses in Canada and the US to the amount where tens of billions are lost? Honestly, I think there's a case to be made that in the US or UK if business interests were threatened to the point of losing that sort of money by protestors... those governments would step in to act much quicker than we saw with Canada.

Both examples are good examples of lazy & bad faithed arguments to try to highlight "western hypocrisy." It relies on people outside of Canada not knowing enough about what happened with the protests in Canada and perhaps being sympathetic to those who were given a choice of getting a jab or losing their jobs, in order to agree that "yes Trudaeu acted like a despot" when in reality... I don't think that's what Trudaeu demonstrated at all in his actions. He arguably acted with kid gloves considering the economic cost of those border crossings being shut down.

And I think that's a bit weird, because you really don't have to try too hard to find evidence of western hypocrisy that's... pretty fucking legitimate. Our complicity with the Saudi coalition's invasion in Yemen, the Iraq war, etc... but I think highlighting that sort of hypocrisy might be shining a light on a problem in our society that they maybe don't actually want us to address, so that's probably why they don't bang that drum.

[RandoEFC+]

4 minutes ago, Dr. Gonzo said:

The fact that some people used to not care should open peoples' eyes to what's happening in English football, not be used as an excuse to turn a blind eye to it for even longer

Yeah I really feel as if our eyes should be open to this. It's already pissing me off to be honest that people don't really seem arsed by Newcastle's owners. I'm poorly educated on the Saudi-Yemen conflict but it sounds like it's in a similar ball park to what Russia are doing to Ukraine. Like I said, poorly educated so I'm happy to stand corrected if needs be. But the question should be asked, what's the actual difference?

For fans, the difference is a large part down to the fact that Newcastle haven't "stolen" any of the success reserved for the "established" teams or given anyone anything to be bitter about quite yet, which is a shame and very cynical of me but I really do think that's a part of it. I don't know whether Saudi Arabia's conflict with Yemen is more legitimate in some way, my understanding is that it isn't but again, I won't pretend to be an expert. I can't imagine any circumstance in which what they're doing is palatable though.

Anyway, why aren't we treating Newcastle's owners the same as Chelsea's? Why were they allowed to buy a Premier League club in the first place? Is it because their actions in Yemen aren't as bad as Putin somehow? Is it because we want to buy oil from and sell arms to Saudi Arabia and there isn't enough public outrage about them to override this for our government?

As an aside, I'm not necessarily calling for Newcastle to face the same sanctions as Chelsea, I'm not sure about the sanctions reaching as far as the rest of the football club when Abramovich is the only one personally responsible for anything related to Putin. I'd have thought there was a way to transfer ownership of the club without him getting a penny out of it and not having it impact on Chelsea's staff and fans. But I don't know, there's a lot of nitty gritty in there that I'm not overly interested in. What I'm generally interested in is the disparity between outrage and sanctions directed at Abramovich and the lack of outrage and sanctions directed at Newcastle's owners, because I can't find an angle to look at it without seeing some pretty massive double standards and some unpleasant truths about who Putin's victims are compared to who the Saudi regime's victims are.

[Dr. Gonzo]

53 minutes ago, RandoEFC said:

Yeah I really feel as if our eyes should be open to this. It's already pissing me off to be honest that people don't really seem arsed by Newcastle's owners. I'm poorly educated on the Saudi-Yemen conflict but it sounds like it's in a similar ball park to what Russia are doing to Ukraine. Like I said, poorly educated so I'm happy to stand corrected if needs be. But the question should be asked, what's the actual difference?

From a Western perspective, the Ukraine-Russia conflict is a lot more "clear cut" than the crisis in Yemen, at least in terms of "standing up for Western values." With Ukraine getting invaded, it's a democracy that wanted closer ties with the EU getting invaded by an autocratic country. It's much easier for us to imagine a side to support in this conflict, we're from the UK and have lived with democracy our whole lives - we have such close ties with the EU too that we were even fucking in the bloody thing until recently.

With Yemen, it's a much more complicated situation because: ultimately, regardless of who wins the conflict, there's nobody that you or I (or anyone else on the forum) would consider a good option for the future of Yemen. And it's a conflict steeped in sectarian bullshit, which is really offputting for most people.

Since 2004, the Houthi rebels (who at the time I think were all Shia, whereas now they're predominantly Shia but Sunnis fight with them too now) started an insurgency against Yemen's government (which was essentially a Saudi puppet government), by 2014 economic collapse & the end of oil subsidies had turned this conflict into a full blown civil war. In 2015, the president of Yemen fled when the Houthis stormed the presidential compound.

And it goes without saying, the Houthis are definitely not nice people. They're religious extremists, just a different flavour to what we're used to with Wahabi/Salafist extremists like ISIS (which btw we can also thank the Saudis as the biggest financial backers and proponents of the shite Wahabi ideology). Having said that, having absolute shit people in your country is not justification for what the Saudis have done to Yemenis generally.

Hadi (Yemen's president) fled to Saudi Arabia, where MBS & co. decided to support their failing puppet by leading a military intervention in Yemen. This originally consisted of bombing campaigns, but eventually spread to a blockade. This blockade has prevented food from reaching Yemen. The blockade would eventually lead to a food source crisis, which at this point has expanded into a famine in the country.

As the war expanded, the Saudi coalition (which the US and UK are a part of) started racking up a long list of war crimes in the conflict. They declared an entire city a legitimate military target (violating international law) and began deliberately targeting civilian infrastructure with cluster munitions. They began deliberately targeting facilities run by aid organisations & targeting camps for wounded war victims and doctors - this sent the message that aid workers and medical personnel in Yemen should fuck off outta there, which has led to critically low numbers of doctors in Yemen. This isn't just an issue for providing aid to the war wounded, it's led to the spread of diseases like cholera... and of course it's not like COVID-19 decided it would just ignore a warzone.

Other war crimes aside (btw, it's weird typing that out), using famine and disease as weapons of war to prop up a puppet government that was ousted from the country it was meant to rule is absolutely disgusting. But as I've described, they're not just using famine and disease for the war - there's a whole host of other war crimes.

And it's absolutely grim what's going on in Yemen and pretty disgusting that the West doesn't just arm these warmongers but also provides them support as members of the coalition as well.

[RandoEFC+]

@Dr. Gonzo good info but very much not good.

[OrangeKhrush]

Daniel medvedev now has to get up like a puppet and denounce Putin to play.   like anyone really needs to be concerned about a tennis player playing tennis.   

it's gone to far

[RandoEFC+]

Are some of you more upset with the reaction to Putin's war (tennis players having to disagree with mass murder and Chelsea fans not being able to buy tickets to football matches for a while) than what Putin himself is actually doing (killing thousands of people, mostly those from his own military that he's sending to their deaths to do his bidding)? I'm giving you a chance to say no because that's a pretty horrible conclusion to come to, but for some people, that's where all the evidence points.

[OrangeKhrush]

47 minutes ago, RandoEFC said:

Are some of you more upset with the reaction to Putin's war (tennis players having to disagree with mass murder and Chelsea fans not being able to buy tickets to football matches for a while) than what Putin himself is actually doing (killing thousands of people, mostly those from his own military that he's sending to their deaths to do his bidding)? I'm giving you a chance to say no because that's a pretty horrible conclusion to come to, but for some people, that's where all the evidence points.

given that medvedev and Chelsea have nothing to do with Putin, or sport with geo political issues.

I don't see what it will help and he could flat out lie and nobody will be wiser.  

what Putin is doing is wrong, but the persecution of Russians just for being Russia is a bridge to far (no pun)

[LFCMadLad]

Putin and his sidekicks will most probably already have a red dot on their forehead. It's about time the trigger was pulled. 

[RandoEFC+]

47 minutes ago, OrangeKhrush said:

given that medvedev and Chelsea have nothing to do with Putin, or sport with geo political issues.

I don't see what it will help and he could flat out lie and nobody will be wiser.  

what Putin is doing is wrong, but the persecution of Russians just for being Russia is a bridge to far (no pun)

The position that sport should never have anything to do with political issues is completely unrealistic. Perhaps it should be, I wouldn't necessarily say so because we've seen countless examples throughout history of sport being a force for good and a tool to encourage unity and positive relations, but if that was your view I wouldn't have a major problem with it. The reality, though, is that horse has bolted and it did so a long time before either of us was born.

Enough people have laid out the evidence in this thread about why Abramovich has been sanctioned (not persecuted). It's not because he's Russian, it's because he has links to Putin. Alisher Usmanov is another distasteful character linked to Premier League football who has been sanctioned for his links to Putin and he's from Uzbekistan, not Russia.

As for Medvedev, I don't see how that fits into your example of persecution. Him coming out and denouncing the war isn't him being persecuted. Again, you betray your own ugly worldview by suggesting that he has to come out "like a puppet" as if he can't make the decision for himself that the mass death and destruction caused by Putin.

I'm not in favour of picking on people just for being Russian but the ones who have actually been sanctioned have been done so for good reasons. The sport stuff is a grey area, such as the British motorsport authorities deciding that Russian and Belarusian drivers can't even compete in the UK under a neutral licence, or the Russian teams being banned from European football. I don't necessarily agree with that stuff, I haven't fully made up my mind to be honest because it's wrong to penalise people who aren't at fault but it increases the pressure on the Russian government domestically because those things have happened to their sports teams and their citizens as a result of Putin's actions. Like I said, grey area. I can understand people expressing their opinions on this but I do find it baffling that anyone could manage to get themselves so wound up about these small injustices while seemingly being able to shrug off the absolutely massive injustices being inflicted upon people in Ukraine.

[OrangeKhrush]

4 minutes ago, RandoEFC said:

The position that sport should never have anything to do with political issues is completely unrealistic. Perhaps it should be, I wouldn't necessarily say so because we've seen countless examples throughout history of sport being a force for good and a tool to encourage unity and positive relations, but if that was your view I wouldn't have a major problem with it. The reality, though, is that horse has bolted and it did so a long time before either of us was born.

Enough people have laid out the evidence in this thread about why Abramovich has been sanctioned (not persecuted). It's not because he's Russian, it's because he has links to Putin. Alisher Usmanov is another distasteful character linked to Premier League football who has been sanctioned for his links to Putin and he's from Uzbekistan, not Russia.

As for Medvedev, I don't see how that fits into your example of persecution. Him coming out and denouncing the war isn't him being persecuted. Again, you betray your own ugly worldview by suggesting that he has to come out "like a puppet" as if he can't make the decision for himself that the mass death and destruction caused by Putin.

I'm not in favour of picking on people just for being Russian but the ones who have actually been sanctioned have been done so for good reasons. The sport stuff is a grey area, such as the British motorsport authorities deciding that Russian and Belarusian drivers can't even compete in the UK under a neutral licence, or the Russian teams being banned from European football. I don't necessarily agree with that stuff, I haven't fully made up my mind to be honest because it's wrong to penalise people who aren't at fault but it increases the pressure on the Russian government domestically because those things have happened to their sports teams and their citizens as a result of Putin's actions. Like I said, grey area. I can understand people expressing their opinions on this but I do find it baffling that anyone could manage to get themselves so wound up about these small injustices while seemingly being able to shrug off the absolutely massive injustices being inflicted upon people in Ukraine.

if he doesn't denounce it he is banned, that is persecution based on preconceived ideas that all Russians are complicit.   medvedev has absolutely no reason to be asked this.   

it is enough to denounce Putin and his cronies, slam the largely ineffective embargos on them.   but treating every Russian with contempt is to far.

[RandoEFC+]

3 minutes ago, OrangeKhrush said:

if he doesn't denounce it he is banned

Can you back this up with credible evidence or is this conjecture? Genuine question, I've not seen anything about that though.

3 minutes ago, OrangeKhrush said:

 

it is enough to denounce Putin and his cronies

If Abramovich doesn't fit this criteria I don't know who does...

[OrangeKhrush]

15 minutes ago, RandoEFC said:

Can you back this up with credible evidence or is this conjecture? Genuine question, I've not seen anything about that though.

If Abramovich doesn't fit this criteria I don't know who does...

he and all Russia players must give statements or they will be banned from Wimbledon

[OrangeKhrush]

Just my opinion on the Chelsea sanctions.   Chelsea FC is a juristic person that exists and operates beyond a director,  a director is just a person in the entity.   I could happily go along with a sanction that lets money be moved out of the club under the guise of "directors dividends" and benefits,  but chelsea's trust account operates independently to Abramovich.   Chelsea like all football clubs make money from various sources of income be it sponsorships, tv revenue, competition money,  etc.   If the money is obtained by the club through the already know sources,  why should Chelsea be prohibited from using it?