A finance expert believes that Chelsea needed to raise £150m in profit by the end of last year to comply with the Premier League's Profit and Sustainability rules. The Blues' finances have been heavily scrutinised since a consortium of investors led by Todd Boehly and a private equity group, called Clearlake Capital, bought the club in May 2022.

In nearly three years, Chelsea have forked out over £1bn on signing while generating nearly £500m in player sales. In fact, the west Londoners' annual report and financial statements for the year ending June 2023 revealed the club earned £512m in revenue during the 2022/23 campaign – which was six per cent more than the 2021/22 season.

However, Chelsea's wage bill soared almost 20 per cent to £404m – the second largest in the English top flight behind only Manchester City (£423m). The Blues also recorded £249m in day-to-day operating losses, which was almost £100m more than Leicester City (£152m) in second and Aston Villa (£139m) in third.

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While Chelsea's spending has been closely monitored since the takeover, they have continued to comply with financial regulations. The club's next annual report and financial statements for the term ending June 2024 will be made public in April 2025.

In the meantime, Chelsea are awaiting feedback from the Premier League regarding the latest Profit and Sustainability calculations, which have been under review since the deadline on December 31 slammed shut. Any club found to have breached their limit for allowable losses will be formally informed of any charges.

Allowable losses cannot exceed £105m over three years under PSR – a figure that's reduced by £22m for every season a club isn't in the Premier League. Until a verdict has been reached and the results are made public, it remains to be seen whether or not Chelsea – or any other club – have passed.

Nevertheless, Stefan Borson believes that the Blues had an up hill battle to avoid a potential points deduction. The finance expert, who was previously an advisor at the Etihad Stadium told Football Insider: "They need to have made something like £150million of profit from intra-group sales.

"There is a lot of unknowns in terms of the precise numbers, like what was last year’s wage bill? We are going to find out a lot in the next couple of weeks because not only next week we find out about PSR but also for teams that haven’t breached, we are going to get the Deloitte report.

"That usually comes out in the next two weeks of the year. In that report, you will see the turnover and the wages, and that’s the first time that we will see that information for teams that haven’t published their accounts. We will be able to start to piece together what’s happened.

"My model and Swiss Ramble’s model are not overly dissimilar. Both of them would say they need over £150million of profit from non-football assets being traded, so that can be the women’s team, more property or something completely different. It could be something that we haven’t seen."