Chelsea have hit back at Real Madrid president Ramon Calderon’s suggestion that their spending power is distorting transfer fees for other European clubs.
Calderon claimed that Chelsea’s spending spree sicne being taken over by Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich means Real will have to spend more to attract the world’s best players to the Bernabeu.
“Abramovich is paying a lot of money for players but we have to compete with it,” said Calderon.
“In his case, he admitted to having lost nearly £150m last season.
“You just don’t know how long those people are going to stay in soccer. If somebody decides to leave, it’s going to be a problem.
“I think it’s a problem, prices are high. It’s very dangerous.”
But Chelsea director of communications Simon Greenberg responded: “It is an open market but sometimes we have to pay more because we are Chelsea.
“The money that we have spent has been invested into football – the majority of it. A very small amount of Roman’s investment went on purchasing the club.
“The rest of it has gone into football and filtered down through football.
“Although we made a substantial loss last year, there were a number of one-off payments that won’t be repeated this year.
“We run ourselves as much as we can as a plc and we are completely transparent about our accounts – which is something that cannot be said for many top European clubs, including, I would say, Real Madrid.”
