Chelsea sale: Boston Celtics owner Stephen Pagliuca is latest suitor

A joint-owner of the Boston Celtics and Serie A side Atalanta has emerged as one of the parties who have tabled offers to buy Chelsea.

Sky News has learnt that Stephen Pagliuca, a prominent private equity executive who co-chairs Bain Capital, submitted a bid for the Premier League club ahead of the deadline late last week.

It was unclear on Thursday who Pagliuca’s partners in his bid for Chelsea are.

With wealth estimated in the hundreds of millions – rather than billions – of dollars, sports industry insiders said it was unlikely he had bid for Chelsea alone.

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If Pagliuca does not make it to a shortlist of bidders expected to be selected by Raine Group, the merchant bank handling the sale, he could seek to team up with one of the remaining consortia.

Saudi bid out of running

One bid that appears to be out of the running is the Saudi Media Group, who have been told they have not made the shortlist, according to the PA News agency.

Chelsea fan Mohamed Al Khereiji fronted the Saudi consortium bid, but concerns over possible delays with the Premier League and UK Government will have factored into Raine’s decision not to progress their offer.

Saudi Media insisted their offer was completely separate from the Saudi Arabia state, but the long-running issues around the Saudi takeover at Newcastle will have played a part in Raine’s consideration of the offer to buy Chelsea.

“What is happening at the moment is the Raine Group, who are handling the sale of Chelsea, are getting in touch with some of the bidders to let them know whether they have been successful, or unsuccessful into making in on to the shortlist.

“And they are first of all contacting those bidders who have been unsuccessful. Now as far as the Saudi Media Group are concerned, we have never reported officially that they have made a bid for Chelsea, that was not something we were able to confirm, lots of other media outlets also never reported that the Saudi Media Group had made an offer for Chelsea.

“One of the issues is the Saudi Media Group’s turnover is something like £700-800m a year, so it is not very clear how they would have the money to buy a club like Chelsea.

“But, as it is, the Press Association are reporting that they are not on the shortlist.”

Source: Sky Sports

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