Revealed: Eghbali’s Chelsea plan – and it begins with Stamford Bridge

Sam WallaceFri, September 18, 2026 at 6:00 AM UTC

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Behdad Eghbali (pictured) will share decision-making duties at Chelsea with Clearlake colleague Jose E Feliciano - Getty Images/Robin Jones

The new Chelsea regime post-Todd Boehly believes it has fresh impetus to solve the critical problem at the heart of the club – rebuilding Stamford Bridge as a stadium fit for the modern era or moving elsewhere – although, as ever, the rest of English football will reserve judgment.

The departure of Boehly, erstwhile chairman and the public face of holding company BlueCo in the early days of the takeover, has marked an end of an era of sorts – although since January 2023 the club has effectively been run day-to-day by Behdad Eghbali. His Clearlake Capital group has completed the acquisition of the 12.8 per cent stakes held by Boehly and his fellow US investor Mark Walter. Both Eghbali and Clearlake co-founder José E Feliciano have increased their personal stake in the fund that now owns outright about 87 per cent of the club.

Todd Boehly was the face of BlueCo’s £2.5bn takeover of Chelsea in 2022 - PA/Rafal Oleksiewicz

Clearlake has also taken the remaining 12.8 per cent stake outside its direct control, owned by Swiss billionaire Hansjörg Wyss, into the fund. The deal has for the first time given Clearlake complete governance control of the club – if not quite complete equity control. Previously all key figures in the BlueCo consortium had to sign-off all decisions. While that worked for the high-volume trading of players – even as Eghbali and Boehly’s relationship deteriorated – the question now is whether having one entity in charge will result in more effective decision-making for decades-long financial commitments.

The Stamford Bridge question

The decision is whether Chelsea rebuild Stamford Bridge, their home for 121 years, or relocate to Earls Court – the only feasible west London alternative. Boehly always favoured Earls Court, which already has planning for a £10bn housing and retail development. The opposing view was that it did not put Chelsea in a strong position to negotiate for a part of the site. What is not in doubt is that Chelsea have made precious little progress in what some at the club call the “hardest stadium rebuild in the world”.

Are they right? There is certainly a formidable range of factors to resolve before one even reaches the financing of what could be a £3bn stadium – or more. Not only securing the support of Chelsea Pitch Owners, the fan-led plc which controls the freehold, or Chelsea’s likely disputatious neighbours in a well-heeled part of the London borough of Hammersmith and Fulham. There are also the railway lines to the east, the current single exit point on to Fulham Broadway and a site that is fundamentally too small for the kind of stadium Chelsea would like. Build downwards? That was once the Roman Abramovich plan but no one knows for sure what lies beneath. The joke told back then, told with a hint of tension, was that it might be one of London’s buried rivers.

There are nine Premier League grounds with a bigger capacity than Stamford Bridge - Reuters/Isabel Infantes

It requires some very big investment at a club that had already spent around £1.8bn under BlueCo. There are those who feel with a united single ownership makes financing a new stadium more possible. The club bought the Sir Oswald Stoll Mansions, the veterans’ accommodation on a two-acre site adjoining the stadium in April 2024, and then nothing happened.

Ambitious stadium building remains a huge commercial factor in sport in Clearlake’s native US where the Chicago Bears of the NFL are the latest to propose a controversial move – this time to a new-build in the neighbouring state of Indiana. As a means of driving up revenue in European football it is one of the few big decisions in the hands of ownership, with rights deals centrally negotiated. It would require more massive borrowing or long-term investment partnerships.

Has Clearlake got the appetite for it? They may well have no choice with annual match-day revenues, most recently at £86.8m, far behind those of London peers Arsenal and Tottenham, as well as Manchester United and Liverpool. The case would have to be made anew to investors or lenders that the popularity and revenues of English football are durable for the long term.

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Cobham investment

An easier win is the club’s plan to invest in Cobham, its 20-year training ground outside the Surrey town, where first team, women and academy are based. Built in the Abramovich era as a groundbreaking, no-expense-spared new home after generations of Chelsea players had to share the Harlington sports ground near Heathrow with Imperial College students, Cobham is now considered to be in need of a new lease of life. Additional land has also been acquired on the other side of Stoke Road.

As with other famous training grounds, Cobham has a brand of its own – note the rebranding of the Under-21s to “Cobham NextGen”. A training ground naming rights deal might be a possibility. Again, there will be those who will wait to see whether promises from BlueCo come true in regard to new building at Cobham – with its focus so far having been clearly on player trading.

New chairman

For the time being, Boehly will not be replaced in an official capacity as chairman, a role that meant he was at the front of the queue among club officials to walk across the pitch at the Fifa Club World Cup final last year alongside US president Donald Trump. Eghbali now calls the shots, without any requirement to make the case to anyone other than Feliciano who is not focused on the day-to-day running of the club. Both men are effectively the proverbial head of state at Chelsea in all but title. The club may yet make the chair a non-executive ceremonial job.

Boehly’s role as chairman meant he was often the most publicly visible member of Chelsea’s hierarchy - Reuters/Mike Segar

What they might lack in an official chairman they make up for with all those sporting directors. While those five are recruitment focused, the key non-ownership figures away from football are Jason Gannon and James Bonnington. Gannon was recruited from the Kroenke Group in the US where he was managing director of the new Sofi Stadium, home of the Los Angeles Rams in the NFL, and the adjoining Hollywood Park. It is Gannon who is expected to take the lead on the new stadium and it would be fair to say that so far it has been slow-going. Although as the chief operating officer – and “president” in the US-corporate style – he is also in charge of the commercial and fan engagement portfolios.

Both Gannon and Bonnington have, at different times, taken the second seat with Eghbali in the Premier League shareholders meetings. Bonnington is one of the rare senior figures under BlueCo who also worked under the Abramovich regime. Previously general counsel he is now chief legal officer and the expectation is that he will have an expanded role. As well as the vacated chairman’s position, the club do not formally have a chief executive. The roles most commonly associated with that job that are spread among Eghbali, Gannon and Bonnington.

Either way, it is unlikely that Chelsea will ever have a public-facing figure with the profile that Boehly enjoyed – and then endured – for a brief period. Eghbali and Feliciano have not chosen to step into that void in recent years and are deeply opposed to any of their higher-profile employees doing the same.

Managing Alonso

The exception to that would be Xabi Alonso although as with his predecessors he will be expected to work with Eghbali and his sporting directors. The new Chelsea manager made it clear in the build-up to Friday’s Premier League game at Brentford that his principal relationship at the club has been with Eghbali, who, along with Feliciano, sold the Chelsea job to him earlier this year.

“Not daily but quite often,” was Alonso’s response on Thursday as to how often he spoke to Eghbali. “We are in touch. We want to assess things, especially in the early days of this new start. For him and for us [coaching staff] it is important that we share our views and know where we want to go.” Alonso added: “It is not like one person has the final word for everything. We try to be aligned when taking important decisions. We have made a few of them so far and there is more to be taken. This is the way I like to work.”

Xabi Alonso was given the title of manager by BlueCo, marking a change in approach from the ownership - Getty Images/Yu Chun Christopher Wong

Alonso has to win the Premier League and challenge in the Champions League – something the club has failed to do since the 2022 takeover. It will fall on Eghbali, Feliciano and the rest of their inner circle to overcome Chelsea’s biggest obstacle – its outdated stadium and the low revenue it generates relative to its European peers. There is still a cast-iron belief at Clearlake that European football is a future-proof investment that is robust against AI and all other impostors and distractions. It is certainly a bet that they have backed to the hilt.

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Source: “AOL Money”