Chelsea have been handed an additional £10m fine by the Football Association after admitting to more than 70 charges of breaching financial rules, but the club has avoided a points deduction.

The violations occurred during Roman Abramovich's tenure as owner — the Russian oligarch was forced to sell the club in 2022 after being sanctioned by the UK government following Russia's invasion of Ukraine — and involved undisclosed payments to agents, including those related to the signings of Eden Hazard, Willian, and Samuel Eto'o.

An independent FA commission had initially imposed a suspended points deduction, but Chelsea successfully overturned it on appeal, receiving a suspended transfer ban instead.

This latest fine brings Chelsea's total financial penalty to over £20m, following an earlier sanction from the Premier League for the same breaches this year. The absence of a sporting sanction stands in contrast to the treatment of other clubs under English football's financial regulations: Everton and Nottingham Forest both received points deductions during the 2023–24 season for breaching the Premier League's Profitability and Sustainability Rules, though those cases involved different regulatory frameworks.

Chelsea sought leniency on the basis that the club's current owners — a US consortium led by Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital — self-reported the infractions upon discovering them during the acquisition process.

The Premier League, however, faced criticism for reaching a settlement with Chelsea in March that carried no sporting penalty.

The original FA commission's ruling was sharply critical of senior Chelsea personnel, whose conduct spanned more than a decade — a period during which the club won multiple trophies including two Premier League titles and the 2021 Champions League.

"Nevertheless, that conduct was so egregious, so persistent and such a duration that an overall sanction, whilst taking account of the mitigation which has rightly been described as 'very powerful', must reflect the fact that over a period of 13 years, one of the leading clubs under the umbrella and authority of the FA, if not in Europe, behaved in such a way that the integrity of football, and the competitions in which it was competing, was seriously compromised," the commission stated.

Mudryk Cleared to Play

In a separate development, Chelsea received a boost ahead of the new season after the FA confirmed that winger Mykhailo Mudryk is eligible to play again following a suspension for anti-doping violations.

Mudryk had been sidelined for over 18 months after testing positive for meldonium — the same substance that led to tennis player Maria Sharapova's suspension in 2016 — in a drug test conducted in late 2024. The Ukraine international appealed his four-year ban and has since reached an agreement with the FA and the World Anti-Doping Agency. Under the terms of that deal, Mudryk admitted to the breaches, and his suspension concluded on 30 July.

Chelsea signed Mudryk for £89m in January 2023, having fended off competition from Arsenal for the highly rated youngster. His career had stalled prior to the drug ban, and he now faces the challenge of reigniting his progress at Stamford Bridge.