Sanctioned

The sale of Chelsea Football Club in 2022 wasone of the highest-profile and most controversial sports transactions of alltime. In the shadow of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, what unfolded after RomanAbramovich was forced to put his beloved club up for sale would change Englishfootball for ever. Under the threat of bankruptcy and ruin, Chelsea pulled offa complex transaction in three tense and troubling months – a quarter of the timemany analysts would normally set aside for such a deal. Sanctioned isthe definitive account of this unique period.

Through unprecedented access to Abramovich himselfand key figures from Chelsea’s new ownership, as well as further interviewswith a star-studded footballing cast, Nick Purewal unfolds a wide-ranging taleof political sanctions, hushed negotiations and Cold War-style geopolitics, alltold in vivid, propulsive prose against a backdrop of war on the edge ofEurope.

From the club’s owners to its staff, players andsupporters, via UK government intervention, dramatic peace talks and even a foul-playpoisoning episode, Sanctioned chronicles ninety-five extraordinary daysin English football.

“Nick Purewal knows Chelsea inside out. So he’s perfectlyplaced to tell the inside story of the most extraordinary period in the historyof Chelsea – and of English football. He’s even got Roman Abramovich to talk.”Henry Winter

“A story the whole of football has been waiting to read.Football meets geopolitics in an epic tale of money and power.” Paul Hayward, TheObserver

Nick Purewal is a freelance reporter and writer withtwenty years’ experience in news and sports journalism. Nick reported on the entiretyof the Chelsea sale in his role as Chelsea correspondent at the PressAssociation, breaking the world exclusive that Roman Abramovich was working tohelp the early peace process between Russia and Ukraine and later the shocknews that key bidders the Ricketts family had pulled out of the race to buy theclub. Beginning his career at the Grimsby Telegraph, Nick has alsoworked for the Newcastle Chronicle, the Gloucester Citizen andthe Evening Standard and now freelances for a variety of nationaloutlets in addition to ghostwriting books and working on other long-formprojects.

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