It was at Gatwick train station that the idea behind a planned protest against the Chelsea hierarchy first originated. Although calls online for change at the top of the club had been rife prior to the Valentine's Day defeat to Brighton just over one week ago, it was here that things started to move.
One supporter, who by their own admission had 'about seven followers' on X (formerly Twitter), took responsibility and movement has followed. Not expecting much to come of it, a post calling for action ahead of Tuesday's home match against Southampton has now been seen by more than a quarter of a million people (enough to fill out Stamford Bridge more than six times over).
With it coming so shortly after a powerful march by thousands of Tottenham fans towards their stadium ahead of the game against Manchester United last Sunday, the disconnect at Chelsea is starkly different. This is an institution which only changed owners two-and-a-half years ago as opposed to more than two decades of Daniel Levy in north London. Chelsea have spent vast amounts of money where Spurs have not, and at the time of protest talk kickstarting, there were six places in the table separating them in Chelsea's favour.
For those on the outside, Chelsea are still in the race for a top four finish and teams in such a position rarely see such open revolt, even after a poor run of form. This is a different story. The strong platform for what was expected to be comfortable Champions League qualification has evaporated, exposing a side of the club that doubters of the Clearlake Capital-Todd Boehly project do not like.
In truth, that side has been there ever since the 2022 takeover but after a prolonged period of disappointment, patience has run out. Now, with this week being deemed the ideal starting block for measures to be taken, football.london goes behind the scenes of the protest plans and how they have split an already divided fanbase.
It was in McDonald's on the way back from the second of two defeats to Brighton in six days that Fullington Fulbright (X user @FFulbright) - an online pseudonym to protect their identity on professional grounds - snapped. Chelsea had just meekly submitted to a third loss in five, watching the FA Cup campaign come to an abrupt end whilst also damaging top four prospects at the same time.
"Not a single big account will call a protest despite me prompting them to all week," the message on social media reads. "So I'll call it. Help me spread far and wide. Tuesday 25th v Southampton. 6pm outside the Bovril Gate." That got the ball rolling.
Almost 3,000 have now liked the post, including some of the platform's most popular Chelsea-related figures and accounts who have shared it. It is still not clear how many are expected to be in attendance or in what guise the protest will take on Tuesday but the sentiment of needing change is evidently widespread. This has been shown by the return of chants for Roman Abramovich on a regular basis recently.
Why now, though, with Champions League qualification still within touching distance (even if the form table suggests otherwise)? "I guess initially I posted out of frustration," the creator of the Fullington Fulbright account told football.london. "I'd just been to the Brighton game and found myself at Gatwick McDonald's on the way home, wondering why on Earth I'd just wasted my evening away from my kids.
"I know I wanted Chelsea fans to unite in making our feelings clear to [Co-owner, Behdad] Eghbali that this squad, this squad building approach, their erosion of everything that proceeded them, including the academy, their fixation on playing 'style' and their constant tampering with the club's brand and matchday experience is not acceptable for us."
Fulbright now has considerably more than seven followers and in years to come, the post calling for others to join in with a vocal and physical act of discontent may well become something of folklore and serious importance. It might struggle to have the desired impact now, though, because just what the planned protest is rallying against is not so singularly clear.
There is yet to be a notable or official supporters' group back the protest despite the large number pining for it online. The Chelsea Supporters' Trust (CST) was asked for comment by football.london about the plans and its stance on the proposal. The Chelsea Pitch Owners (CPO) declined to offer a stance as it is outside of their remit.
Between these organisations, which confer directly with the club and board, Chelsea fans have and do act on the most important issues. Without their championing for this protest, the legitimacy and desired impact may well fall short.
Despite the evident passion from those involved to try and improve matters both on and off the field, a lack of leadership or central voice for the protest threatens to undermine and negatively impact the turnout and any subsequent desired changes. The off-the-cuff nature to the protest so far has also seen the aims blurred.
"My hope for the protest is that Eghbali sees fans will not just take this lying down," explains Fulbright, who is not a willing head for the action. Instead, they are "just a lifelong fan and season ticket holder" with a generational connection to Chelsea.
Chelsea co-owners Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali at West Ham vs Chelsea
The idea of voicing frustration is there but the steps have not necessarily been carried out to do it in an aligned way with a streamlined approach and plan. "Perhaps we muddy their reputation a little," Fulbright continues. "Perhaps we bring more light to and more focus on the clear flaws and limitations of their model. Perhaps they try harder to recognise the efforts and traditions of matchgoing fans as well as tourist visitors and social media influencers."
These are all valid arguments for a club which has changed nearly everything about what can now be considered 'Old Chelsea' or Abramovich's Chelsea in the three years of Clearlake Capital-Todd Boehly ownership. Since the May 2022 takeover, Chelsea have spent more money than anyone in world football, throwing out the foundations of a squad which had won the Champions League and Club World Cup within the previous 12 months without the results to justify such an outlay.
The plan, instead, has been shifted towards a long-term model with success measured in different ways. The goal has been to make Chelsea more sustainable but financial results are yet to support that and things have dipped on the sporting front as well.
Heading the much-maligned and heavily criticised recruitment strategy in the two most under-fire roles are co-sporting directors Paul Winstanley and Laurence Stewart, neither of which had held the role at their previous clubs. Their performance and continued backing is one of the main areas of contention for worried and angry supporters who see the spending on youngsters as symptomatic of Chelsea's inefficiency and missing elite prowess at all levels.
"The sporting directors, ticket pricing, recruitment model, treatment of academy players, and long-serving staff, the mess around stadium plans and the CPO are all concerns," says Chelsea fan and content creator Daniel Childs to football.london. As a regular at Stamford Bridge, he is behind a protest to voice concerns but, like others, has seen Tuesday's plan only raise more questions than answers.
"For a unified message, online has to play a major role, and the sad truth is that it has been divided for a long time," Childs explains. "Some fans are cynical about the intentions behind protests and online movements. The backing of the Supporters' Trust would give more credibility and a more aligned and specific focus would help."
Rob Pratley, another Chelsea fan, season ticket holder for the women's team at Kingsmeadow, and journalist, agrees. "My view on protests all the way through has been, if you can get a protest that is well organised, relevant, cogent, and peaceful, it's worthwhile," he told football.london.
"Any protest that confers to those barriers, whether it is the ESL [European Super League] protest or a non-sport related protest, they can have an effect. And protests can be powerful as we have seen with the ESL."
Chelsea supporters protest the ESL
The European Super League did not go down with Chelsea supporters in 2021
The current protest has been met with a mixed reaction, though. No firm body behind the action has left an unorganised feeling of vexation rather than a strongly banded together unit. To make matters worse, the intentions have initially been quickly disregarded and looked down upon by some, including talkSPORT, who had former Crystal Palace owner and regular radio speaker Simon Jordan hit back firmly at the prospect when responding to a supporter aiming to be involved.
One fan, who has pushed hard for campaigns against Clearlake-Boehly's holding company and multi-club group BlueCo, as well as the American owners in charge, went onto Jordan's show to discuss and raise awareness for the protest. During a 10-minute segment they cited leveraged debt making Chelsea 'go bust' as a reason behind the protest and was ridiculed on air. This added to the annoyance of others who believe that the message of change being needed is only diluted the longer there is no clear figurehead for this movement.
"The sad thing is that one bad interview can create a bad perception and allow the club, media and even some fans to dismiss future protests which might prove more beneficial," reflects Childs. "The concerns are not unwarranted, and they can’t all be swatted away by dismissing supporters as entitled or selfish."
Fulbright echoes the same message. "I've never thought it my place to question or contradict what the protest means for others. Each to their own. But I really want the club to have a clear picture of what most fans feel and would like it rethought."
Protesters do believe that having started something, a sense of co-ordination is still there, hence the eagerness for so many to support action, even if it is just spreading the message online at the moment. "Perhaps it was my initial post that got the protest off the ground, but that was by chance if anything," Fulbright continues. It'd never have taken off if there wasn't a widespread feeling of frustration and exasperation with Eghbali and his directors."
Pratley also feels that whilst a protest, in theory, is fine, this one could be sabotaged and confused by an unfocused stance, something that has come from individuals taking the idea of a protest into their own hands and going in separate directions rather than coming together to form a coherent strategy. "The problem with this protest is that there is no unified voice behind what people want," he says.
"Do they want to change them all? Do they want Clearlake out? Do they want BlueCo out? Do they want X, Y, Z sporting directors out of the equation? Do you want Maresca out of the equation? Do you want any combination of all of this out of the equation? Do you want to change the pricing strategy or whatever? Do you want information on the stadium?
"I have heard all of these suggested as points. That is not a protest. That is just a list of things you want clarity on. A protest is having a clear goal.
"If the clear goal was to challenge the sporting directors and whether they are adequate for the role, that's a clear goal. If you want them, for instance, to end the contract with Vivid Seats, that's a clear goal. When you actually have one of those, you can build a cogent, sensible argument with supporting material."
He adds: "Unfortunately, this has just been hijacked by people who, I have got no doubt are genuine Chelsea fans, like the chap who was on talkSPORT. I'm not going to doubt that or that people are Chelsea fans and they care an awful lot about the club, I do to.
"What I do doubt is that for every one of them, you have got five people who are just jumping onto a bandwagon or, alternatively, they see it as a way to grift some money out of it." And perhaps nothing is more problematic than the sheer array of voices without direction.
"Spurs have been protesting in one way or another over Enic for a decade in various guises," Pratley explains. "It's the same with [Manchester] United and the Glazers. The earliest protest I remember is in 2015. It was clearly backed, sensible messaging.
Tottenham Hotspur fans protest against the club owners ahead of the Premier League match at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, London.
Tottenham Hotspur fans protest against the club owners ahead of the Premier League match at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, London.
"We might one day get to that stage and I'm not saying that there is no point in protesting, I'm not trying to prevent people from protesting. If people think there is a clear message behind it that they want rally behind then go ahead.
"To do Spurs' protest at the weekend, which is a great example of this, it took three months of planning and organising to get people there with a unified goal and clear people saying 'We are starting the march here, we are going to Y, we are going to get our message out to journalists who want to cover it and are interested in covering it because they have been there for a long time.'
"All I will say is if you are attending the protest then be clear, concise, and cogent in what your aims are. Just chanting the name of the previous owner, whatever you think of Mr Abramovich or the current owners, just chanting 'We want our Chelsea back' is not a clear message. It's not a tangible thing you can achieve."
What Chelsea fans can achieve and what they want to get out of this remains up in the air. Without those involved to push it through established channels there will always be an amateurishness sense to it for this week. That does not mean that there aren't large and substantial groups on the same page about wanting a change of direction at the top of the club. It does not mean that it is a bad idea or that it cannot and will not work in the long run either.
It has to be accepted that this might not be the turning point for Chelsea but it could be the start of a louder and public conversation that has been going on in terraces across the country for a while now. If that is what this protest becomes, and bigger things develop from it, then it has served a purpose. For now, until there is a defined leader and agenda to set, there will instead remain a lot of noise rather than a serious argument being put forward to the decision-makers.
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