The latest (small) wrinkle
The eagerly awaited approval from the UK government for Chelsea’s sale to the Clearlake-Boehly consortiom should be arriving this week, perhaps as soon as the next few hours, but there is now a new wrinkle in the process as well. We apparently need EU approval as well!
As with all previous wrinkles, this isn’t expected to be a major problem either nor should it “delay confirmation beyond this week”, but is yet another administrative hurdle that needs to be cleared. And no one’s ever accused any government of being fast or efficient.
Last year, Roman Abramovich was granted Portuguese citizenship under a naturalization process offered to the descendants of Sephardic Jews, and while that decision (and process in general) is currently under investigation by Portugal’s justice department, Abramovich does hold Portuguese (and thus European Union) citizenship at this time, which means they need to approve the sale as well — presumably for similar sanctions-related reasons as for the UK.
Still, we apparently expect the “green light” by the end of this week at the latest, which will be not a moment too soon.
