Lavish spending, sustained only by Roman Abramovich's investment, funded Chelsea's 21 trophies during his 19 years as owner. Now there are fears the Premier League club could run out of money after the British government sanctioned the Russian oligarch and froze his assets.
A team that won the Champions League last year and was crowned world champions by FIFA a month ago has now had some banking facilities frozen with officials unable to use corporate credit cards while Barclaycard assesses what is permitted under government rules.
