Chelsea transfer news: Where are 13 players signed by departing Todd Boehly during 2022 sporting director stint?

Chelsea announced late on Wednesday night that chairman Todd Boehly had sold his 12.8% stake in the club to Clearlake Capital.

Along with director Mark Walter also parting ways with the same stake, it marks a new era at Stamford Bridge.

After the takeover from Roman Abramovich in 2022, Boehly quickly inserted himself as Chelsea's interim sporting director, the aim being to ease the transitional period when other key figures were leaving the club.

The American would oversee 13 incomings during that summer transfer window, Boehly signing a mix of experienced, established players and prospects that some supporters would not have heard of.

Here, Sports Mole looks back at how many of Boehly's Chelsea signings were a success, and whether he made a profit or loss on the business that he conducted.

How many Boehly Chelsea signings were a success?

Of the 13 players that arrived at Chelsea during the 2022 summer transfer window, only three of them - Wesley Fofana, Gabriel Slonina and Shim Mheuka - remain at Stamford Bridge.

Chelsea committed to paying a guaranteed £70m for Fofana, but injuries have restricted him to just 76 appearances in all competitions.

© Iconsport / David Klein/Sportimage

The Frenchman's form when fit has also left a lot to be desired, and many Blues supporters would argue that they would prefer him to be left out of Xabi Alonso's preferred backline.

As for Slonina, the £8.1m American goalkeeper has not made a single first-team appearance for Chelsea, and he will leave for a cut-price fee or handed a free transfer in January having failed to attract suitable offers in recent months.

There remain high hopes for Mheuka, who arrived from Brighton & Hove Albion and subsequently starred at youth level for Chelsea. He has since signed a new long-term contract and is on loan at Celtic.

In terms of player performance, only Marc Cucurella - who was signed for approximately £60m from Brighton - has proven to be a overwhelming success.

© Imago / IMAGO / Sportimage

Despite his indifferent first season, Cucurella developed into one of the best left-backs in the world at Chelsea, made 163 appearances, won two pieces of silverware and was sold to Real Madrid for a profit on the accounts.

With 19 goals and 15 assists in 81 appearances, Chelsea got relative success out of Raheem Sterling, signed for £47.5m, before he was excluded from Enzo Maresca's plans in 2024, but the former England star was ultimately released on a free transfer to get his high wages off the club's outgoings.

Napoli centre-back Kalidou Koulibaly lasted just a season after a £33m transfer before leaving for Al-Hilal, only making 32 appearances. Carney Chukwuemeka played the same amount of games after a £20m transfer from Aston Villa.

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang had been brought to Chelsea for £10.3m in order to link up with familiar face Thomas Tuchel, only for Boehly and Clearlake Capital to sack the head coach in the hours after the player's debut in a Champions League defeat at Dinamo Zagreb.

© Imago

The Gabon international made just 21 outings for Chelsea, while unknown Italian youngster Cesare Casadei - who was signed from Inter Milan for nearly £17m without making a first-team appearance - featured on just 17 occasions.

However, Boehly deserves some credit for signing Omari Hutchinson on a free transfer from Arsenal. While he made just two senior appearances, the winger left for Ipswich Town in a £20m deal two years later.

One forgotten piece of business is Chelsea signing Tyler Dibling from Southampton, but the youngster returned to the South coast after just two Under-18 appearances due to home-sickness. Goalkeeper Eddie Beach was also signed from Southampton and never featured for the Chelsea first team.

Zak Sturge was brought in from Brighton & Hove Albion's academy and left without playing a senior match.

Did Chelsea make profit or loss with Boehly as interim sporting director?

Despite not including add-ons and some of the fees based on reports because they were undisclosed, Boehly and Chelsea still spent somewhere in the region of £275m that summer.

In return, the West Londoners have received around £125m, although Chelsea will not have suffered such a deficit when amortisation is taken into consideration.

The investment in Mheuka could pay off, either through the striker becoming a first-team player or sold for a substantial profit, and money could still be generated from the sale of Fofana in a later transfer window.

Nevertheless, it is fair to say that Boehly wasted an astronomical amount of money when he held the sporting director reins, and it arguably set the tone for BlueCo's scatter-gun approach to the transfer market in the years that followed.