Chelsea's move for Arsen Zakharyan sportswashed away on deadline day
Chelsea encountered their first act of sportswashing 2.0 under Todd Boehly on deadline day. If only Arsen Zakharyan had chosen his parents better.
British politicians are putting the force of law behind the old advice to athletes to “choose your parents well.” The British government, and to varying extents those in Europe and the United States, are stifling the careers of athletes who were born in the wrong place to the wrong people. And, just to enhance the counter-productivity of their actions, are harming domestic businesses and sporting competitions in the process.
Chelsea encountered their first act of sportswashing 2.0 under Todd Boehly (related but distinct from the campaign of sportswashing 2.0 that brought Boehly to Stamford Bridge) on transfer deadline day. Early in the day, rumors of the Blues’ interest in Dinamo Moscow winger Arsen Zakharyan appeared for the first time, and were almost immediately followed by reports saying that Chelsea would be unable to execute the deal because of the restrictions, the sanctions, the… reasons… on Russia.
On dealing with Russian clubs? Unclear. On buying Russian players? Never mentioned. Restrictions imposed by the Football Association, Premier League or UEFA? Or the sanctions imposed by the UK government? Dinamo Moscow itself, taking the rare step of confirming a transfer rumor by issuing a public statement, said late in the day that “technical reasons” prevented the sale.
Only The Daily Mail offered a relatively specific explanation, citing the blanket ban on British individuals or companies transferring money to Russian individuals or companies. SImply, Chelsea wouldn’t be able to send Dinamo Moscow the transfer fee. The Daily Mail also noted potential difficulties with Zakharyan getting a work permit to play in England.
FIFA exercised its authority over clubs and players shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine by authorizing foreign players at Russian and Ukrainian clubs essentially to dissolve their contracts and leave their club – and, therefore, Russia or Ukraine – without penalty, and then sign with any team as a free agent for the remainder of the 2021/22 season.
As an aside, are all those players back in Russia right now playing in the 2022/23 Premier Liga season?
FIFA, then, is able to alter the usual flow of players and money in response to world events, member petitions and whatever voting processes they have in place. Likewise, as Chelsea fans know better than any other sport watchers in the world, the UK government can direct funds to whatever escrows or intermediaries they choose when the intended recipient is disfavored (and, yes, I do owe an update on whatever I can dig up about the foundation disbursing the funds from Chelsea’s forced sale).
Between FIFA, UEFA and Europe’s national governments, somewhere in a penumbra or emanation is the authority to allow – or compel – player transfers between clubs on either side of the sanction line. Normally, pre-February 2022, I would not argue that player transfers are anywhere near a government’s purview, nor that – even if somehow they were – they should be a priority. But that ship sailed as quickly as Roman Abramovich’s yacht. The speed with which the UK government acted to seize Chelsea FC from its former owner and with which FIFA unilterally abrogated a stack of contracts show that, when they choose to, they can act quickly and decisively to bring about a desired end.
Perhaps these bodies would have granted an exemption or policy revision to allow buying Russian players from Russian clubs if only Chelsea had asked, or had asked in time. This was a deadline day rumor, after all, and it’s not like there is a lot of movement of Russian players from Russian clubs to Europe’s “Big Five” leagues. Since 2017, only six Russian players transferred from Russian clubs to the Big Five countries: two to Serie A, and one each to the Bundesliga, Ligue 1 and leagues further down the German and Spanish pyramids.
The football player transfer application of the sanctions is as counter-productive and collaterally damaging as pretty much any other aspect of the sanctions.
The party who experienced the greatest detriment in this incident is Arsen Zakharyan. If not for the sanctions, he’d be able to advance his career and live and work in a country that, for all its faults, is immeasurably better than Russia. But because he was born in the wrong place to the wrong people at the wrong time, his career is plateauing when it would otherwise be accelerating. A distant second most-harmed party, but second nonetheless, is Chelsea FC, who do not have a player they assessed as beneficial to their future. If there is a third on this list, it would be Dinamo Moscow and the list would end there.
Denying Zakharyan the transfer in order to deny Dinamo Moscow £12.6 million does not in any way limit, constrain or punish the Russian government’s war machine. If Dinamo or any other Russian team wanted (or was compelled) to sell players to funnel money towards the war or elsewhere in the Russian economy, they would have little trouble finding buyers.
If the British government wanted to leverage sports to chip away at Russia, they would facilitate the transfer of Russian players to English clubs. The British government commendably issued passports to Hong Kong residents after China’s soft takeover, not only to give those people a path to freedom but also to deprive China of their value – a “brain drain.” By draining the best players from Russia’s Premier Liga, the UK could strengthen the Premier League while making Russia’s domestic league even more of a backwater. Zakharyan may not want to leave if this were an explicit policy, especially given the possibility of reprisals against any player who left Russia under those circumstances (balconies and windows are particularly dangerous places for Russians these days). But at least it would have preserved choice and competing incentives for all involved, particularly since none of these parties are involved in the war itself.
Both first and second generation sportswashing start with the premise that sports can influence culture and politics through strengthening the “home team” or weakening the opponents. Sportswashing 2.0 is much closer to zero sum than the original. All those golfers on the LIV tour are at least making gobs of blood-stained money, after all.
Todd Boehly benefitted from the British government’s landmark act of sportswashing 2.0, but now he’s on the other side of it. Hopefully he and other team owners around the world will realize that the Chelsea precedents augur more caprice and volatility for people and jobs that already have enough of both. Unless the sports industry starts taking steps to deny governments the authority to sportswash and publicly oppose future rounds of sportswashing 2.0, eventually, it’ll come for everyone.
Judging by progress and trends on all of these fronts – especially in England, looking at you, Wimbledon - players will be able to choose their parents before that happens.