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Further rumors of the shirt sponsorship kind today from Business Insider. These now join the initial rumors from a month or so ago as well as the deleted tweet / pseudo-confirmation from Turkish Airlines themselves last week about the changing of the guard on the front of the Chelsea shirts.
There's plenty of intriguing information in this latest report. First off, it sounds like Samsung had the option to renew for future seasons, but balked at the amount asked. No doubt spurred on by the mega deals at the likes of Manchester United and Arsenal, apparently Chelsea asked for double the current amount from the South Korean electronics giant.
The contract for the current estimated $16m-a-year shirt deal (before extra bonuses are paid out if the club gets to the late stages at major competitions such as the UEFA Champions League, for example) will not be renewed this year, sources have told Business Insider, as Samsung is unprepared to pay the $32m-per-season now being asked.
-source: Business Insider
The $16m (£10m) is significantly lower than what other sources have reported -- the Mail went with £18m, which matches ESPN's $30m as well as Sporting Intelligence's figures -- but perhaps the payouts are indeed structured with all sorts of performance bonuses and the like. I think the main takeaway here is that we are looking for much, much more than we're currently receiving from Samsung. Samsung are apparently not prepared to pay these moneys and thus a new sponsor will be coming in, which most likely will be Turkish Airlines.
Samsung's official response to these rumors neither confirms nor denies anything.
"Samsung is not commenting on its current contractual position with Chelsea FC, or any potential sponsors of Chelsea FC. Samsung's partnership with Chelsea FC is ongoing. Samsung has not decided regarding any extension of sponsorship."
-source: Business Insider
The Business Insider report goes on to claim that we're also looking to sell naming rights for our training kit (yay!), training ground (ok...), and stadium (boo!).