City supporter groups and fan representatives have written to the club’s chairman, Khaldoon al-Mubarak, expressing their ongoing concerns about ticket pricing and season ticket arrangements.

They are asking the club to follow up on its promise made last June to find solutions, and requesting lower or reduced season ticket prices for 2024-25.

In the same week, Chelsea fans voiced their concerns about the practice of ticket reselling and ticket touting.

The resale of tickets for English football matches is illegal in the UK, but this has not stopped them from being sold on foreign resale sites.

It has become an issue close to home for Chelsea, as the club’s owner and chairman, Todd Boehly, is invested in one such business, Vivid Seats, via his holding company, Eldridge Industries.

In 2017, Eldridge Industries led a round of funding for sports betting company DraftKings. In 2021 DraftKings then invested in a ticket resale website Vivid Seats, purchasing part of Eldridge Industries’ existing stake. An almost farcical money-go-round.

“We are pleased to announce this investment from DraftKings, one of the country’s leading and most visible sports tech entertainment companies,” Boehly said in October 2021.

“Today’s announcement is a nod to Vivid Seats’ growing and powerful ticketing marketplace, and will aid the company with its overall mission to empower fans to Experience It Live.”

What they really mean by “empowering fans to Experience It Live” is exploiting those fans by raising ticket prices or massively inflating them on the secondary market.

Ticket resale outlets are one of the many unnecessary intermediaries that make money merely from the fact money is being spent, adding nothing but taking plenty away.

In this way, they are exploiting both the creators of this entertainment and those who want to enjoy it.