On Monday afternoon, Sky Sports broke the news that Chelsea's PSR-related punishment had finally come down.
According to chief correspondent Kaveh Solhekol, the London Blues were fined £10.75 million by the Premier League and were given a "one-year transfer ban suspended over two years," along with a nine-month academy transfer ban.
Solhekol went on to reiterate that the investigation centered around "secret payments" made by the club between 2011 and 2018, and while they weren't undertaken by the current ownership, they were uncovered during the process of that sale in 2022.
A number of transactions were apparently identified in relation to payments made as part of previous fines and deemed to be problematic, leading to this week's announcement.
Of course, this announcement calls to mind the 2023/24 Premier League season, where Everton were docked points on two separate occasions for reported breaches in PSR. Originally, the club received a 10-point deduction early in that season that was later reduced to six, before receiving a second two-point deduction in April of 2024.
Everton survived relegation somehow that year, remained in the top-flight under new ownership, and looks to have finally righted the ship after several seasons of struggle.
Frankly, Chelsea receiving a fine (a number that seems astronomical to most people but is probably a drop in a bucket to a club of that size) and a transfer ban that might kick in two years from now is an embarassment to the Premier League.
It's Big Six bias is showing, and the league isn't even trying to cover it up this time.
Nottingham Forest could also have words to say on the subject, given their deduction in March of 2024 due to an overspend of roughly £34 million over three seasons, a number similar to Everton's breach.
The Reds also avoided any long-term implications, but the principle of the matter is that it's pretty clear that relatively minor issues with PSR appear to matter more to the powers-that-be than seven years of secret payments.
Leicester City, who went down to the Championship last season, now find themselves in the relegation zone of the second tier after receiving their own six-point deduction for a £20 million overspend.
This doesn't even take into account Manchester City's long-known history of spending issues, something the league has yet to address, even as their spending continues to be in question.
It's this kind of activity from the governing bodies of major leagues that makes supporters upset and causes them to want to remove themselves from the game altogether. The rules should be the rules, regardless of what badge is on your shirt or who pays the bills for your club.
But that's not how it works. Everyone already knew that. In that regard, Chelsea's punishment isn't a surprise.
All it did was confirm what everyone already knew. The information is still bad, even if it wasn't a secret.