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Premier League match tickets at Chelsea have been selling for more than twice the price of a season ticket on an American exchange website with a familiar director and investor to supporters – club chairman Todd Boehly.

Amid growing fan fury, Sky News was able to access the Vivid Seats platform on different devices last week from London – and saw tickets for the visit of Liverpool on 4 May, priced by Chelsea at a maximum of £80, being sold for between £537 and £2,666.

Some tickets were listed as being sold by traders.

Todd Boehly, co-founder, chairman and CEO of Eldridge, speaks at the 2023 Milken Institute Global Conference in Beverly Hills, California, U.S., May 3, 2023. REUTERS/Mike Blake
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Chairman of Chelsea Todd Boehly. Pic: Reuters

Chelsea’s official website appeared to show no availability for this premium fixture, with the Blues battling for Champions League qualification and Liverpool potentially celebrating being crowned Premier League winners.

The most expensive Stamford Bridge season ticket for this campaign was £1,015.

Vivid is listed by the Premier League among “unauthorised ticket websites” with a message: “We would urge fans to exercise extreme caution when dealing with these websites.”

Vividseats logo
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Vivid insisted it adheres to laws and regulations in Britain

The Chelsea Supporters’ Trust has written to the Premier League to ask that Vivid – given its ties with a club’s shareholder – “ceases facilitating the sale of tickets for significantly above face value”.

Mr Boehly – part of the consortium that replaced Roman Abramovich as owner in 2022 – has not addressed accusations of a “conflict of interest” or claims he is undermining efforts to combat ticket touting.

There are anti-touting warnings on signs in the streets approaching the stadium.

Chelsea football club ticket graphics
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Sky News found some tickets for more than £2,000 on Vivid Seats

An official Chelsea Ticket Exchange allows season ticket holders to sell their tickets “at the pro-rata price of season tickets” to a club member “in a safe, secure environment”.

While Chelsea’s website says to only buy tickets in the UK from official sellers, it adds: “Many of the websites that advertise and sell tickets online are not within the jurisdiction of UK law.

“This means, while we report these sites when we see Chelsea tickets on them, there is little we can do to shut down the sites.”

Sign at Stamford Bridge warning against ticket touting
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Sign at Stamford Bridge warning against ticket touting

On Vivid, we did see warnings telling visiting users not to buy seats in the home sections and a pop-up eventually appeared after browsing the availability, saying: “Tickets for the EPL matches are not currently available for purchase in your location.”

No attempt was made by us to buy tickets. But should we have been able to see the listings at all?

Sky News first asked for comment from Vivid last Monday and continued to see ticket listings with variable prices in pounds during the week. It took until Friday night for any form of response.

“Vivid Seats respectfully adheres to the laws that are in place in the United Kingdom and is not in violation of any regulations around EPL tickets,” the email read in part. “As such, Vivid Seats’ policy restricts the sale and marketing of EPL tickets in the United Kingdom.”

Soccer Football - Premier League - Brentford v Chelsea - GTech Community Stadium, London, Britain - April 6, 2025 Chelsea's Malo Gusto and Trevoh Chalobah Action Images via Reuters/Matthew Childs EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NO USE WITH UNAUTHORIZED AUDIO, VIDEO, DATA, FIXTURE LISTS, CLUB/LEAGUE LOGOS OR 'LIVE' SERVICES. ONLINE IN-MATCH USE LIMITED TO 120 IMAGES, NO VIDEO EMULATION. NO USE IN BETTING, GAMES OR SINGLE CLUB/LEAGUE/PLAYER PUBLICATIONS. PLEASE CONTACT YOUR ACCOUNT REPRESENTATIVE FOR FURTHER
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Pic: Reuters

When Sky News checked the website again on Saturday the listings for Premier League matches were no longer visible as they are from outside of Britain.

Asked if they were no longer visible after our inquiries, Vivid’s official replied: “The conclusions that you are drawing are factually incorrect.

“We understand that people will try to find ways to circumvent technology and as such, we have validation protocols in place in order to restrict the sale and marketing of EPL tickets in the United Kingdom.”

Again, Vivid insisted it adheres to laws and regulations in Britain.

But the same official did not respond to an email detailing how we were able to view the tickets listings from London on separate days, without using VPN software that can make your browser seem as if it’s accessing the internet from another country.

Chelsea's Stamford Bridge stadium
Soccer Football - Premier League - Chelsea v Ipswich Town - Stamford Bridge, London, Britain - April 13, 2025 Chelsea's Jadon Sancho celebrates scoring their second goal with Chelsea's Enzo Fernandez and Chelsea's Cole Palmer REUTERS/Dylan Martinez EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NO USE WITH UNAUTHORIZED AUDIO, VIDEO, DATA, FIXTURE LISTS, CLUB/LEAGUE LOGOS OR 'LIVE' SERVICES. ONLINE IN-MATCH USE LIMITED TO 120 IMAGES, NO VIDEO EMULATION. NO USE IN BETTING, GAMES OR SINGLE CLUB/LEAGUE/PLAYER PUBLICATIONS. PL
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Chelsea’s match against Ipswich at Stamford Bridge. Pic: Reuters

‘It’s the only way I was going to get here’

Ticket exchange websites can be the only way for some fans overseas to come to matches.

When Ipswich played at Stamford Bridge on 13 April, Baz Gillespie was able to watch after 20 years living in Cyprus by paying a vastly-inflated £300 for two tickets on a website other than Vivid.

“The only way I was going to get here was that way,” he said, remembering the days he could just queue up and pay a fiver for a ticket.

The same match was Martin van Dijk’s first-ever game at the Bridge, having come from the Netherlands after paying €150 (£128) on another exchange website after initially trying through Vivid.

“If there’s no other option, and you want to visit, it’s the only way, but I’d rather get it through like the normal way,” he said.

Chelsea fan Martin van Dijk travelled from the Netherlands
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Chelsea fan Martin van Dijk paid €150 for a ticket on a resale website

‘An absolute disgrace’

It is the “normal way” that so many supporters want to protect and are aghast at Mr Boehly’s links to Vivid, predating his purchase of a stake in Chelsea.

“It’s an absolute disgrace,” supporter Ben Grey said. “He shouldn’t be involved in Chelsea and a reselling website. It’s unethical from a basic perspective.

“The club are coming out with communication saying that they’re against ticket reselling and our semi-majority shareholder [has a website] reselling tickets to our games.”

Asked what the Premier League should do, he replied: “I’m a massive Chelsea fan, I don’t want Chelsea to be hit hard by anything.

“But the fact of the matter is they need to sort that out and if they’re allowing there to be an owner of a club who’s reselling tickets, it’s a disgrace.”

Chelsea supporter Ben Grey
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Fan Ben Grey said Mr Boehy shouldn’t be involved in Chelsea and a reselling website

‘Not a very good look’

Another fan, Rich Still, called it “21st century greed”.

The issue is resonating with young children.

Rhys Edwards, watching with his father, said: “It doesn’t look too good on Chelsea and their owners to be fair.

“Saying that [the website] is not authorised by the league they’re playing in isn’t a very good look.”

Officials with Chelsea, the Premier League and Mr Boehly declined to comment.

The Vivid statement to Sky News stressed: “It is important to note that Vivid Seats does not set the base price for tickets sold on its marketplace or receive any revenue from that base price; only the seller sets and receives the base ticket price.”

Labour MP for Ealing Central and Acton Rupa Huq
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Labour MP Rupa Huq has proposed a law change to improve pricing transparency

‘It’s like the Wild West’

Vivid highlighted to Sky News its “long-standing partnership”, including being a backer of a 2023 summer tour of the United States.

Chelsea’s website featured a quote saying: “We are pleased to join with a company committed to becoming the ultimate partner for connecting fans to the live events, teams and artists they love.”

The government has launched a consultation to prevent people from being ripped off in Britain by the resale of tickets.

Read more:
Chelsea star’s £160,000 car seized
UK set to host 2035 Women’s World Cup

The limit could range from the cost of the original ticket to a 30% uplift to stop the public being “fleeced” by professional touts.

Labour MP for Ealing Central and Acton, Rupa Huq, has separately proposed a change to the law to improve pricing transparency on secondary ticketing sites.

“It’s an unregulated market,” she told Sky News. “It’s like the Wild West. It needs getting back into control.”

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Southport stabbing victim reveals how she survived attack – and fears ‘it could happen again’

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Southport stabbing victim reveals how she survived attack - and fears 'it could happen again'

A girl who was stabbed in the Southport attack has told Sky News how she thought she was going to die that day.

Warning: Some readers may find this content distressing

It is exactly a year since Axel Rudakubana killed three girls and attempted to murder eight others at a summer holiday Taylor Swift-themed dance event in the seaside town.

The girl, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was stabbed in the back and the arm after going to the class with her younger sister.

She is now campaigning for children to have mandatory first aid training at school in response to the growth of knife crime.

She said she clearly remembers what happened that day.

Flowers and tributes near the scene of the attack a year ago. Pic: PA
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Flowers and tributes near the scene of the attack a year ago. Pic: PA

“Some of the girls were sat down in a circle making bracelets with the teachers, and a couple of them were getting up to get beads. I was standing between two tables and he came through the doors.

“He stabbed a little girl in front of me and then came for me and stabbed my arm. I turned and then he stabbed my back, even though I didn’t feel it at the time.

“There was a bunch of girls huddled around so I just started pushing them down the stairs, telling them to get out and run.

“I was thinking ‘Where’s my sister?’ and ‘We need to get out’.”

She and many of the other victims ran to the house of a neighbour for shelter. “I just thought that I was going to die,” she said.

Killer ‘looked possessed’

The girl said she can clearly picture Rudakubana that day.

“What I remember most about him is his eyes. They just didn’t look human, they looked possessed. It was kind of like a dream and you’re on a movie set and watching yourself go through it and make these decisions.

“It’s just kind of like adrenaline. People like to think they know what they’d do in that situation but, in reality, you don’t until you’re in it.”

Alice da Silva Aguiar, Elsie Dot Stancombe and Bebe King were murdered in an attack at a Taylor Swift-themed class.
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Alice da Silva Aguiar, Elsie Dot Stancombe and Bebe King were murdered in the attack

Six-year-old Bebe King, Elsie Dot Stancombe, who was seven, and nine-year-old Alice da Silva Aguiar died in the attack. It is something she finds difficult to talk about.

“I don’t think I can express how I feel about it,” the girl said. “A lot of anger and sadness.”

In January, Rudakubana was jailed for life and must serve a minimum of 52 years before he can be considered for release.

The chairman of the public inquiry into the atrocity called the attack “one of the most egregious crimes in our country’s history”.

Carrying knives ‘disgusting’

The girl who survived has now launched a campaign, supported by a clothing range called “Go Anywhere, Be Anything” to raise funds, to improve the ability of schoolchildren to help in the event of knife attacks.

“Everyone that’s going out and carrying knives is getting younger and younger,” she said. “And to think that it’s people my age is like disgusting.

“I just want to try and do the best I can to let people know that it’s not okay to do that and that they need to think about what they’re doing and the risks and how they’re harming themselves and other people.”

Her sister, who was also there that day, helped design “Go Anywhere, Be Anything”.

Read more:
Missed chances to stop Rudakubana

‘Terrorism has changed’, says PM

A three-minute silence will be held in Southport at 3pm to mark one year on from the attack. In an open letter to the community, Sefton Council wrote: “This period is incredibly hard for the families of Alice, Bebe and Elsie and all of those children and adults injured or who suffered lifelong psychological impact of witnessing the attack, and we acknowledge the huge impact on their lives, too.

“We must not forget the local people who rushed to support and to our emergency responders. They all remain always in our thoughts.”

It is a sentiment shared by the survivor.

“You live in fear every day that it could happen again,” she said.

“Physically I’m getting better every day and healing. Obviously, my scars stay as a reminder but everyone from that day is going to have mental scars forever.”

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Revealed: The scale of cheap Chinese imports flown into UK without paying any tariffs

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Revealed: The scale of cheap Chinese imports flown into UK without paying any tariffs

The scale of cheap Chinese e-commerce imports flown into Britain without paying any tariffs has become clearer following a Sky News investigation into this new multi-billion pound phenomenon.

We have uncovered the first official estimate of the value of so-called “de minimis” imports into Britain, ahead of an official inquiry into whether this legal clause – which excludes packages worth less than £135 from paying customs duties – should be allowed to continue.

Companies like Shein and Temu have become big players in British retail, not to mention elsewhere around the world, by manufacturing cheap products in China and then posting them directly to consumers, benefiting from the de minimis rules.

Inside the cargo plane

Clothing manufacturers in the UK claim that de minimis makes it nearly impossible to compete with these Chinese competitors, raising questions about the viability of domestic textile and apparel production.

However, economists argue that the main beneficiaries of the policy to exclude cheap imports from customs are lower-income households, since it allows them to spend less on their shopping. Removing it, they say, would disproportionately affect poorer families.

The government has committed to an inquiry into the rules, which are also being changed in the EU and the US, but up until now there has been no official estimate of its scale.

According to HM Revenue and Customs data released to Sky News following a Freedom of Information request, the total declared trade value of de minimis imports into the UK in the last fiscal year (2024-25) was £5.9bn.

That was a 53% increase on the previous year (£3.9bn), underlining the scale of growth of e-commerce imports into the UK.

While it is hard to gauge how much revenue this means the Treasury has forgone, an illustrative 20% tariff on flows of that order could raise more than £1bn.

De minimis trade is growing

While that sum alone would not fill the fiscal black hole faced by Chancellor Rachel Reeves in the coming budget, it would nonetheless be nearly enough to pay for the government’s recent U-turn on winter fuel allowances.

Sky has also obtained the first television access deep into the supply chain, helping bring those goods into the UK, as it boarded a flight that had just travelled from Chongqing to Bournemouth Airport.

We filmed inside the belly of a plane belonging to European Cargo, one of a number of air cargo firms booming as a result of these trade flows.

Read more:
The rarely examined trade clause about to become a very big deal
UK city’s clothing industry in crisis

The untold story about de minimis is that it hasn’t just had an impact on shopping habits in the UK, or for that matter, the textiles manufacturing sector – it has also changed patterns of distribution.

Struggling regional airports that never saw their passenger numbers recover after the pandemic are now re-establishing themselves as hubs for cargo.

European Cargo is now the single biggest airline at Bournemouth Airport, despite not carrying a single passenger.

Other regional airports like East Midlands Airport and Prestwick in Scotland are seeing rapid growth in flows of trade.

All of which raises the stakes for the government’s inquiry into the de minimis system.

At present, there is no timeline for its decision, but removing the clause would have far-reaching effects across the economy.

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Lionesses parade: The route and key timings as thousands of England fans to descend on central London

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Lionesses parade: The route and key timings as thousands of England fans to descend on central London

The Lionesses will celebrate with thousands of England fans in central London today as the players take part in an open-top bus procession.

The bus will carry the team through central London, allowing supporters to celebrate the team’s defence of their Women’s Euros title alongside the likes of Leah Williamson and Chloe Kelly and catch a glimpse of the silverware.

Here is all you need to know.

Where will the parade go and when?

The team’s open-top bus will travel along The Mall from 12.10pm.

It will end with a staged ceremony at the Queen Victoria Memorial in front of Buckingham Palace, which is expected to start at roughly 12.30pm and end at 1pm, the Football Association (FA) announced.

The Royal Marines Portsmouth band and the Central Band of the Royal Air Force will perform on the stage and highlights from the tournament will be shown on big screens.

England manager Sarina Wiegman will then lead her triumphant team out on stage to lift the trophy.

The event will be hosted by former Lioness and football pundit Alex Scott.

Fans will be able to attend the event for free, but the FA have warned that the capital is going to be “very busy”.

“People should plan their visits carefully, both coming into central London and travelling home,” the association said.

England players celebrate with the trophy after winning the UEFA Women's Euro 2025. Pic: Reuters
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England players celebrate with the trophy after winning the UEFA Women’s Euro 2025. Pic: Reuters

How to watch

You can watch coverage of the entire event live on Sky News from 10am and follow all the action with our live blog.

Fans can also follow coverage of the event on the BBC, ITV and across England’s social media channels.

Celebrations with the deputy PM

The Lionesses landed back in the UK from Basel, Switzerland, on Monday, where celebrations continued with a reception at Downing Street.

Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner and sports minister Stephanie Peacock hosted the team ahead of today’s bus parade.

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‘It’s very, very special’

Sir Keir Starmer said: “The Lionesses have once again captured the hearts of the nation.

“Their victory is not only a remarkable sporting achievement, but an inspiration for young people across the country.”

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Chloe Kelly saves England again

An extra bank holiday?

As the team have become the first senior England side to win a major tournament on foreign soil, some have called for an extra bank holiday to mark the occasion.

Liberal Democrats leader Ed Davey was one of those who asked the prime minister if it was “time for that bank holiday”.

He was referring to comments made by Sir Keir in 2023. When, as leader of the opposition, he wrote on X that there “should be a celebratory bank holiday if the Lionesses bring it home”.

But with estimates suggesting an extra bank holiday would cost the economy £2.4bn, it’s understood such a move isn’t being planned by Downing Street.

‘There is no stopping them now’

The impact of the Lionesses second consecutive Euros title is already being felt across the UK.

At Bearsted Football Club in Maidstone, Kent, a mural of Alessia Russo, who levelled Sunday’s final with a goal in the 56th minute, has been unveiled.

Soccer Football - UEFA Women's Euro 2025 - Final - England v Spain - St. Jakob-Park, Basel, Switzerland - July 27, 2025 England's Alessia Ru
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Alessia Russo scoring the levelling goal. Pic: Reuters

The club is where Russo first started playing, and chairman Jamie Houston told Sky News the Lionesses have helped transform the women’s game.

“Five years ago we never had a girl’s football team,” he told Sky correspondent Mollie Malone. “Now we have five separate teams for girls, and boys are accepting of more girls in the game.

“There is no stopping them now.”

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What’s next for the Lionesses?

Read more:
In pictures: The story of the Euros final
Fans celebrate at club where Lioness began journey
Analysis: England showed resolve and relentlessness

Lynda Hale, who played in the England squad in the first ever international women’s match against Scotland in 1972, reiterated that women’s football has changed drastically since she played.

“When I first started playing there was hardly anyone that would watch,” she told Sky News Breakfast.

“To put on the England shirt and think what we started has grown to this magnitude, and it is still going to grow, is absolutely fantastic. I think the sky’s the limit in women’s football.”

Asked what advice she would have for the current England squad after their win, Ms Hale said: “The girls need to make as many memories as they can and take everything in their stride.”

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