Boli Blitzer and Harris Ricketts and Palyuk family shortlisted for

Boli, Blitzer and Harris, Ricketts and Palyuk family shortlisted for Chelsea takeover

Rein shortlisted proposals from Todd Boley, David Blitzer and Josh Harris, the Ricketts family and Boston Celtics owner Stephen Palyuki as four candidates to head Chelsea.

The Athletic reported on Thursday night that Nick Candy and Woody Johnson have dropped out of the race to buy Chelsea.

And now it became known that the Raine Group has selected the last four proposals.

Palyuki, 67, is believed to have a real shot at buying the West London club. He owns the Celtics and co-chairs private equity group Bain Capital. He also owns a 55% stake in Serie A club Atalanta.

Centricus dropped out of the race.

Reign aims to complete their part of the sale by the end of April, at which point they will send their preferred challenger to the government and the Premier League.

Chelsea are up for sale after the UK government imposed sanctions on Roman Abramovich earlier this month.

The UK government has called Russian billionaire Abramovich a “pro-Kremlin oligarch” and his assets have been frozen.

Chelsea are expected to be sold for over $3bn (£2.27bn), while Abramovich has said he doesn’t need the £1.5bn he has invested in the club.

(Photo: Brian Babino/NBAE via Getty Images)