Kenyon hits back in Mutu row

Chelsea chief executive Peter Kenyon has hit out again at Gordon Taylor in the row over Adrian Mutu’s punishment for drug-taking.

Mutu was suspended for seven months by the Football Association on Thursday for testing positive for a banned substance, said to be cocaine.

But Taylor, chief executive of the Professional Footballers Association, had implied that Chelsea targeted the player in order to get him out of the club and insisted the Barclays Premiership side did not care about the welfare of their players.

But Kenyon, writing in the club’s programme ahead of their clash with Everton this afternoon, retorted: “To suggest the club targeted Mutu purely to get him out of the club is total nonsense. Our actions have resulted in a significant financial loss to the company when we could have sold him or allowed him out on loan in the summer which would have minimised this loss.

“The facts of the case are these. Chelsea has excellent support mechanisms for all our players. If a player has a problem of any nature and approaches the club with a desire to deal with that problem then Chelsea will support that player completely.

“I can assure everybody of that. In the case of Adrian Mutu, he was offered the chance by manager Jose Mourinho and others to admit he had a problem. He did not take that chance and lied about it.

“Once a player does that and goes on to commit gross misconduct, in this case by failing a drugs test for what is an illegal substance, the rules are very clear. These are not only Chelsea’s rules but those of the FA and agreed with the PFA.”

Kenyon also reiterated comments that the FA had shown themselves to be weak in only handing the player a seven-month ban.

Kenyon added: “As a club, we can only take the action we believe is right for Chelsea. However, the FA has a much wider responsibility to look after the interests of the game as a whole and in this case, we believe it has shown itself to be weak over the issue of drugs.”