Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck stands by Roman Abramovich's mega spending in the early years of his reign.
Buck admits Abramovich wanted success as quickly as possible.
"When we acquired the club there was about £90m worth of debt, and Mr Abramovich was able to pay that off. In terms of moving forward and having a financial model that worked for the long term, though, we had a problem.
"Mr Abramovich's strategy was to be as successful as soon as possible but also build for the future, but you can't do that without spending a significant amount of money. Our strategy was not to be frugal in the early years and we did spend a lot of money, there's no denying it.
"It took maybe three or four years until we realised we had to change our model and be more frugal, more conservative and have a structure for the future. That's what we're doing now and hopefully for the long term we'll be successful."
