Chelsea have warned their staff to be careful about revealing team news through Fantasy Premier League, after Joao Pedro's injury appeared to be given away by fantasy team changes before the club had announced anything.
The club have sent an email to staff reminding them of the potential consequences of using inside information when playing Fantasy Premier League or other public gaming platforms, according to BBC Sport. Selection choices, the warning makes clear, can reveal which players are unavailable or close to returning — long before an official team sheet is published.
The trigger was Chelsea's 2-0 home defeat by Tottenham last month, when Pedro was a surprise omission from the squad. The Brazilian forward had suffered a quadriceps injury, but no announcement had been made before kick-off at Stamford Bridge. To seasoned fantasy watchers, however, the news was already out.
How a fantasy game gave the game away
Several influential Fantasy Premier League content creators claimed to have seen evidence that forward Morgan Rogers, along with several members of Chelsea staff, had removed Pedro from their fantasy teams before kick-off. Rogers, Pedro's team-mate after his big-money summer move, was named alongside club employees in the reports covered by football.london.
Asked about the matter by BBC Sport after the Tottenham defeat, head coach Xabi Alonso said he was unaware of the situation. "I am not into the fantasy team thing, so I didn't know that," he replied. Since joining Chelsea in the summer, Alonso, 44, has generally been guarded when discussing injuries in media conferences — which makes an accidental leak through a game his staff play all the more awkward.
Pedro has been missed. Chelsea started the season in flying form but have felt his absence in recent weeks, and the latest team-news picture before the Sunderland trip still had him among those not expected to feature. Reports suggest he could return after the international break — a comeback Chelsea need after Sunday's 1-0 defeat at Sunderland underlined how short of a cutting edge Alonso's side look without him.
Not Chelsea's first leak problem
This is not the first time team news has escaped Stamford Bridge early. During former manager Liam Rosenior's four-month spell in charge last season, team selections were leaked before both legs of the club's Champions League defeat by Paris Saint-Germain. The fantasy route is a newer, stranger version of an old problem.
Chelsea are not alone, either. BBC Sport notes further examples said to involve players from clubs including Arsenal, Liverpool, Leicester and Newcastle making revealing fantasy changes, and the highest-profile case remains Jack Grealish's omission from the Aston Villa squad before a match against Leicester in February 2021 — a game Leicester won, with their manager Brendan Rodgers later admitting he had heard the rumours beforehand.
More than 11 million people are said to play Fantasy Premier League. The Premier League itself offers no specific guidance to clubs on whether those involved in the game should take part, and there are strict rules prohibiting gambling — but participation is generally treated as a matter for individual clubs to manage.
So what happens next?
For now, Chelsea are treating this as an isolated case. No further restrictions on fantasy participation are expected, with the club believing greater awareness among players and staff will be enough. The email is a warning shot, not a ban.
But the lesson travels well beyond one club. In an era when every fantasy transfer is tracked, timestamped and screenshotted by an army of content creators, a single tap on a phone can do what a dressing-room mole once did — and do it in public, before kick-off, for every opponent to see. Expect other clubs to quietly send the same email before long.
Beyond the Final Whistle: Chelsea are right not to overreact with a ban — but they should not kid themselves that awareness alone fixes this. When your own staff's fantasy teams are a more reliable injury source than your press conferences, the information war is already lost; the next leak is a matter of when, not if, unless clubs treat fantasy accounts like the security risk they plainly are. Should Premier League clubs ban staff from playing Fantasy Premier League at all? Let us know what you think in the comments.
