Bates' Harsh Words for Roman

Ken Bates has given Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich and his team at Stamford Bridge a verbal battering, calling his new signings "mercenaries" and the Russian's treatment of manager Claudio Ranieri "shameful."

In the tirade, which came in an interview with Sky Sports News, Bates also said the Russian way of working with people - coloured by "years of communism" - would cost the club its most loyal servants.

"The way Ranieri has been treated is quite shameful," he said, "and he doesn't deserve it.

"I think the job he's done this season, could you do your job if you were being vilified every day in the press and media? And not lose your temper but smile and make a joke?

"He's a gentleman - the Russians don't deserve him. I speak to Claudio and he's a proud man and I think he's done a great job."

Bates, not unfamiliar with sacking managers himself - Gianluca Vialli went in 2000 despite winning the FA Cup four months earlier - also criticised the prolonged uncertainty around Ranieri's future.

"I've sacked a few managers in my time but I've done it - bang, out. I haven't done it by death of a thousand cuts.

"If you want to change your manager, you change the manager but there's a way of doing it and a way of not doing it."

He also said Stamford Bridge would become little more than a playground for money-chasing players.

"Some of the players signed this year are only highly paid mercenaries. They don't give a damn about Chelsea, they just give a damn about their wage packets and it's interesting that not many of the new players, the foreigners, have made it into the team successfully," he said, referring to the appearance of only three new signings in the starting XI in the Champions League semi-final second leg against Monaco

And he had strong criticism for the new ways of doing things at Stamford Bridge and the character of the club.

"I think Chelsea are losing the reputation that was built up over the last 20 years. I treated the staff well and got an extra 10% out of them but they're in danger of losing that, if it hasn't been lost already. It's a great pity, the staff and the fans are what makes the club.

Asked if that was down to oil-billionaire Roman Abramovich, Bates replied:

"It's his henchmen. Remember, if you're aged under 80, you've only ever lived under communism and the communist way of life is very different from the western way of life.

"People below you are treated like dirt and the people above you, you grovel to. It's not the way of doing things in England and they are learning that the hard way.

"They will end up losing all the good people because they'll be headhunted elsewhere."

Unsurprisingly, Bates insists that had he stayed in West London, the trophy cabinet at Chelsea would have had new occupants this season.

"Claudio's done a good job here," he said. "Semi-finalists in the UEFA Champions League and runners-up in The Premiership.

"I would keep him. He would've done better [under me] as he would not have been under the disloyal pressure he has had for the past nine months."