The row was reignited this week when former Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino, now head coach of the United States men's national team, said Chelsea should be stripped of that Premier League crown and the title handed to Spurs instead.
"If they admitted they broke the rules, the Premier League title was for the second-best team," Pochettino said.
Chelsea's admission that they made £47m in undisclosed payments on transfers between 2011 and 2018 triggered punishments from the Premier League, the Football Association and UEFA, sparking a fierce backlash. Everton supporters were particularly aggrieved, having seen their own club docked points for breaching Profit and Sustainability Rules while Chelsea escaped their FA case with a £10m fine and a suspended two-window transfer ban.
The Premier League's position is that the current ownership, led by Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital, self-reported the issue after taking over the club in 2022, having uncovered illegal payments made under Roman Abramovich's regime.
Among them were seven payments totalling £5.6m to an unregistered agent "for the benefit of" Eden Hazard's transfer — Hazard having been Chelsea's outstanding performer in the 2016-17 season when Pochettino's Tottenham finished as runners-up.
"It's historic. It's very different to the PSR cases. In the case of Chelsea, the new owners came forward with all of the information and we decided to enter into a sanction agreement," Premier League chief executive Richard Masters said last month.
"That was overseen by a commission as well and part of the role of that commission is to ensure that sanction is not unduly lenient."
The Premier League has also argued that even accounting for the illegal payments, Chelsea would not have breached the PSR threshold, and that their £10m fine remains a record. They maintain the club went to considerable lengths to demonstrate transparency throughout the process.
The FA's own investigation initially produced a fine alongside a suspended six-point deduction, but that sporting sanction was overturned on appeal in the summer, with the FA's appeal board ruling it an "excessive sanction" and replacing it with the suspended transfer ban instead.
It remains unclear whether the FA, as governors of the English game, would have the power to go beyond a points deduction and strip a Premier League club of a title outright. The governing body's investigation continues, though it is understood to now be focused on the agents and intermediaries involved in the payments, given that Abramovich and the Chelsea staff of the time have long since left the club. Tottenham declined to comment.