Chelsea owners Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali's regular dressing room trips are another sign of dysfunction

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When Behdad Eghbali strode across the Stamford Bridge turf in the direction of the Chelsea dressing room after the 0-0 draw with Liverpool earlier this month, a frisson of excitement murmured among those still in the ground. To this day, the sight of an owner striding towards the inner sanctum of the playing staff tends to mean only ominous things await. Two days later Frank Lampard, the Chelsea legend had been in the directors' box on that night, was appointed interim manager until the end of the season.

And yet, to hear the Chelsea players and staff discuss the presence of ownership in the dressing room is to be told this should be the most normal thing in the world. When a report from Monday morning was put to Kepa Arrizabalaga, one claiming Todd Boehly had labelled the Blues' performance in a 2-1 defeat against Brighton "embarrassing" in a post-match locker room debrief, his response was to effectively contend not to worry, these things happen all the time.

"Todd comes to the changing room in every game," Chelsea's goalkeeper said. "He had different chats with us after different games. I am not going to say what he said. It is normal when he came."

The current manager, meanwhile, seemed to suggest that it had been a fault of previous owner Roman Abramovich, a man who effectively allowed players such as Lampard and John Terry to rule the roost at Stamford Bridge, that he did not pop down from his ivory tower often enough. "There may have been some criticism of our old owner for not coming to games, not being around, and that wasn't always true to be fair," Lampard said. "But when an owner is invested in their interest in the team and wants to help and improve, it's their prerogative to have the input they want. I remember the moments as a player of owners first coming into the dressing room.

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"It first happened at Chelsea. I remember being really happy that they were there. You could touch them, you could high five them and listen to them and feel them. That's not a bad thing in terms of the identity of the club and where you want to get to. There is no problem with it. I had my things to say after the game. If the owner comes in and wants to be positive and speak to the players, then I think it is his part to do that."

How positive it is to label the performance of your players embarrassing remains firmly open to debate, particularly as it has since been suggested that Boehly singled out one individual for particular criticism. Had anyone in the dressing room been feeling particularly brave, they might have questioned how much embarrassment ownership has brought on Chelsea since their takeover nearly a year ago. From the micro (Boehly pitching a north vs. south All Star game or predicting a 3-0 win over Real Madrid hours before his undermatched side were crushed at the Santiago Bernabeu) to the macro (signing Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang for Thomas Tuchel days before they would sack him, a decision they claimed to have been planning for weeks), there has been little from on high to give Chelsea players or supporters a sense of swagger. No wonder those sat above Boehly at Stamford Bridge this weekend seemed to have had enough.

It is not as if owners across the Premier League appreciate the omertá of the dressing room en masse. Boehly's counterparts at Arsenal have been snapped in the post match afterglow on occasion; this very weekend Amanda Staveley was spotted celebrating with Newcastle United's womens team after a 6-1 win against Bradford. Therein lies the difference however. It is one thing for an owner to add their garlands after an impressive win, quite another to dress down individual employees after a bad loss. After all, you pay your third head coach of the season to identify what needs to improve after a performance as insipid Saturday's.

If that is not enough, it is not as if Chelsea are short of sporting and technical directors who can offer seniority. Sidelining the entire management structure so that he can have his say suggests Boehly believes he knows better. If this were a one-off it would be easy to minimise but this is an ownership group that seems intent on radically disrupting something it does not understand yet. Handing out seven year contracts to fringe players, building a heaving front office with little clear delineation of responsibility, hiring a head coach whose strengths are people management before giving him a squad too big to register: none of these gambits have done anything but backfire in the most spectacular. For once the proper football men might be onto something when they contend that these individuals don't know the game.

A dressing room dressing down, like so many other things Boehly and Eghbali have done this season, reflects an owner who does not know their place. They might write the cheques but there are, or at least ought to be, limits to what they should do. There is plenty of embarrassment to go around at Chelsea, Boehly deserves more than his fair share.