Arsenal could be set for problems with their plans for a US tour once again, with a proposed friendly against Chelsea in doubt.

Arsenal intended to travel to the US for pre-season last summer, drawing up plans to play in a mini-tournament involving Inter Milan, Everton, and Millonarios.

Sadly, it all fell apart when Covid-19 cases in the Arsenal camp forced them to cancel the trip altogether.

This year, Arsenal again intend to travel across the Atlantic, but Goal report there’s another spanner in the works.

Part of the current proposals were to face Chelsea, in either Las Vegas or Orlando. But the recent ownership issues faced by the other London club mean that plan is now in doubt.

Travelling abroad obviously carries a great financial cost and plenty of organisation. You usually make that money back through sponsorships and ticket sales, but Chelsea have sponsors pulling out of the club every other day right now.

That’s not to mention the fact that Chelsea are currently limited to spending just £20,000 per match on travel, hotels, and other associated costs.

There’s no way they could do a US tour on that kind of budget, should those restrictions extend beyond May.

You’d hope Arsenal could find another opponent with this much warning, but the issue is that the Chelsea situation could still go either way. Perhaps they’ll be sold to new owners and unrestricted by summer.

Given there’s no certainty over their future, this may drag on for a while before the Gunners even know whether or not they need to make new arrangements.