Soccer had already begun to change when Roman Abramovich became the controlling owner of Chelsea in the summer of 2003.
The Champions League had grown enough in stature that virtually every major soccer player in the world wanted to play in it. The Bosman ruling of 1995 and the UEFA's discontinuation of foreigner limitations in a given squad had already created a seller's market. Real Madrid had already begun their Galacticos ways (aka, "fill the team with stars at every position") and had just shocked England by plucking David Beckham from Manchester United.