One of the truisms trotted out in MBA programmes is that business is about relationships. The more people you know, the better off your business is likely to be. And the degree to which your business is likely to be better off is directly proportional to the quality -the importance and power -of the people you know.

Right now, if you are in the business of football, there are few people worth knowing more than Roman Abramovich. The Russian billionaire hangs over the game like some kind of ubiquitous deity, invoked by the debt-ridden and feared by Chelsea's rivals, eager to avoid the kind of financial confrontation that would only ever have one winner. For a man who now never talks to the media and, compared with other tycoons, keeps a low profile, it is remarkable how pervasive his aura seems to be. With so much of the footballing world struggling to cope with oceans of red ink, Abramovich represents hope, the angel investor swooping out of the heavens to rescue the club. In times such as these, the idea of Abramovich -indeed, the possibility of Abramovich -becomes more important than Abramovich himself.

Last month, Augusto Lendoiro, president of the impoverished Deportivo La Coruna, announced that he had drawn interest from would-be investors in Russia and England. "Abramovich?" he said. "I don't know for sure, but it could well be people close to him."

That was enough to send speculation into overdrive and lift the club's spirits.

Tell people that you are a "friend of Roman's" looking to invest and you will quickly make hundreds of new best friends. Last season, AS Roma went through a similar experience when it was revealed that Franco Sensi, the owner, was negotiating with a mysterious Russian oil services company called Nafta Moskva.

"Nafta? Oil? Russia? The signs are all there...Abramovich must be on his way! Await the Messiah!" Such was the reaction in the Roman press, which could talk of little else for a month.

Deportivo and Roma eventually realised that their interlocutors had nothing to do with Abramovich. But now the "Abramovich effect" has infected Corinthians, the Brazilian club, so much so that the Sao Paulo side completed the biggest deal of the transfer window, securing arguably the best player in the world outside Europe.

In November, a previously obscure investment group called Media Sport Investment (MSI) took control of Corinthians. Essentially, they are "renting" the club for ten years at a cost of Pounds 20 million and the promise of future investment. The front man for MSI, which is based in London, is Kia Joorabchian, a 33-year-old Iranian emigre who holds a Canadian passport and was educated in Great Britain.

Joorabchian's arrival at Corinthians was greeted with scepticism, particularly when it was leaked that he was going to buy Carlos Tevez from Boca Juniors. Tevez is the South American Footballer of the Year and has just turned 21. He is the kind of player who ordinarily would end up at a big European club and the asking price of Pounds 10.5 million was four times the previous record paid by a Brazilian club.

Because details of Joorabchian's past are sketchy and he was secretive about which investors were backing him, many felt that this was a Michael Knighton situation, a bombastic potential owner sitting atop a house of cards. But when he delivered Tevez and then followed up by signing Carlos Alberto from FC Porto, the spin machine went into overdrive. Clearly, someone with serious funds was backing Joorabchian.

And that is when Abramovich was dragged into the affair. Despite formal denials from Joorabchian, the whispering world seems convinced that the Iranian is only a front man for the Chelsea owner. They cite plenty of circumstantial evidence.

Abramovich's yacht, Le Grand Bleu, was moored in Buenos Aires while Joorabchian was negotiating with Boca over Tevez. The agent who brokered the Tevez deal was Fernando Hidalgo, who has close links with Pini Zahavi, the intermediary who helped to arrange Abramovich's takeover of Chelsea and who is regularly employed by the Stamford Bridge club. Jorge Mendes, the Portuguese agent, arranged the signing of Carlos Alberto from Porto and he has close links to Jose Mourinho, whom he represented in his dealings when he signed for Chelsea. Vagner Love, a transfer target, plays for CSKA Moscow, a club whose biggest sponsor is Sibneft, the oil giant, in which Abramovich has a controlling stake. And, perhaps most tellingly, six years ago, Joorabchian bought Kommersant, a Russian newspaper, and then sold it to Boris Berezovsky, Abramovich's former business partner and fellow oligarch.