Oil-row businessman aims to score against Chelsea owner

Henry Cameron, a 65-year-old former solicitor, could knock Chelsea off their perch if he succeeds in a legal action seeking £500m from a business associated with the club's super-rich owner, Roman Abramovich. He claims that the Russian was involved in share deals that cost him a 50 per cent stake in a £1bn Siberian oil fields venture.

Instead of making his fortune, he says, he ended up with 1 per cent of the business, after directors of the Russian firm Sibneft issued thousands of new shares in the business to their own subsidiary companies.

The Scot is a director of Russian-owned Sibir, which struck a deal with Sibneftto jointly develop oil fields in Siberia.

Mr Abramovich is named in a lawsuit launched by Mr Cameron's company in the British Virgin Islands, where the case is being heard because a number of co-accused firms are registered there.

Mr Abramovich's spokes-man, John Mann, insisted his boss had acted legitimately.