Cristiano Ronaldo’s time at Al Nassr has made him the first person in history to become a billionaire thanks to their football career – but even his wealth isn’t enough to get him into the list of the 50 richest people in the sport.
And Wrexham co-owner Ryan Reynolds can forget about it, too – while he’s valued at around £300m, you’ll need a net worth of at least £2.6bn to make our list, restricted to people who own at least 25 per cent of a club, or otherwise have an active role.
Numbers are based on publicly available figures. Where possible, we’ve used Forbes valuations as of early December.
Despite hours of painstaking research, inevitably there may be some omissions, given the sheer number of clubs in world football. This, though, is one of the most extensive football rich lists created for some time.
50. JOHN TEXTOR - LYON/BOTAFOGO £2.6BN
Rarely do investors create as much noise as John Textor managed in 2025. The Missouri native had owned more a stake of more than 40 per cent of Crystal Palace since 2021, but sold his shares to compatriot Woody Johnson after the Eagles’ FA Cup victory.
The win meant Palace qualified for the Europa League – a boon for any investor – and New York Jets owner Johnson gladly swooped in for a £190m purchase. Textor, who made his fortune through a string of tech and media ventures, made a cool £100m profit, yet he parted with his portion reluctantly, as Palace tried in vain to save their Europa League place. UEFA rules bar multiple teams from a single multi-club ownership structure taking part in the same competition – Palace argued they weren’t part of such a structure, but Textor’s Eagle Football Group holds a controlling interest in Brazilians Botafogo, RWDM Brussels of Belgium and significantly French side Lyon, who’d qualified for the Europa League after finishing sixth in Ligue 1.
If things weren’t already complicated enough, Lyon were also battling to retain their place in France’s top flight, after the body that oversees the accounts of French professional football clubs ruled that they should be relegated because of the poor state of their finances.
Textor bought Lyon from long-time owner Jean-Michel Aulas in 2022, then invested in the squad after they sat bottom of the table early in his first full season in charge. In October 2024, Eagle Football Group announced debts of £422m. Lyon fans protested against Textor last summer but eventually the club won an appeal against relegation, selling Rayan Cherki, Said Benrahma and Georges Mikautadze to boost their finances, as well as releasing Alexandre Lacazette and Nemanja Matic.
Textor’s club purchases were angled towards a networked approach, with scouting, transfers and commercial strategies aligned across four nations. It was appearing to bear fruit thanks to Palace’s triumph and Botafogo claiming domestic and Copa Libertadores success in 2024, but Lyon fans aren’t the only ones who have been sceptical.
Botafogo fans turned on him in 2025 over poor performances and the sale of stars, including Igor Jesus to Nottingham Forest in a cut-price deal. Given that Palace supporters aren’t huge fans of him either these days, with the sale of his shares coming too late to avoid their demotion to the Conference League, Textor has quickly found out that club ownership isn’t the best way to make yourself popular.
49. JOHN FISHER - SAN JOSE £2.9BN
WHO? Fisher inherited part of his parents’ Gap retail empire. He’s no stranger to sports, having invested in baseball’s San Francisco Giants and Oakland Athletics – the latter he’s controversially moving to Las Vegas.
RECORD As well as a small stake in Celtic, Fisher bought the San Jose Earthquakes in 2007, helping them return to MLS, but has plans to sell.
48. RENZO ROSSO & FAMILY - VICENZA £2.9BN
WHO? Rosso founded fashion label Diesel in the late 1970s and now heads his Only The Brave Group, an umbrella organisation including a range of luxury designer labels.
RECORD He entered football in 1996, buying his local Italian side Bassano Virtus. In 2018, he rescued bankrupt Vicenza Calcio and merged the clubs.
=46. BEHDAD EGHBALI & JOSE E. FELICIANO - CHELSEA £2.9BN EACH
WHO? Eghbali and Feliciano made their fortunes in investment banking, before co-founding private equity giant Clearlake Capital in 2006.
RECORD Clearlake own a 61.5 per cent stake in Chelsea and Strasbourg, with Todd Boehly, Mark Walter and Hansjorg Wyss owning the rest.
45. GAIL MILLER & FAMILY - REAL SALT LAKE £3.6BN
WHO? Larry H. Miller began with a single car dealership in 1979 and created a conglomerate, also buying NBA team Utah Jazz. Wife Gail took over after his death in 2009.
RECORD Gail added MLS side Real Salt Lake and NWSL’s Utah Royals, plus their stadium, to the family’s portfolio in April 2025 for £450m.
44. FLORENTINO PEREZ - REAL MADRID £3.6BN
WHO? It’s hard to imagine the modern football landscape without the Real Madrid president. An engineer by trade, Perez built his fortune through ACS, a construction company he transformed into one of the world’s most powerful infrastructure, telecommunications and services groups. The corporate authority, wealth and influence that he garnered in that role led to the career shift that has come to define him.
RECORD After a first failed bid for the Real Madrid presidency in 1995, Perez finally won the role in 2000, pledging to sign superstar Luis Figo from arch rivals Barcelona if he won the election. Such a ludicrous notion was initially laughed at, yet Perez was a man of his word and pulled off one of the most jaw-dropping deals in football history.
Figo’s arrival kickstarted the Galacticos era, with Perez aiming to sign the world’s biggest superstars. In came Zinedine Zidane, Ronaldo, David Beckham, Kaka, Cristiano Ronaldo and countless others in the years that followed. Across his two spells as president – he stepped down in 2006 after criticism over a poor period of results, but was re-elected in 2009 – Perez has reshaped Real Madrid from a traditional giant into a modern superclub that consistently delivers. Seven of Los Blancos’ record 15 European Cups have been won under his stewardship, while no club comes close in terms of marketing and revenue.
43. EVANGELOS MARINAKIS - NOTTINGHAM FOREST/OLYMPIACOS £3.9BN
Whether remonstrating with Nuno Espirito Santo on the pitch, or his club barring Gary Neville from using the City Ground commentary box, things tend to be eventful when Marinakis is around. He’s not short of passion.
Born into a prominent Greek shipping family, Marinakis built on his father’s foundations by growing Capital Maritime & Trading Corp into a global empire and becoming one of the most influential figures in international trade. He has added media and energy ventures to his portfolio, securing his status among Greece’s most powerful businessmen.
His first foray into football came in 2010, when he bought Olympiacos. The juggernauts have since re-established domestic dominance, won Greece’s first European trophy at club level with the 2024 Conference League, and have regularly reached the group stage of the Champions League. He has invested heavily in infrastructure, expanded the club’s commercial reach and pushed for modernisation across Greek football.
Yet his tenure has not been without friction. Marinakis is known for his fiery temperament – sudden managerial changes, public criticism of refereeing standards and other rows have become part of his shtick in Greek football, and it’s a temperament that English football fans have also come to know well.
In 2017, he brought his combative energy to the Midlands, completing a takeover of Nottingham Forest. His mission was clear – revive a sleeping giant. After years of instability, Forest suddenly had real financial backing and an owner willing to act decisively. The early years were turbulent – frequent managerial turnover and inconsistent recruitment slowed progress – but the pivot came with the appointment of Steve Cooper. Backed by Marinakis’s willingness to invest, Forest surged to promotion in 2022, returning to the Premier League after a 23-year exile. Survival at the top level has proved challenging. He has spent aggressively to keep Forest competitive, signing huge rafts of players in single windows. Some have flopped, while others have soared. His relationship with managers remains combustible – particularly Nuno, who masterminded Forest’s run to Europe last term before being sacked just a few games into the new season. Successor Ange Postecoglou didn’t last long either.
What can’t be questioned is Marinakis’s ambition. Forest’s commercial profile has grown, matchday revenue improved and long-stagnant infrastructure projects have moved forward under his direction.
42. JOE MANSUETO - CHICAGO FIRE £4BN
WHO? The Chicago Fire owner made billions telling investors how much things are worth – his Morningstar Inc provides recommendations to the asset management industry.
RECORD On-pitch results have been lacklustre, but Mansueto’s tenure at the Fire has brought a return to the city’s 61,000-seater Soldier Field stadium and a new training ground.
41. SALINAS FAMILY - MAZATLAN £4BN
WHO? Mexican Ricardo Salinas Pliego turned interests in telecomms, retail, media and financial services into the sprawling Grupo Salinas empire.
RECORD His company took on Liga MX side Mazatlan in 2020, but reports say he could sell his stake in them and Club Puebla, potentially funding a 2030 presidential campaign.
40. ROCCO COMMISSO - FIORENTINA £4BN
WHO? Italian-born Commisso moved to the States with his family aged 12 and worked in the financial sector before founding Mediacom, the fifth largest cable TV company in the US.
RECORD He first bought the New York Cosmos in 2017, then Fiorentina two years later, but La Viola have been rock bottom of Serie A this season.
39. JOHN W. HENRY - LIVERPOOL £4BN
WHO? Henry made his money in investment management and has since built a sporting empire, notably ending the Boston Red Sox’s 86-year wait for a World Series title.
RECORD His Fenway Sports Group bought Liverpool in 2010, and have delivered two Premier League titles and a Champions League to Anfield.
38. DIETMAR HOPP - HOFFENHEIM £4BN
If you tuned in to the Bundesliga over the 2019-20 season, there’s a good chance you will have seen Dietmar Hopp’s face staring back your way through sniper’s cross hairs.
That was the year fan protests over Hopp’s involvement in German football reached their peak, with games across several weekends plagued by threats and abusive chanting on the terraces. Hopp, the owner of TSG Hoffenheim, had rapidly become one of the most hated figures in German football.
After graduating from university in the 1960s, Hopp worked as a software developer at IBM. In 1972, he and four associates founded the SAP software company, which eventually became the world’s third-largest IT group and remains the most valuable company in Germany today. He retired in 2003, but retains around 5.5 per cent in shares and is one of Germany’s richest figures.
When Hopp bought his hometown side Hoffenheim in 1990, they were an eighth-tier club based in a small village. But thanks to his huge investment, they catapulted up the leagues, reaching the 2. Bundesliga in 2007 and the top tier just 12 months later. Hopp built two stadiums, a state-of-the-art training facility and is believed to have spent around £300m of his personal fortune on players, staff and facilities. His status as generous benefactor, while envied by rival supporters, was without question.
Until 2015, that is, when Hopp applied for an exemption from Germany’s 50+1 rule, which stipulates that 50 per cent of the voting shares in football clubs, plus one share, remain in the hands of their members, rather than investors and private companies. Exemptions are made for investors who can show they have supported a club “substantially and uninterruptedly” for 20 years, as Hopp believed he had. When this exception was granted, the abuse began.
To many ultras across Germany, Hopp came to represent everything rotten about the modern game – a billionaire who wanted to do away with tradition and seize power of a collective entity. Each and every time the 50+1 rule saw a new challenge, Hopp’s face finds itself back in the cross hairs.
He announced his decision to annul the exemption in 2023 and has since taken a back-seat role at the club, but football fans don’t forget in a hurry.
37. MIKHEIL LOMTADZE - WYCOMBE £5BN
WHO? The CEO of Kazakh “super app” Kaspi, Lomtadze sees football through the lens of data and bought 90 per cent of Wycombe in 2024, but is reportedly yet to attend a game.
RECORD The noises at Wycombe have been around long-term success and sustainability, but a slump from League One’s automatic promotion race will have stung last term.
36. RYBOLOVLEV FAMILY - MONACO £5BN
WHO? Dmitry Rybolovlev is a rare breed – a Russian oligarch who has avoided western sanctions following the 2022 invasion of Ukraine, he distances himself from the regime.
RECORD Since becoming Monaco’s majority owner in 2011, they have gone from Ligue 2 to the French title and Champions League semi-finals.
35. LEWIS FAMILY - SPURS £5BN
WHO? The ultimate power behind Spurs, the Lewis family are majority owners of ENIC, an investment group that is the club’s majority owner.
RECORD The asset-first ownership model: build an impressive stadium, grow revenues and let the football catch up. Trophyless years may have irked fans, but it hasn’t all been bad.
34. JUAN CARLOS ESCOTET - DEPORTIVO £5BN
WHO? The Madrid-born founder of the Venezuelan financial instutition Banesco, plus majority shareholder of Abanca, a major Spanish bank.
RECORD Abanca bought Deportivo La Coruna in 2020, with Escotet now their president. The struggling club’s debts have been paid off, and they have risen back to the second tier.
33. JIM KAVANAUGH - ST LOUIS CITY £6BN
WHO? A tech founder with a love for European football, Kavanaugh spent some of his World Wide Technology riches to bring MLS to St Louis.
RECORD The team were a winning machine in their debut MLS season. They became the first rookie club to top their conference, but suffered a humbling early play-off elimination.
32. NASSEF SAWIRIS - ASTON VILLA £6BN
The Aston Villa that Nassef Sawiris walked into in July 2018 was a lot different to how the club looks now. They were licking their wounds after defeat to Fulham in the Championship play-off final, which left them staring at a third straight second-tier season.
With only one year of Premier League parachute payments left, Villa were at a fork in the road. Fail to clamber back up to the top table for a third successive season and they risked going the same way as other fallen giants, dealing with the fallout of a long-term exile. The pressure was on for Sawiris and co-owner Wes Edens to hit the ground running. It was a gamble. Fast-forward to 2026 and that risk appears to have paid off, the good times returning via an exciting side that made the Champions League quarter-finals last term.
Perhaps Sawiris’ judgement should never have been doubted. The youngest son of Egyptian business giant Onsi Sawiris, Nassef is a part of one of the country’s richest dynasties thanks to the success of the Orascom group, which reaches across several industries. The Villa owner cut his teeth working with Orascom’s construction arm, helping the business grow beyond Egypt to become an international player.
Sawiris’ nose for opportunity led to Villa, joining forces with US billionaire financier Wes Edens to form V Sports and buy the club from previous owner Tony Xia when Villa faced significant cash flow issues. The group also now has a stake in Portuguese Primeira Liga club Vitoria Guimaraes.
The co-owners’ first big decision at Villa Park was to sack manager Steve Bruce following a run of three wins in 11 matches to start the new campaign, turning instead to Dean Smith. That appointment would prove an inspired move, with the hometown hero leading the Villans on a 10-match winning run to surge into the play-offs, where they beat Frank Lampard’s Derby to return to the Premier League.
That eye for managerial change has been a theme over Sawiris’ spell at the club, with Unai Emery’s arrival in October 2022, as the replacement for Steven Gerrard, transforming Villa into a regular qualifier for European competition. The yearly need to sell players in order to stay on the right side of PSR limits has complicated things, but there’s a real sense that, if rules allowed it, even more of Sawiris’ money would have been poured into helping the team climb up the Premier League table.
31. RINAT AKHMETOV - SHAKHTAR DONETSK £6BN
WHO? Ukraine’s richest man, he founded a business that supplied fuel for steel production and grew his wealth through investment group System Capital Management.
RECORD Shakhtar have been a force domestically since Akhmetov took over as president in 1996 and won the Europa League in 2009.
30. DENISE YORK & FAMILY - LEEDS/RANGERS £6BN
WHO? American sports aristocracy as owners of San Francisco 49ers and Pittsburgh Penguins’ 1991 NHL championship team, the family’s wealth came from mall real estate.
RECORD It took two seasons for the Yorks’ 49ers Enterprises to get Leeds into the Premier League again, while they’ve had a rocky start to life with Rangers, just ask Russell Martin...
29. PAVEL TYKAC - SLAVIA PRAGUE £7BN
WHO? A hard-nosed investor with a formidable reputation in the Czech Republic, Tykac grew his wealth as a specialist in the energy market.
RECORD A lifelong Slavia Prague fan, he bought the club from Chinese ownership in 2023 and delivered a title last term, but results in Europe have been underwhelming.
28. DAN FRIEDKIN - EVERTON/ROMA £7BN
WHO? There’s a case to be made that Friedkin is the world’s coolest club owner. After taking charge of the family business, The Friedkin Group, which primarily distributes Toyotas across North America, he used his enormous bank balance to explore his own passions. He moved into film, buying the production company behind the Oscar-winning Parasite. The son of a wealthy pilot and stuntman, Friedkin has produced films himself and won an award for best speciality stunt after landing a Spitfire on a beach for Dunkirk.
RECORD Friedkin splashed £532m to buy Roma in 2020, hiring Jose Mourinho to lead the club to 2022 Conference League glory, and added Everton to his portfolio in December 2024. After years of frustration under Farhad Moshiri, Toffees fans are now hopeful for steady progress.
27. TODD BOEHLY - CHELSEA £7BN
It’s hard to believe that as recently as 2022, hardly any football fans had heard of Todd Boehly, such has been his impact leading the consortium that bought Chelsea in May that year.
Not that the American was alien to all sports fans. At the time of his arrival in London, Boehly already part-owned the LA Dodgers baseball team and women’s basketball outfit the LA Sparks. You don’t build that kind of portfolio without a whole lot of cash.
Boehly made that money in finance. After rising in banking and investment firms, he founded Eldridge Industries in 2015 – a private holding company that invests in multiple areas, including big tech, insurance and real estate.
Under the stewardship of Boehly and his ownership group, the Dodgers have won three World Series. There, he built a reputation for taking long-term control of players’ contracts by offering lengthy deals on high wages. While considered a risk by some, the move does limit the chances a valuable player can leave for free during their prime.
After the headline-smashing Chelsea purchase, in collaboration with Behdad Eghbali and Jose E. Feliciano at Clearlake Capital, Boehly repeated his old MLB trick by installing himself as chairman and interim sporting director.
His lack of a footballing background quickly saw him given meme status by Premier League fans, particularly thanks to some questionable early decisions. Fresh into his new role, Boehly went on a £250m spending spree, swiftly sacked Champions League winner Thomas Tuchel and called for a Premier League All-Star game. Next manager Graham Potter lasted just seven months.
With Boehly still chairman but no longer sporting director as of January 2023, the Blues gradually became more settled. The club’s ownership group also bought Strasbourg – the French outfit have risen to the point they returned to Europe this season for the first time in six years, while Chelsea have steadily progressed at a more high-profile level.
Italian gaffer Enzo Maresca was given a lot more time to work with one of the youngest squads in Europe, moulding them into an exciting unit built around the mercurial talents of Cole Palmer, and lifting the Conference League and Club World Cup last year.
It’s been proof that if you’re willing to throw enough money at a situation, eventually something sticks. People laughed at Boehly when he arrived in London. They’re not laughing now.
26 - MICHAL STRNAD - VIKTORIA PLZEN £8BN
WHO? Owner of Czechoslovak Group (CSG), a sprawling industrial-defence conglomerate originally built by his father, producing armoured vehicles, ammunition, radars and more.
RECORD Last year, Strnad moved into sports by becoming majority owner of Viktoria Plzen, with plans to expand youth development and ensure long-term economic stability.
25. AVRAM & JOEL GLAZER - MANCHESTER UNITED £8BN
WHO? American Malcolm Glazer built an empire through finance and real estate, before buying NFL side Tampa Bay Buccaneers in 1995.
RECORD Glazer’s 2005 Man United takeover took out huge loans against the club. Sons Avram and Joel are still joint chairmen, but sold a 27.7 per cent stake to Jim Ratcliffe in 2024.
24. DANIEL KRETINSKY - WEST HAM/SPARTA £8BN
WHO? Kretinsky’s J&T investment group bought Sparta Prague in 2004, and he now owns 40 per cent of the club personally. He acquired 27 per cent of West Ham in 2021.
RECORD Conference League victory in 2023 had the Hammers dreaming, but unrest has been rife this season, though not focused on Kretinsky.
23. ARTHUR BLANK - ATLANTA UNITED £8BN
WHO? The Atlanta United owner’s smart retail moves made him billions as the co-owner of US DIY giant Home Depot. Blank also owns the Atlanta Falcons NFL franchise.
RECORD Atlanta United took MLS by storm after joining in 2017, winning the title in 2018 and the US Open Cup a year later, but things have slowed.
22 EDWARD S. ROGERS III - TORONTO FC £9BN
WHO? Canadian boardroom royalty, Rogers runs Rogers Communications, and is chairman of the Rogers Bank, Toronto Blue Jays and Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment.
RECORD Toronto FC’s fortunes have fluctuated from the highs of winning the MLS Cup in 2017 to missing the past five play-off campaigns.
21. ANDERS HOLCH POVLSEN - FC MIDTJYLLAND £10BN
WHO? Dane Povlsen took over his family’s fashion house Bestseller at 28, while holding stakes in ASOS and Zalando, and owning 220,000 acres of the Scottish Highlands.
RECORD In 2023, Povlsen bought a majority stake in Midtjylland from Brentford owner Matthew Benham. The club won the title a year later.
20. ROBERT KRAFT - NE REVOLUTION £10BN
WHO? After hitting it big in the paper and packaging world, Kraft diversified into entertainment, real estate and private equity, notably multiple Super Bowl winners New England Patriots.
RECORD He founded MLS side New England Revolution in 1996. They finally lifted the Supporters’ Shield in 2021, setting a points record.
19. HASLAM FAMILY - COLUMBUS CREW £11BN
WHO? James Haslam started a petrol station empire in 1958. Son Jimmy now owns MLS’s Columbus Crew, NFL’s Cleveland Browns and a stake in NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks.
RECORD After purchasing the Crew in 2019, Haslam scrapped plans to move the team to Texas. They won the MLS Cup in 2020 and 2023.
18. SHAHID KHAN - FULHAM £11BN
Big moustache, bigger pockets. If ever there was a walking, talking advert for the American dream, then it’s Fulham’s billionaire owner Shahid Khan.
Born in the Pakistani city of Lahore in 1950, Khan emigrated to the United States as a 16-year-old with just $500 in his pocket. He put himself through college washing dishes for $1.20 an hour, ultimately emerging with a degree in industrial engineering and bagging himself a director job at automotive manufacturing company Flex-N-Gate.
In 1978, he started his own business, Bumper Works, which made parts for customised pickup trucks, thanks to a $50,000 loan from the Small Business Administration. It was so successful, he returned to Flex-N-Gate after buying out his former employer and taking control of the firm. In just a few years, Khan transformed the company into one of the biggest automotive part suppliers in North America, becoming Toyota’s sole provider along the way.
Today, Flex-N-Gate boasts over 25,000 employees and 70 manufacturing plants across the US, China, Argentina, Spain, France, Germany, Mexico and Canada. A lover of sports from a young age, Khan became the first ethnic-minority owner of an NFL franchise in 2012, with the $770m purchase of the Jacksonville Jaguars. Eighteen months later, he paid north of £150m to Mohamed Al Fayed for Premier League side Fulham.
His tenure hasn’t been without its bumps, with the Cottagers relegated in his first season at the helm, ending a 13-year stay in England’s top flight. They almost went down again before coming back up via the play-offs in 2017-18. Two further relegations and promotions were to come, with Khan’s son Tony – installed as sporting director, despite little prior experience within the game and also splitting his time with his All Elite Wrestling interests – coming under particular fire from fans.
The West Londoners’ Premier League return for the 2022-23 season preceded an era of subsequent calm, however. Under Portuguese gaffer Marco Silva, who has performed miracles despite occasional frustrations in the transfer market, the club has remained well clear of relegation danger.
Shahid, in the meantime, has set about transforming Craven Cottage, commencing with a renovation of the Riverside Stand in 2019. Now complete, the stand boasts an extra 3,000 seats, luxury hospitality, a hotel, restaurants, bars and even a rooftop pool.
Jibes about Fulham being the club of choice for the champagne-guzzling upper-middle class are at an all-time high, but anyone who’s experienced a match from its sumptuous leather seats will tell you Khan has created something extraordinary on the banks of the River Thames.
17. JIM RATCLIFFE - MANCHESTER UNITED £13BN
Few modern superclubs can boast an owner who genuinely counts himself a supporter. In minority shareholder and overseer of football operations Jim Ratcliffe, Manchester United can.
Raised in a council house in Greater Manchester, a young Ratcliffe was a Red Devils fanatic from an early age. Yet few would have predicted his rise to one of football’s most prominent positions.
Ratcliffe took a circuitous route to his self-made fortune. After graduating with a chemical engineering degree from the University of Birmingham in 1974, he was reportedly fired from BP for having eczema. Undeterred, he joined Esso and studied for a masters at London Business School, before spending much of the 1990s working for a US private equity firm. Everything changed in 1998, when he launched INEOS.
The company hoovered up run-down petrochemicals plants across Europe, streamlined them and turned them into money-making machines. INEOS rapidly grew from a single Antwerp site into a global chemicals and materials group with tens of billions in annual sales.
Ratcliffe’s first foray into the sports world came in 2017, with the purchase of Swiss Super League club Lausanne. He added Ligue 1’s Nice in 2019, the same year he bought cycling’s Team Sky – the latter overseen by marginal-gains disciple Dave Brailsford, who would become a collaborator of Ratcliffe’s across multiple projects.
Sailing and F1 investments followed, yet it was his move into Premier League football that caused the biggest splash. When the Glazers announced they were looking for investment in Manchester United, Ratcliffe purchased a 27.7 per cent stake in the club, on the condition that he and his team would assume control of football operations.
Fans initially rejoiced at his arrival, as Ratcliffe overhauled a much-criticised executive line-up and promised to shift the club’s focus from commercial growth to winning silverware.
Yet it’s been far from plain sailing. Executive and managerial missteps – including Dan Ashworth’s brief tenure as sporting director and a U-turn over manager Erik ten Hag’s sacking in the wake of the shock FA Cup win in 2024 – plus more than 400 staff redundancies, have drawn ire from the fanbase.
There’s been the promise of a new 100,000-seater stadium, which Ratcliffe has dubbed “the Wembley of the North”, and the billionaire remains committed, but turning around a listing ship of such magnitude is his toughest challenge yet.
16. JOHANN RUPERT - STELLENBOSCH £14BN
WHO? Rupert ranks as South Africa’s richest man and serves as chairman for luxury goods company Richemont – with brands including Cartier – and investment company Remgro.
RECORD As owner of hometown club Stellenbosch, steady growth is the order of the day. They soon earned top-flight status and have finished third each of the last two seasons.
15. TAYLOR FAMILY - ST LOUIS CITY £14BN
WHO? The Taylor family are known for masterminding the worldwide boom of rental car giant Enterprise. They’ve applied their family values to MLS expansion side St Louis City.
RECORD After establishing the club in 2019, St Louis topped the Western Conference in their maiden 2023 campaign. Not too shoddy!
14. PHILIP ANSCHUTZ - LA GALAXY £15BN
WHO? “Without Phil Anschutz, there’s no MLS.” Those were the words of the league’s commissioner Don Garber in 2006. Even today, few would disagree. Born in 1939 in rural Kansas, Anschutz made his fortune after buying out his father’s drilling company, striking oil in Wyoming and selling a stake in the field to Mobil in 1982 for around $500m. He then diversified into transport, real estate and just about every other lucrative avenue one might expect.
RECORD Recognising the potential of football in his homeland ahead of the 1994 World Cup, Anschutz was one of the founders of MLS, owning a number of teams at various stages due to the league’s financial issues. It’s his stewardship of LA Galaxy, whom he purchased in 1998, that he’s best associated with, the club winning six MLS Cups on his watch.
13. FAIQ BOLKIAH - RATCHABURI £15BN
If you asked most people to name the world’s richest footballer, they’d get the answer wrong. It’s not Cristiano Ronaldo, nor is it Lionel Messi.
If you include former players, some might say Mathieu Flamini, but the former Arsenal midfielder was forced to deny that he’s now worth £26bn, after the environmentally conscious former player co-founded a biochemicals company in 2008. “This sum does not match up with the valuation of our company – in fact it’s the total value of the market we want to attack,” Flamini insisted. “There was a misunderstanding, as if we had given only one restaurant the value of the entire catering market.”
The world’s richest footballer actually plays for Ratchaburi FC in Thailand’s top flight, but Faiq Bolkiah didn’t rise from humble beginnings. Rather, he was born into unimaginable wealth as a member of Brunei’s royal family.
The nephew of the Southeast Asian nation’s Sultan, Hassanal Bolkiah, Faiq was born in LA in 1998, then moved to England and was educated at Berkshire’s prestigious Bradfield College. He joined Southampton’s academy aged 11, and had spells at Chelsea and Leicester.
It was while playing for the Foxes’ age category sides that Bolkiah made his international debut. Despite being scouted by the USA, owing to his dual citizenship, Bolkiah ultimately opted to play for his family’s nation. At the age of 18, he played the full 90 minutes of a Suzuki Cup qualifier with Timor-Leste. The fact he was captain on his debut, still a teenager, had absolutely nothing to do with his family’s status, we’re sure.
Bolkiah also played for Leicester in the UEFA Youth League, but moved on to Portuguese side Maritimo in 2020. A right-footed left winger who enjoys cutting inside and shooting from range, Bolkiah failed to play a first-team game for Maritimo, despite making the bench for a Primeira Liga clash against Lisbon juggernauts Sporting in February 2021. Come December that year, he joined Thai League 1 outfit Chonburi.
The first Bruneian to sign for a Thai club, Bolkiah finally became a regular starter with Chonburi, staying for two seasons and scoring his first goals in senior football. He moved to Ratchaburi in 2023, and has remained there since.
At the age of 27, Bolkiah surely won’t be thinking about post-playing pursuits just yet, although FFT can’t imagine he’ll feel the need to jump aboard the punditry circuit in order to make a few extra bob after hanging up his boots.
12. STAN KROENKE - ARSENAL £16BN
WHO? After he married Walmart heiress Ann Walton, Kroenke was taken under his father-in-law’s wing and launched a real estate empire, mainly focused on shopping malls.
RECORD He acquired full control of Arsenal in 2011. Despite consistent cup success, failure to land Premier League glory has frustrated fans.
11. PINAULT FAMILY - RENNES £16BN
WHO? The family own some of the best-known luxury brands in the world, such as Gucci and Yves Saint Laurent, and have also branched out into the wine and culture sectors.
RECORD Since 1998, the Pinault era at Rennes has been about steady growth, rewarded with a Coupe de France triumph against PSG in 2019.
10. AMIN H. NASSER - AL QADSIAH £17BN
WHO? As club backers go, Nasser is in the big leagues as president and CEO of Aramco, the world’s largest oil producer. He was the face of their 2023 takeover of Saudis Al Qadsiah.
RECORD The team immediately won the Saudi First Division in 2024, and signed Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Nacho for their top-flight debut.
9. DAVID TEPPER - CHARLOTTE FC £18BN
WHO? Investment banker Tepper left Goldman Sachs in 1992 to found hedge fund Appaloosa and is owner of the NFL’s Carolina Panthers.
RECORD In 2019, he paid roughly £240m to bring MLS to Charlotte by launching a new team. They debuted in the 2022 season and draw some of the league’s top attendances.
8. SHEIKH MANSOUR - MANCHESTER CITY £23BN
Thanks to the investment of Emirati royal Sheikh Mansour, there’s a whole generation of Manchester City fans too young to remember a time before their relentless modern success.
It’s almost hard to imagine that, as recently as 2002, City were in the second tier, reliant on the goals of Paul Dickov and Shaun Goater to mount promotion pushes. Even as recently as 2008-09 they finished 10th – a distant 40 points behind rivals Manchester United, still the dominant force in English football. But everything was about to change.
The latter season marked the arrival of Mansour, who paid around £200m to purchase the club outright from Thai businessman Thaksin Shinawatra. If fans weren’t already excited by reports of their new impresario’s bank balance, the deadline day signing of Brazilian star Robinho soon sent them into overdrive. That was merely a taste of things to come, as City – dubbed the “noisy neighbours” by Red Devils gaffer Alex Ferguson – spent vast sums hoovering up some of the most coveted talent in world football over successive windows.
City’s 35-year wait for silverware ended in May 2011, as Roberto Mancini’s side sealed FA Cup glory. Twelve months later, they had a first top-flight title in 44 years, courtesy of Sergio Aguero’s iconic stoppage-time winner against QPR on the final day of the season.
The silverware has kept flowing, as successive managers and superstars have turned City into England’s most feared outfit. While that was already the case before Pep Guardiola’s 2016 arrival, the winning machine has since gone into overdrive. He has delivered six Premier League titles, two FA Cups, four League Cups and a long-coveted Champions League success in 2023 – the latter part of an historic treble.
Mansour’s ambition hasn’t stopped in Manchester. In 2013 he founded City Football Group (CFG), a global multi-club setup, with City as the flagship. He has acquired and launched clubs across the world. Notable members include Girona, Palermo and New York City, establishing a network sharing resources, scouting and commercial know-how.
Meanwhile, Mansour’s vast wealth has revamped every aspect of those clubs, with City boasting world-class academy, training and hospitality facilities – the former delivering a conveyor belt of starlets the envy of world football. In short, arguably no football club owner has delivered so much, so emphatically, to a single fanbase, in so little time.
7. IDAN OFER - FAMALICAO £25BN
WHO? A shipping, mining and energy magnate, he owns Quantum Pacific Group, which runs one of the largest private shipping fleets in the world.
RECORD Ofer bought an 85 per cent stake in Portuguese side Famalicao, who won promotion to the top flight in 2019, and a 33 per cent share of Atletico Madrid, though the club are currently being taken over again.
=5. MARK MATESCHITZ & CHALERM YOOVIDHYA - RED BULL CLUBS £33BN EACH
WHO? Austrian Mateschitz and Thai businessman Yoovidhya inherited their Red Bull stakes, respectively holding 49 and 51 per cent.
RECORD Red Bull have had success through Leipzig’s ascent in Germany and Salzburg’s Austrian dominance, plus hold a minority stake in Leeds.
4. HARTONO FAMILY - COMO £38BN
WHO? Among Indonesia’s most powerful families, the Hartonos made their vast wealth from tobacco, then moved into a host of other sectors.
RECORD A Serie D outfit at the time of their 2019 takeover, Como have been catapulted into Serie A with Cesc Fabregas in the dugout and Hollywood stars battling for tickets.
3. ARNAULT FAMILY - PARIS FC £143BN
WHO? The Arnaults are the French business dynasty, owning luxury goods company LVMH. Its brands include Louis Vuitton and Dior.
RECORD It took a matter of months for the Arnaults to end Paris FC’s 46 years out of the top flight in May. Now the club’s aim is to establish themselves as a genuine force.
2. AL THANI FAMILY - PSG £253BN
WHO? Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani is the Emir of Qatar – in 2004, he founded Qatar Sports Investments and has ploughed the Gulf nation’s petrodollars into global sport.
RECORD The 2011 purchase of PSG transformed them into a superclub. By 2025 they’d secured 36 domestic trophies and the Champions League.
1. MOHAMMED BIN SALMAN & FAMILY - NEWCASTLE/PIF CLUBS £1.2TN
So loathed by the Newcastle faithful had owner Mike Ashley become after 14 years of inertia, fans would likely have been happy to see him replaced by one of the cast of Geordie Shore.
Instead, when the retail magnate did finally sell up in 2021, they were taken over by people worth over a trillion quid – that’s 12 zeros, for the record. The club are now owned by the Public Investment Fund (PIF), the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia and their royals, with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the country’s de facto ruler, the figurehead. The PIF also owns four clubs in the Saudi Pro League – reigning champions Al Ittihad, last year’s Asian Champions League Elite winners Al Ahli, Cristiano Ronaldo’s Al Nassr, plus Al Hilal, who had Neymar on their books for a period and beat Manchester City to reach the last eight of last year’s Club World Cup.
PIF’s vast wealth, aided by the nation’s huge oil reserves, prompted Newcastle’s long-suffering fans to quickly dub Bin Salman a hero – some even seeing fit to don traditional Arabic robes and head scarves to games in the aftermath.
The acquisition was the first major step in Saudi Arabia’s aggressive sports and culture investment push over the past four years, to boost the nation’s international profile. Everything from heavyweight boxing bouts and F1 to comedy festivals have recently been staged in Saudi Arabia, which has also won hosting rights to the 2034 World Cup. Critics have been quick to label the Saudis’ actions as sportswashing – a PR smokescreen to distract from human rights abuses in the country and its deeply conservative values.
Back on Tyneside, PIF’s arrival has rapidly transformed Newcastle. Just like Nassef Sawiris’ first move at Aston Villa, much-maligned manager Steve Bruce was quickly dispensed with – in came Eddie Howe, and with him a host of new signings who were capable of delivering an exciting brand of football.
It has transformed the Magpies from relegation candidates to Champions League regulars, even if Premier League profit and sustainability regulations have made it difficult for them to rise all the way up to title contention just yet, like Manchester City quickly did after Sheikh Mansour’s takeover in 2008. Last March though, Newcastle won the League Cup to finally end 56 trophyless years – on Tyneside, absolutely nobody was still pining for Mike Ashley.
