Football Legends Transitioning to Club Ownership
Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo, Kylian Mbappé, Luka Modrić, Vinícius Júnior, Thibaut Courtois. For two decades they’ve shaped football from the pitch. Now they’re quietly reshaping it from the boardroom.
This isn’t about vanity shares or ceremonial titles. Around Europe – and beyond – some of the game’s biggest names are buying into clubs, attaching their reputations to projects that range from romantic homecomings to hard-edged multi-club ambitions.
Messi goes home – in his own way
In April, UE Cornella, a modest fifth-tier side on the south-west edge of Barcelona, dropped a bombshell: Lionel Messi had completed a 100 percent takeover.
Cornella framed it as a natural extension of a bond that never really broke. “Reinforces Messi’s close ties to Barcelona and his commitment to the development of sport and local talent in Catalonia,” read the club’s statement, tying the move directly to his 17 years at FC Barcelona.
Messi didn’t just sign paperwork. He introduced himself to players and staff via video, backing their promotion push. They fell short in the playoffs, but the effect off the pitch was instant. Cornella’s Instagram exploded into the hundreds of thousands. A niche Catalan club suddenly had a global footprint.
The football base is already solid. Cornella’s academy is respected across Spain – Jordi Alba passed through here, as did current Barça player Gerard Martin and Arsenal goalkeeper David Raya. This is not a vanity project dropped on barren ground. Founded in 1951, the club has pedigree, even knocking out Atlético Madrid in the 2021 Copa del Rey.
Messi is expected to push investment towards Catalan youth, using that academy as the engine. The footballing project will take time. The brand impact hasn’t.
And this isn’t his only experiment in ownership. In Uruguay’s fourth tier, he and Inter Miami team-mate Luis Suárez have created Deportivo LSM, a brand-new professional club. For Messi, the blueprint is clear: start small, build structures, lean on local talent.
Ronaldo’s next rivalry is on the balance sheet
Cristiano Ronaldo has never hidden his ambition. So when he turned 40 and was asked about his post-playing future, his answer was blunt: “If I can be a club owner, why would I be a manager, sporting director or CEO?” He spoke openly of wanting “several” clubs.
The first step arrived in February. Through CR7 Sports Investments, Ronaldo bought a 25 percent stake in UD Almería, a Segunda División side with recent La Liga experience and clear room to grow.
“It has been a long-held ambition of mine to contribute to football, beyond the pitch,” he said. Almería, he added, offered “strong foundations and clear potential for growth.”
The Spanish club is primarily controlled by a Saudi-led consortium headed by Mohammed Al-Khereiji, who welcomed Ronaldo as more than a figurehead: “He is regarded as the greatest to ever play the game, he knows the Spanish leagues very well and he understands the potential of what we are building here both in terms of the team and the academy.”
Ronaldo certainly knows the territory. Nine years at Real Madrid, two La Liga titles, four Champions Leagues, and the small matter of becoming the club’s all-time top scorer have given him a deep familiarity with Spanish football’s ecosystem.
Almería’s potential is real. They last played in La Liga in 2024 and were a single step away from returning this June, losing 2-1 on aggregate to Málaga in the playoff final. Since then, the club has doubled down: hiring García Pimienta, a highly rated coach forged over two decades at La Masia, and signing seven new players to go after automatic promotion in 2026-27.
The new era produced a surreal image in August. In Lisbon, Ronaldo sat in the stands for a pre-season friendly between Al-Nassr, the club he plays for, and Almería, the club he now co-owns. His Saudi employers lost 2-0 to his Spanish investment. On the pitch, he still hunts goals. Off it, he’s chasing returns.
Vinícius Júnior and the rebirth of Alverca
While Ronaldo and Messi have gone for clubs with established reputations, Vinícius Júnior has attached himself to a story of resurrection.
In February 2025, the Real Madrid winger joined a group of investors to buy between 70 and 80 percent of Portuguese side Alverca for around €10 million. The timing could hardly have been better. Three months later, Alverca sealed back-to-back promotions to return to the top flight for the first time since 1998.
This is a club that died once already. Relegated from Liga Portugal in 2005, Alverca folded, then reformed a year later and began a long climb through regional divisions. When the Vincintin family – who also owned Santa Clara – were forced to sell due to league rules prohibiting multi-club ownership, Vinícius and his partners moved.
He is not the day-to-day operator. His agent, Thassilo Soares, is the majority shareholder, and those inside the club are clear about the arrangement. “Our relationship with Vinícius is remote,” sporting director Fernando Malta told Get French Football News, in comments carried by The Guardian. “We say he is the club’s most famous fan.”
That “fan” has already helped. Alverca’s Complexo Desportivo hosted Vinícius for the first time early last season when Benfica came to town. The club then finished a respectable 10th in their first year back at the top, powered by a remarkable 35 new signings.
Malta is realistic. He does not see Alverca morphing into a challenger to Porto, Sporting CP or Benfica. “We are not a big club in terms of size, so we need to be creative in our scouting and use of data,” he said. The priorities are clear: stay in the top division, sell players, grow smartly.
Star power will help. Alongside Vinícius, Real Madrid team-mate Eduardo Camavinga and American rapper Travis Scott are involved in communication and marketing. Alverca might never dominate Portugal, but it will no longer be ignored.
Mbappé’s tough lesson at Caen
Not every superstar-ownership story starts with a fairytale.
Kylian Mbappé, via his company Interconnected Ventures and its investment arm Coalition Capital, took a majority stake in SM Caen in June 2024. He reportedly invested €15 million of his own money into a club he nearly joined as a youth player in 2012, before choosing Monaco.
Caen’s statement heralded “a significant step in the club’s strategic development” and spoke of reinforcing “its natural ambition to remain among the historic places in French football.” At the time, they were in Ligue 2 and pushing upwards.
The reality bit hard. Caen collapsed to 18th in 2024-25 and were relegated to the Championnat National – their first drop to the third tier in 41 years. Results nosedived, popular coach Nicolas Seube was sacked, and anger spilled over. One banner, unfurled after a damaging defeat to Clermont Foot, cut through the PR: “SMC is not your toy.”
Mbappé, juggling a move to Real Madrid and the demands of elite football, struggled to give Caen the hands-on attention the crisis demanded. Yet he did not retreat. At the end of last year, he made a bold call by appointing Gaël Clichy – better known to many as a former Arsenal and France left-back – as head coach.
Clichy steadied the ship. Caen missed the playoffs in May but stopped the slide, and there is optimism about a quick return to Ligue 2 this season.
Another decisive move came this summer, when Mbappé approved the arrival of former Caen and Paris Saint-Germain midfielder Mathieu Bodmer as director of football. According to L’Équipe, the pair did not even speak before the appointment, a detail that underlines both the delegation of power and the distance between owner and operation.
Mbappé’s project has been bruising, but it has also been instructive. Owning a club is not the same as carrying one on your back.
Modrić and Swansea’s growing star power
Luka Modrić chose a different route. On the brink of ending a 13-year spell at Real Madrid last summer, he quietly became a minority investor and co-owner at Swansea City.
“Hi Swansea fans, I’m Luka Modric and I’m excited to be part of the journey,” he said in a club press release. “My goal is to support the club’s growth in a positive way and to help to build an exciting future.”
For Swansea’s American ownership group – Andy Coleman, Brett Cravatt and Jason Cohen – this was the marquee name they had been hunting, inspired by Wrexham’s Hollywood-fuelled revival under Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney.
Modrić knew the club from his Tottenham days, having faced them home and away in 2010-11. Reports in The Guardian suggest the move is driven by his wish to learn the business side of football, not just lend a famous face.
He has immersed himself in strategy discussions and even volunteered to speak directly with potential signings. For now, with his playing career continuing in Serie A at AC Milan, he remains a background presence at the Swansea.com Stadium. That is expected to change when he finally hangs up his boots at 40.
The impact is already visible. Snoop Dogg joined as an investor a couple of months after Modrić. Martha Stewart followed in December. “It puts us in a different league in terms of some of the things that we are able to do,” chief executive Tom Gorringe admitted.
The next step is literal: back to the Premier League. Swansea have been out of the top flight for nine years and missed the Championship play-offs in 2025-26 by nine points. As the new campaign begins, having a Ballon d’Or winner on speed dial for advice is not a bad card to play.
Courtois and the multi-club vision
If Messi’s moves are romantic and Modrić’s are educational, Thibaut Courtois’ portfolio looks unmistakably strategic.
At 34, still one of the world’s best goalkeepers and Real Madrid’s No.1, the Belgian has already taken stakes in three clubs this year alone. All via NxtPlay Capital, the investment company he co-founded with Gonzalo Vilar.
In February, Courtois joined an all-star ownership group at Le Mans, where Novak Djokovic and Felipe Massa were already on board. The timing was shrewd. Le Mans have since celebrated a return to Ligue 1 for the first time since 2010.
Three months later, NxtPlay became co-owners of CD Extremadura. The Spanish club has rocketed up the pyramid with four successive promotions since 2022, landing in the Primera Federación, Spain’s third tier. The trajectory is clear: this is a club on the rise, not a rescue case.
Then came the move that tugged at the heart as well as the calculator. On June 1, KRC Genk announced Courtois’ return as a minority investor – the first external corporate shareholder in the club’s history, following its transition into a limited liability company.
“I have pursued excellence all my life. At KRC Genk, I feel that same fire and ambition,” Courtois told the club’s website. “This investment truly feels like coming home. Through this commitment, I want to help the club continue to grow and strengthen its sporting ambitions. From Limburg to the top of Europe.”
NxtPlay now holds a seat on Genk’s board, with Vilar handling day-to-day responsibilities while Courtois focuses on Madrid. The goalkeeper still shapes commercial strategy and long-term planning. The pattern is unmistakable: clubs with growth potential, spread across key markets, all feeding into a broader, multi-club model.
It is the kind of structure pioneered by City Football Group, Red Bull and BlueCo. This time, though, the architect is not a faceless conglomerate but a player still diving around in Champions League knockout ties.
The new power game
From Cornella’s training pitches in Catalonia to Caen’s bruised but hopeful fanbase in Normandy, from Almería’s promotion charge to Alverca’s rebirth, football’s map is being redrawn by those who once only occupied the dressing room.
Some, like Mbappé, are learning the hard way that ownership is a different kind of pressure. Others, like Courtois, are already thinking in networks and board seats.
The question now is simple: as these icons move from the pitch to the boardroom, who will build the model that shapes the next era of the game – and who will discover that being a legend on the grass offers no guarantees in the corridors of power?
