What’s the biggest prize in football? Many fans would point to the golden trophy awaiting the winners of the World Cup, which kicks off next week. Real Madrid president Florentino Pérez, however, reckons there’s an even more prestigious honour: owning a piece of his club.
Pérez wants the fan-owned club to sell a stake to outside investors for the first time. But, to allay fears among existing members, he insists any new owners won’t actually have real ownership. “It would be like a sponsorship,” he said in an interview with the FT this week.
In some respects, Pérez — the architect of Real Madrid’s so-called Galácticos strategy of signing the world’s most famous players — is in tune with the times. Investors in Elon Musk’s rockets-meet-social-media conglomerate SpaceX have practically no say over governance, but the excitement surrounding its impending flotation suggests there are plenty of people happy to give up control to a leader with a galactic vision.