A-list celebrities exploring takeover of EFL clubs after watching Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney’s Wrexham success
A-LIST celebrities are set to follow in the footsteps of Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney after their success with Wrexham.
The Hollywood actors secured back-to-back promotions with the Red Dragons to return the club to the third tier for the first time in 15 years, and are on the right track to repeat that feat this season.
The pair have acted as a catalyst for celebrity investment in English football, with the likes of Tom Brady, JJ Watt, Will Ferrell and golfers Jordan Spieth and Jordan Thomas all involved at various EFL clubs.
Many more high-profile celebrities are set to follow suit according to football investment specialist Adam Sommerfeld, whose work involves connecting clubs with prospective celebrity investors.
He told SunSport: “There are some incredibly high profile celebrities that are looking, some of the time it’s with their agent, some of the time it’s with the direct celebrity, but there are certainly some incredibly high profile ones looking at the moment.
“Whether they find what they are looking for is another question. Celebrities certainly from the sporting world want to be seen to back a winner.
“If you back a team in the Premier League that then gets relegated three times in a row, you don’t want to be connected to that.
“It’s finding a club that could go on a journey but isn’t likely to plummet and negatively impact your brand.”
Reynolds and McElhenney are quite unique as they are majority owners of Wrexham, whereas the likes of Brady and Watt only have minor shares in Birmingham and Burnley respectively.
But they have already seen a return on their investment in terms of exposure, with League One Blues a regular pick for Sky Sports coverage – David Beckham even attended their match against Wrexham and sat alongside NFL legend Brady.
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And it appears the trend of celeb and US involvement in English clubs is only set to rise, with rapper A$AP Rocky tipped to invest in Tranmere.
Sommerfeld continued: “Every team has at some point spoken in recent months to US investors. Most teams will listen and listen very seriously, as will most companies.
“For a celebrity it’s a win-win. Ultimately you want to make sure you’re not backing the wrong horse that could have multiple relegations, goes out of business, but that’s very rare.
“Otherwise it’s win-win for the celeb because they get to promote their personal brand to that team, they will gain Instagram followers, social media followers, which can be directly related to revenue for them.
“There is the fun element, there is the partnership element of other doors that will open up in terms of co-valuing opportunities for both sides.
“It’s sort of like how can The Rock’s followers go and follow Watford for example, and now that celebrity is being followed by Watford fans and now they might go and watch his latest film because of the affinity to Watford.
“And rarely do celebrities put big capital in, most of it will be brand equity they will be putting in.
“So their name is their investment, it’s not like they have to put in a huge amount of capital.”