Billionaire reveals for the first time: Who really paid for Chelsea FC

But at the Efficiency Club’s “Let’s Talk” event at the Zurich Convention Center at the end of November, where he was honored for his life’s work, Wyss spoke for the first time about the details of the takeover and the real owners of the football icon: his two grandchildren.

Wyss said that since the investment was planned to last 10 years, he financed it from the foundations of his two grandchildren. They are 18 and 21 years old and live in the US as their mother Amy’s only child. I told them: This is a football club. Then they answered: There is no American football team called Chelsea. You don’t know much about European football.”

Wyss took over the club in May 2022, along with his co-investor Todd Boehly, 50, and two other small investors. The purchase price was around 2.5 billion lira, then 3 billion francs. For this purpose, investors have pledged to invest an additional 1.75 billion lira in infrastructure such as stadiums.

“You do it like other people buy a Ferrari they don’t need, or their fourth vacation home,” laughs Wyss, who once raised more than ten billion dollars and generated more than four billion in revenue with the sale of medical technology company Synthes. This endowment, which has already been expanded through his distributed foundation, is the largest donor in Switzerland. After the nationalization of Russian Chelsea owner Roman Abramowitsch (57), the British government was looking for someone in a “white shirt” and Boehly and I had him.

The start was difficult: Boehly changed coaches and players at high rates and suggested to his first coach Thomas Tuchel (50) a 4-4-3 system, that is, a squad of twelve players. The management of Argentine coach Mauricio Pochettino (51) has calmed down a bit. However, Chelsea are still far from reaching the top spot. There has been absolutely no increase in the value of the investment so far.

Wyss sees this calmly. “I go to games occasionally. But my influence is limited. We have a good coach, and Todd Boehly is a guy who likes to take the reins. I would love to do that too, but I don’t have the chance. But sometimes I say: This player is really good, you can sell him. Then He will listen.”