![]() Cesc FàbregasĬurrent team: Como Annual salary: Unknown (€6.3 last year at Monaco) Net worth: $45m Footballing credentials: 1x World Cup, 2x Euros, 1x La Liga, 2x Premier Leagueįàbregas was one of the first footballers on this list to take out the chequebook for a startup, joining forces with ex-Arsenal teammates Thierry Henry and Robin Van Persie in backing cloud video platform Grabyo in 2014. In December 2021, he also launched Sportboost, an accelerator and co-investor for sports-related startups - which Idoven and Casillas’s most recent investment, web management tool for sports clubs Clupik, are part of. The former Real Madrid goalkeeper captained Spain to one World Cup and two European Championships, and stepped onto the startup scene in the twilight years of his career.įollowing a minor heart attack in 2019, Casillas invested in Spanish cardiology startup Idoven’s seed round, and has since backed the company in two further rounds, a follow-up and Series A. Idoven (June 2022, May 2021, May 2020)Ĭurrent team: Retired Net worth: $74m Winners' medals: 1x World Cup, 2x Euros, 5x La Liga, 3x Champions League.The former footballer has since got a taste for fintech, and he’s gone on to back payments startup Sokin and credit card for millennials company Yonder - which emerged from stealth after raising a £20m seed round in March.īut Ferdinand’s investments haven’t always gone to plan, and in March it was reported that he and a number of other high-profile footballers lost £25m after backing a property-focused asset management firm that squandered their cash. Just eight months after the retired defender backed the Paris-based startup at its €44.5m Series A, it hit a valuation of €4.3bn after raising a whopping $680m Series B led by SoftBank. Rio FerdinandĬurrent team: Retired Net worth: $75m Winners' medals: 6x Premier League, 1x Champions Leagueįerdinand’s first investment on the European startup scene, into digital trading card game Sorare, proved a very shrewd bet. ForGood will invest from pre-seed to Series A, and while the vehicle is sector-agnostic, Smalling tells Sifted he’s particularly interested in solutions to the global food waste crisis. ![]() In June, Smalling launched ForGood - an investment vehicle looking to help athletes, musicians and other celebrities invest in startups tackling climate change. He first reached out to Jonathan Petrides, the founder of another portfolio company, Allplants, in the same way. So he tracked down founder Melanie Broyé-Engelkes’s email on Twitter and got in touch. Smalling saw a pair of trainers in a shop made from pineapple leaf manufactured by startup Ananas Anam and wanted in. But how did the England defender get into the impact investing game? Smalling is one of the most active football angels on this list - focusing his energy (and cash) on backing alternative protein and climate tech startups. The German attacking midfielder’s career never hit the dizzy heights many predicted after he scored the winner in the 2014 World Cup final, but there’s more to life than football - like startups.Ĭurrent team: AS Roma Annual salary: €4.6m Net worth: €24m Winners' medals: 2x Premier League (with Man Utd) Sanity Group (November 2021, December 2020)Ĭurrent team: Eintracht Frankfurt Annual salary: €3.5m Net worth: €50m Winners' medals: 1x World Cup, 5x Bundesliga.Top flight female players in England earn an average annual salary of £47,000, more than 60 times less than their male counterparts. Why? Because despite the spotlight shining on the women’s game after the Lionesses victory in the Euros, the gender pay gap in the sport is still massive. * Footballer angel investing is a male-dominated venture at the moment, and Sifted couldn’t find any women players who’d backed startups. So which other footballers wile away the hours spooling through pitch decks and rubbing elbows with founders? Sifted tracked down 19 who’ve backed at least one startup since the beginning of 2021, across a range of sectors. Others like French World Cup winner Blaise Matuidi and ex-Manchester United defender Chris Smalling have gone on to launch their own investment vehicles. Spain’s Gerard Pique and England’s Rio Ferdinand, early backers of NFT trading card game Sorare, saw their shares skyrocket in value following the startup’s post-Series B $4.3bn valuation. And while footballer angels are a relatively new breed of investor, some have already seen real success.
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