Billionaire from Oldham
Sir Jim Ratcliffe is Britain's richest man, the owner of Ligue 1 football club Nice, and a Manchester United fan since childhood.
He previously considered purchasing a Premier League club, like Chelsea, before shifting his focus to French football in 2019.
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He is now based in Monaco and is a supporter of Ineos Grenadiers, the British elite cycling team that was once known as Team Sky but is now named after his petrochemical business and has won seven Tour de France titles.
Despite his connections to Manchester United, Sir Jim became a Chelsea season ticket holder after relocating to London.
Forbes estimates that he is much wealthier than Blues owner Roman Abramovich.
He has also stated that he will use his wealth to succeed the Glazer family at Old Trafford.
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When asked about buying Manchester United from the Glazer family, the 68-year-old distanced himself from the notion because of how badly he feels the club has been managed following Sir Alex Ferguson's departure.
Sir Jim told The Times in 2019 after purchasing Good, "[Ineos] never wants to be the stupid money in town, never, never."
"As a business, they're in a bit of a pickle.
They didn't have the manager range right, and they didn't buy well.
They've been the dumb money, as evidenced by players like Fred."
United have invested an enormous amount since Ferguson left and have been mediocre, to put it lightly," he said.
To be frank, it's shockingly bad."
That wasn't the first time he'd spoken up on the challenges he saw at United.
He told The Telegraph in September 2018: "It's not going any better [at United]."
It's gone from bad to disastrous.
"Talk about a half-empty bottle."
In an interview with BBC Radio 5 Live in September 2019, Sir Jim Ratcliffe's brother and head of the Ineos football division, Bob Ratcliffe, announced that they had entered talks with Chelsea:
"We spent a lot of time researching Premier League players."
"We looked at Premiership club valuations and £5 billion in turnover for the Premier League, with the top six teams priced at £2 billion and upwards, and £450 [million] in net profit before tax."
[It's] pretty tough for us to justify Premier League investments at this time, and then, if you look below the top six, they're all £150m and beyond, and you're going to write a cheque for £50m and get into the 'Everton Cup.'
"There was some early discussion [with Chelsea], but our valuations were significantly different.
Chelsea's problem is its stadium.
We're all getting older, and it'll take you a decade to figure it out."
Sir Jim Ratcliffe was a co-founder of Inspec who made his fortune in shale gas before establishing the petrochemicals firm Ineos in 1998.
In 2017, he became the director of the Swiss football club FC Lausanne-Sport, and in the 2018 Sunday Times Rich List, he was named the UK's richest man for the first time.
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