The news is not official yet, but it is really very close. This is shown by the fact that it is being reported, together, by Diário As and Cope: Sergio Ramos is said to be truly one step away from acquiring the majority of Sevilla’s shares. Through the Five Eleven Capital fund (a Madrid-based financial holding company focused on football), the former Real Madrid captain has reached an agreement with the club’s current shareholders for a total investment of 450 million euros. The payment plan would vary depending on whether or not the club stays in La Liga — Sevilla are currently 13th in the table, only three points above the relegation zone, but with four other teams below them.
To see Sergio Ramos at the helm of the Andalusian club, at least according to what is being written in Spain, only the final formal steps still need to be completed. These include the approval of the National Sports Council (a mandatory step in the country) and the signing of all the documents. The parties are in something of a hurry to close, given that the letter of intent (a pre-contractual document in which the intention to proceed with negotiations for a future and potential agreement is put in writing) signed last January expires in a few days, on May 31. Once in charge of the club, Sergio Ramos and the other investors will already be called upon to make a significant capital increase, estimated at between 80 and 100 million euros, to deal with the economic problems the club is currently facing.
Sergio Ramos’s arrival in Seville is actually a great return. The former captain and defender of the Spanish national team grew up in Andalusia and made his La Liga debut precisely with Sevilla at the age of 17 before becoming a symbol of Real Madrid. He then returned to the white-and-red club in the 2023/2024 season, at the end of his experience in Paris. In a few days, a new chapter of life will in all likelihood open for the former national-team defender. Sergio Ramos, in reality, has not yet officially hung up his boots. At least on paper, he has been a free agent since January, after ending his spell in Mexico with Monterrey. Once he becomes president of Sevilla, however, he will have to abandon playing football forever. In Spain, in fact, there is a law that prevents someone from simultaneously being the owner of a club and a player in La Liga or Segunda División.
It remains to be seen, now, what the reaction of Sevilla fans will be to Sergio Ramos’s return. When the defender returned to play for the Andalusian club in 2023, also turning down extremely rich offers from Arabia, some members of the organized supporters, more precisely those affiliated with the Biris Norte group, were not exactly enthusiastic about his arrival. They had never forgiven him for leaving for the Bernabéu in 2005 and for a provocative celebration towards them with his hands behind his ears in a 2017 Copa del Rey match. Since then, however, many things have changed. First and foremost for Sevilla, used to competing on the biggest European stages and now instead in their third consecutive season fighting to avoid relegation.