Gary Neville believes his and David Beckham’s big-money takeover of Salford City is ‘very different’ to Wrexham and Birmingham.
The Manchester United legends, who were already Salford co-owners, are leading a consortium that will commit significant funds into the club.
Neville has a different plan for Salford compared to Wrexham and BirminghamNeville and Beckham have teamed up with founder of advisory firm Consello, Declan Kelly, and chairman of the Lawn Tennis Association, Lord Mervyn Davies.
The group are believed to have raised around £11-15million to boost Salford’s ‘sporting and infrastructural ambitions’ over the next five years.
It led to comparisons to Wrexham and Birmingham, who have had huge amounts of investment from their famous ownership.
talkSPORT host and former Crystal Palace owner Simon Jordan said earlier this month: “They’ve got a window of opportunity because they’ve seen what Wrexham have done.
“They’ve seen the value of star power and that value of star power has given revenues to Wrexham via Ryan Reynolds and the other fella [Rob McElhenney].”
He added: “They’ve seen Wrexham, they would’ve looked at their model and seen what they’ve done. Beckham said when he went down to Birmingham, he’s never seen an atmosphere like it.”
Hollywood stars Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney have helped take Wrexham from non-league to the Championship in a history-making promotion streak.
Reynolds and McElhenney took over the Red Dragons for £2million in 2021 but have continued to inject cash to fund their rise up the EFL.
Meanwhile, Birmingham were taken over by founder of Knighthead Capital Management, Tom Wagner, in 2023, with NFL icon Tom Brady a co-owner.
The Blues broke transfer records in League One last season, which helped boost them towards a dominant season and a title win.
Reynolds and McElhenney have transformed WrexhamGettyHowever, Neville has rejected comparisons to the two clubs, claiming that Salford will be run in a different way, with less financial change expected.
He said on The Overlap Fan Debate: “Me and Becks [David Beckham] decided that we would put money in for the next four or five years, which is a commitment we’ve all made.
“There’s been quite a lot of money been promised over the next four years. “[But] we won’t change the budget, and to reverse out of the model we already have, you need two or three years.
“You can’t just go from investing to becoming sustainable – you’ve got players’ contracts for three years, and you’ve generally got a model that you’ve built which you can’t get away from.
“I think it’s very different from Wrexham and Birmingham, where you’re talking about hundreds of millions going into those clubs, particularly Birmingham.
“That’s not what we’re looking to do with Salford.”
Neville believes his and Beckham’s approach will be differentGettyNeville continued to speak about his approach at the club, adding: “We want it to be a good football project.
“The money we spent on our football club, we could have easily bought a League One club. The reason we didn’t is that we wanted to build a football club from scratch.
“We had 100 fans at the time, Salford. Every fan that comes to Salford we respect enormously, but they’re there because of the things that actually we’ve done in the last 10 years, which is a great position as owners to be in.
“We can’t be accused of lacking spirit or fight or not putting money where our mouth is. We can never be accused of that sulphur because we didn’t.
“We haven’t got 10,000 fans that have been there for a long time that have an opinion that’s based on the history.”
Salford City just missed out on a place in the League Two Play-Offs this season, finishing eighth, which was a major improvement from the previous year.
They finished 20th in 2023/24 but turned things around to challenge at the top this campaign, and now Neville will be eyeing promotion.
The ex-right back and Beckham are understood to be targeting two promotions up to the Championship across the next five years.
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