How wealthy are Barnsley's owners? | OneFootball

Following their failure to win promotion last season, Barnsley now have a new manager in Neill Collins that is hoping to guide the South Yorkshire outfit back to the Championship.

The Scotsman had a solid EFL career as a defender and took his first steps into management with the Tampa Bay Rowdies in the USA, and he was selected as the individual to take over from Michael Duff in the hot-seat at Oakwell earlier this year.

Whilst they are aiming to make it back to the Championship under Collins, Barnsley's manager needs the support of his board in order to do that - and the ownership structure at the club is certainly complicated to say the very least.

Who are Barnsley's owners?

Since 2003 up until the selling the club in 2017, Barnsley had been owned by long-time fan Patrick Cryne.

Cryne's purchase came after the Mayor of Barnsley, Peter Doyle, took the club out of administration less than a year before, tried to the club to Sean Lewis in the summer of 2003, but the Football League refused to approve - leading to Cryne and Peter Ridsdale teaming up to take over.

After 14 years in charge though, Cryne decided to sell up - one month before his untimely death because of cancer - to a consortium involving Chinese businessman Chien Lee, Moneyball founder Billy Beane and Paul Conway, with Patrick's son James remaining on the board of directors.

In 2022 though, Lee and Conway left the board at Oakwell along with Dickson Lee and Grace Hung, with Jean Cryne and Juile Anne Quay added to the likes of CEO Khaled El-Ahmad and Neerav Parekh as the decision makers at the club.

In terms of the current ownership structure, the club itself is owned by BFC Investment Company Ltd with Parekh, who joined in 2017 at the same time as Chien Lee, as chairman.

Parekh, an Indian businessman, owns 38.53 per cent of the club whilst Lee still owns 23 per cent despite stepping down from the board last year.

Pacific Media Group meanwhile own 9.79 per cent, whilst the aforementioned Ann Quay and husband Matt Edmonds are owners of 7.38 per cent - the Cryne family also still have a vested interest with 21.30 per cent ownership.

How wealthy are Barnsley's owners?

There is a decent distribution of wealth among Barnsley's custodians, although how much they put in is anyones guess.

Parekh's wealth is not known but he is a businessman and his family's business, Pidilite Industries Limited in Mumbai, made 83.4 billion rupees in revenue in 2022 - the equivalent of £823 million - with the family believed to be worth $12.6 billion.

Chien Lee meanwhile is the founder of private investment firm NewCity Capital and owns a number of football clubs across the world, but his estimated wealth cannot really be found anywhere either, and neither can Pacific Media Group's value.

Ann Quay meanwhile is an Australian businesswoman who founded Vfiles but is yet another whose wealth is shrouded in mystery.

The Cryne family however will have earned many millions from the sale of the majority of the club, although they did reveal in 2020 that they were still owed £2.75 million from Lee and Conway for the agreed purchase - reports suggested earlier in 2017 that Cryne was going to sell 98.5 per cent of the club for £20 million but he sold slightly less of his stake.