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Football clubs owned or run by wealthy retired sports legends don’t always thrive, but with Andy Kohlberg, Steve Nash, Steve Kerr and Graeme Le Saux watching them on Saturday night Mallorca are 90 minutes from winning the Spanish Cup and getting themselves into next season’s Europa League.
Former US tennis pro Kohlberg is majority shareholder. Nash and Kerr, legendary names from the world of Basketball, are both co-owners. And former England defender Le Saux is a director and advisor. All have played a big part in the story.
But just a year after the glamorous US-based ownership got involved in 2016, the club were relegated to the tumbleweed of Spain’s third tier.
The journey back to the top flight, down again, back up again, and into Saturday’s Copa del Rey final has been a rollercoaster and the big names the make up that ownership consortium would be the first to point to individuals like Dani Rodriguez as having been the real motor behind the incredible journey.
‘Those of us who have been here for some time have seen a little bit of everything,’ the midfielder tells Mail Sport as the biggest day in the club’s history in the last two decades looms.
Dani Rodriguez has spoken to Mail Sport about the rise of Mallorca ahead of the Cup Final
Former US tennis pro Andy Kohlberg (left) is a majority shareholder in the Spanish club
Former Chelsea, Blackburn and England defender Graeme Le Saux is a director and advisor
He was one of the key members of the team that won promotion back to the Primera Liga in 2019. The following season he scored their first goal back in the top flight after just four minutes of the opening game.
He is still thriving, now under the wily leadership of Mexican coach Javier Aguirre, and can reflect on what a journey it has been.
‘There have been good times, and some not so good, but in the main it’s been great and now to have Mallorca in a cup final, well it would have been unthinkable for many, especially those of us who have been here a long time.
‘We can make history on Saturday and we know we’ll make a lot of people happy in the process if we do.’
The owners, who have been on the island in the build-up to the big game,’ will be delighted and feel vindicated for never losing faith in the project.
‘‘It’s always good to see them, they bring a good vibe with them and they have been with us in the good times and the bad,’ says Rodriguez.
‘What they have done during these years has been fantastic. The club has grown enormously. To go from Segunda B (third tier) to Primera and to play a cup final it means you must have done a lot right.’
Perhaps one of their wisest calls was to stick with 65-year-old coach Aguirre when most people believed he had only been parachuted into to save the club from relegation in the 2021-22 season before being replaced by a younger man.
Aguirre arrived in Spain after starring for Mexico in the 1986 World Cup. He was the player who flicked the ball up for Manuel Negrete to score what was one of the goals of that tournament.
Osasuna signed him but injury cut short his playing career and it was in 2002 that he returned to the club as coach leading them to a fourth-place finish and earning himself a move to Atletico Madrid.
‘His reputation after that was for saving teams from relegation as he did for both Zaragoza and Espanyol before
