A group featuring legendary soccer player Gareth Bale has submitted a new offer to buy Wales-based club Cardiff City, Bale tells Front Office Sports, after a previous bid was recently rejected.
Details of the offer—which Bale revealed during an appearance on FOS Today—were unclear. The Athletic reported last month that the Bale consortium made a proposal to existing Cardiff owner Vincent Tan, who declined, but Bale’s interest never waned. The offer was reportedly worth $54 million (£40 million).
“We have a brand-new offer on the table,” he said on FOS Today.
“We think it’s very fair, if not more than fair, and it’s something we hope the current owners will take serious,” he added.
Cardiff City currently plays in the EFL League One, the third tier of the English soccer system, after being relegated following a poor 2024–25 season in the EFL Championship. The top tier of English soccer is the well-known Premier League.
Bale, a Cardiff native who spent time with Real Madrid and Tottenham Hotspur, has a long list of accolades, including five Champions League titles and three LaLiga titles. He also played in MLS for Los Angeles Football Club in 2022, before retiring from professional soccer in 2023 at 33 years old.
Bale was also previously rumored to be eyeing a deal for Plymouth Argyle, which is also a League One team, but he has denied those reports.
Bale has experience in the world of business. In 2017, he opened a bar in Cardiff called Elevens, and he is an investor in TGL, the upstart indoor golf league led by Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy.
If Bale’s group is successful in its Cardiff City pursuit, he would mark the latest in a growing list of athletes who have ownership in European soccer clubs. Examples include Tom Brady’s minority stake in Birmingham City, Kevin Durant’s minority stake in Paris Saint-Germain, and J.J. Watt’s minority interest in Burnley FC.
