Derby County takeover looms but Crystal Palace and Lyon issues must linger in the mind | OneFootball

John Textor’s move for the Rams comes with extensive baggage

For Derby County, the past years have been a study in repair.

From the moment David Clowes stepped in to extract the club from the wreckage of administration, the project at Pride Park has been defined by quiet restoration rather than grand reinvention.

Stability has become the Ram’s primary currency.

Now, as reports gather pace that American investor John Textor is preparinga formal bid for the club, a new moment of existential choice emerges - one that asks Derby whether the lessons of recent history can withstand the lure of global ambition.

Because wherever Textor goes, the past is never far behind him.

Derby County takeover: John Textor’s turbulent record at Crystal Palace, Lyon and Botafogo must demand scrutiny

Textor has long been a restless figure in modern football’s shifting ownership landscape - a man whose ambitions have always outstripped the confines of any one club.

An evangelist for the multi-club model, he has accrued stakes in Botafogo, Lyon and RWDM Brussels, and until recently held a substantial shareholding at Crystal Palace.

English football has always been his preferred stage - the question has simply been which club would ultimately fit into his grander architecture.

Derby County, valued at around £60 million, is now the club he is said to be targeting most intensely.

According to Alan Nixon, Textor has flown into the UK with the intention of making an official approach.

Several bidders remain in the frame for the Rams, yet the American’s arrival dominates the landscape.

He had previously explored a deal at Sheffield Wednesday - even publicly confirming his interest - but with the Owls’ administrators inviting formal bids and their valuation rising, Derby appears the more accessible opportunity.

The appeal of a swift, decisive buyer, however, is complicated by the nature of the buyer in question.

Wherever Textor’s clubs sit - whether in Ligue 1, the Brasileirao, the Belgian second tier or the Premier League - turbulence seems to follow.

His time at Crystal Palace was defined by friction with Steve Parish, sparked by his attempt to fold Palace into his wider network and culminating in a European eligibility farce after the club’s FA Cup win.

At Lyon, the chaos was more acute: financial instability, UEFA sanctions, ultras in open revolt, and ultimately Textor’s resignation from the board amid spiralling debt and acrimony.

Even his success stories come embedded with warning signs. Botafogo, whose Copa Libertadores triumph under Eagle Football looked a watershed moment, soon became entangled in transfer payment disputes, FIFA sanctions and managerial upheaval.

In Brussels, RWDM supporters staged demonstrations after Textor unilaterally attempted to rebrand the club, a reminder that community cannot be dictated from a distant holding company’s boardroom.

For Derby County supporters, whose nerves have only just begun to settle after years of fiscal trauma, the optics are not reassuring.

Derby County must weigh ambition against hard-earned stability - David Clowes should guard the club’s future

Supporters understand the stakes. Derby’s recent history is a cautionary tale told in real time: a club gambled into ruin by Mel Morris’ hubris, forced through the humiliation of points deductions, fire-sale squads and the dread of not knowing if the next season would arrive at all.

Under Clowes, the recovery has been deliberately unglamorous - a patient promotion, mid-table consolidations, frugal recruitment, steady stewardship - but profoundly meaningful. It has given Derby back its footing.

This is why the emergence of a figure like Textor produces unease rather than excitement.

The American represents a philosophy of football ownership in which clubs are nodes within a larger corporate organism, each serving the strategic needs of a wider portfolio. For a club still relearning its own sense of self, the prospect feels dissonant.

There is, in theory, a compromise. A minority takeover, with Clowes retaining ultimate authority, could bring investment without surrendering identity. But Textor rarely seeks mere influence; he tends to pursue control - and full control changes everything.

The siren call of new money is always loudest in the Championship, where financial gravity works against ambition.

But Derby have already lived through the consequences of misplaced trust. The club does not need disruption, nor a visionary whose track record oscillates between brilliance and brinkmanship.

What Derby need - what they desperately deserve - is protection, patience and principled leadership. Clowes stands at a pivotal juncture, and the decision before him is not simply transactional, it is cultural.

To choose the wrong partner would be to gamble with something Derby have only just reclaimed: their dignity, their direction, their future. The attraction of scale is understandable, but the value of stability is immeasurable.