Gareth Bale link to Sheffield Wednesday takeover must get Owls fans' tongues wagging | OneFootball

Connections between the new preferred bidder for Sheffield Wednesday and the former Welsh international will give Owls fans something to talk about.

A link between the new preferred bidders for Sheffield Wednesday and the legendary former Welsh international will get people in S6 talking, but could Gareth Bale be persuaded to join the Wednesday revival effort?

With relegation from the Championship having been confirmed in February, the remainder of the 2025-26 for Sheffield Wednesday is all about the future.

There's a lot of work to be carried out for the club to become competitive again, and there are no guarantees that they will be next season.

The Storch Family have now been confirmed as the new preferred bidders for the club following the collapse of the previous preferred bid from a consortium led by the professional gambler James Bord, which floundered over the source of the funding of the bid.

This collapse came shortly after relegation had been confirmed, so the success of the Storch bid will have come as a huge relief to all concerned.

There should be few of the issues that Bord's group faced in getting the takeover approved, when it comes to the Storch bid. It could even happen within the next month. And Sheffield Wednesday fans allowing themselves to believe that this could finally see some normality return to the club could even be wondering whether former Real Madrid star Gareth Bale could be persuaded to to join them on this journey.

The friendship between Gareth Bale and David Storch has provoked an online debate

Conjecture over whether Gareth Bale could become involved at Sheffield Wednesday was provoked by a good luck message sent from Bale to Storch on the social media platform X on the 18th March. "Best of Luck, Storchy!", was Bale's reply to a tweet from David Storch reflecting on his week in Sheffield.

The message provoked a considerable response from Wednesday fans, many of whom were pushing Bale to put his boots back on and get playing for the team in League One next season. This seems unlikely, considering Bale's injury record throughout his playing career and the "secret injury" which was reported to have ended it.

But the idea of Bale becoming involved at Hillsborough isn't completely beyond the realms of possibility. Bale certainly has the wealth to be able to get involved - it was claimed when he retired from playing in 2023 that he was worth £120 million at that time - while his previous involvement in an attempted takeover of Cardiff City hints that he sees a potential future for himself in an executive position within the game.

Potential Bale interest in Sheffield Wednesday is an intriguing possibility

Gareth Bale's involvement in a bid to buy Cardiff City in the summer of 2025 ended up not getting anywhere, but it did provoke a huge amount of interest in the media. Bale had previously been involved in talks over potential investment at Plymouth Argyle, but this came to nothing and, as somebody born in Cardiff who'd played at The Cardiff City Stadium many times for the Wales national team, such a move did make success.

But Bale's consortium had reckoned without the truculence of the Cardiff City owner Vincent Tan, who rejected two bids for the club out of hand without any invitation for further talks. In some respects, Tan's decision has been vindicated this season, with the Bluebirds looking likely to make a quick return to the Championship following relegation at the end of 2024-25.

The Storch bid for Sheffield Wednesday, then, has reignited talk that the Welsh superstar could be about to get involved in the game again. But how would this manifest, were it to come to pass? Bale is wealthy, but a net value of £120 million wouldn't be enough to support a bid for a club the size of Sheffield Wednesday on its own, while the former player's injury record would make a return to the game as a player at the age of 36 - and he turns 37 before the start of the 2026-27 season - look extremely unlikely.

It might be that Bale could take a role similar to that of former NFL star Tom Brady at Birmingham City or the rapper Snoop Dogg at Swansea City, where a relatively small shareholding makes him a minority stakeholder who can act as one of the public faces of the club as they embark on their rebirth.

There's little to indicate that Bale is set to join Storch's consortium, so all of this conjecture is very much speculative. But the mere fact of such a high-profile figure having a close connection to the likely purchaser of Sheffield Wednesday can at least serve as a reminder that, once the disaster that the 2025-26 season has become is put behind them, the future could be bright for this famous old club after all.