Moritz said he was first made aware of the Pirates after reading an article online, and following some initial calls he met those running the club late last year.

After further talks, Stonewood committed money to the club and agreed to take a place on the board of directors.

“We had a meeting of the minds, so to speak, in terms of what we could add and what the club was offering, and it wasn’t very long after that that we formalised a framework for an investment,” Moritz said.

“I think we’re going to be involved at the board level, and that means to us that we are involved in important decision-making.

“We are certainly not operations people, we’re not going to get involved in the day-to-day operations of the club.

“But, as in any of our investments, we do care about the strategy, the direction, how we can help, and those things are done more at the board level than the day-to-day grind, so to speak, of the club.”

Moritz said he had no timescale on how long he and his firm would stay involved with the Pirates, or what sort of return they were looking for on their investment.

But he is confident that with Stonewood’s input the club will grow and become a more attractive asset.

“We never really know how we’re going to get a return on any of our investments,” he said.

“We assume that we will do the right things by the enterprise, and grow the value of the investment… and then how we exit, and when we exit, it’s always up in the air, and we don’t really try to make too specific a claim on when that might happen.

“We find that if we do the right things by the investment, we grow it, we execute the strategies that people think will take us to a better place, all good things happen at that point.

“So, when we are there, we’ll realise that there’s been enough accretion and value that we’ve done what we can do, and at that point, maybe we’ll have an exit.”

Manchester United co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe remains one of the 10 wealthiest people in the United Kingdom, though his estimated wealth has dropped by almost £2billion.

British newspaper the Sunday Times published its 2026 Rich List on Friday, which names the 350 richest people in the UK.

Several others involved in sport, including active and retired sportspeople and team owners, have made the list. These include former England, United and Real Madrid midfielder David Beckham, who has become the first British billionaire sportsman.

Ratcliffe’s estimated wealth is just over £15.19bn ($20.53bn), down from £17.046bn in 2025. This drops him one spot to ninth on the list, behind Russian financial trader Alex Lerko. Sanjay and Dheeraj Hinduja and the Hinduja family, who own the multi-national conglomerate the Hinduja Group, occupy top sport with an estimated wealth of £38bn.

Ratcliffe, 73, made his fortune through chemicals company INEOS, which he founded in 1998. He topped the Rich List in 2018 as the UK’s richest person with an estimated wealth of £21.05bn.

Ratcliffe purchased a 25 per cent stake in United in December 2023, giving him control over sporting matters at the club. His sports portfolio also includes the Mercedes F1 team, of which he owns a third, French football club Nice, Swiss team Lausanne-Sport and the Ineos Grenadiers cycling team.

Since his investment, United have recorded Premier League finishes of eighth and 15th, though the team have improved this season, securing Champions League qualification with three games to go and currently sitting third in the top flight table.

United also won the FA Cup under Erik ten Hag in 2024 though he was sacked later that year and replaced by Ruben Amorim, who himself was dismissed in January 2026.

Ratcliffe has overseen the £50m redevelopment of the club’s Carrington training complex and announced plans to replace Old Trafford with a new 100,000 capacity stadium, forecast to cost £2bn.

In his first year at the club, Ratcliffe implemented drastic cost-cutting measures that saw hundreds of staff members lose their jobs, which he claimed were necessary last year to stop the club running “out of money at Christmas”.

Ratcliffe drew significant criticism this year after stating that he believes that the UK “has been colonised by immigrants”, with British prime minister Sir Keir Starmer, mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham and United supporters groups all condemning his words. Ratcliffe later said that he was “sorry that my choice of language has offended some people”.

A number of others involved in sport were named on the list, including:

• Bernie Ecclestone and family: £2bn
• Sir David and Victoria Beckham: £1.185bn
• Barry and Eddie Hearn: £1.035bn
• Ben Francis: £800m
• Sir Lewis Hamilton: £435m
• Tom and Phil Beahon: £350m
• Rory McIlroy: £325m
• Anthony Joshua: £240m
• Tyson Fury: £162m
• Harry Kane: £110m
• Sir Andy Murray: £110m

Chris had an extremely good week in the BBC Premier League predictions race – wrapping up not one but TWO weekly wins.

Last weekend, he got six correct results from the 10 games in week 36, including one exact score, for a total of 90 points.

The BBC readers managed five correct results, with no exact scores, for a total of 50 points.

His guest, boxer Fabio Wardley and AI both managed five correct results with on exact score, and ended up on 80 points.

There was one other game played, between Manchester City and Crystal Palace on Wednesday, which had been postponed from week 31 because City were in the Carabao Cup final.

Chris had, provisionally, been given the weekly win for the purposes of the table below – but he still could have lost it, which could have been catastrophic for his title hopes.

Before City versus Palace, he had 70 points, his guests – Crookhaven stars Amari Bacchus & Genesis Lynea – both had 60 points, the BBC readers had 30 points and AI had 20 points.

Things turned out well for Chris, however. He picked up 40 points for an exact score after correctly backing City to win 3-0.

Amari also thought City would win 3-0 and collected 40 points while Genesis, the BBC readers and AI all picked up 10 points after going for the same outcome but a 3-1 scoreline. Those points (or an average of them for the two guests) have been added to their scores.

With two rounds of fixtures to go, Chris is back on top of the table. The guests can no longer catch him, but AI and the BBC readers still can.

Chris currently has nine outright weekly wins, one more than anyone else. They have always been used to determine positions in the predictions table, since the days before AI and the readers could make predictions too, when his guests were his only opponents.