How England ace Jude Bellingham saved Birmingham City from financial peril

Birmingham City have a lot to thank England and Real Madrid superstar Jude Bellingham for.

The 20-year-old from Stourbridge is adored by the blue half of Birmingham and no fan base is stronger in their support for his achievements with club and country. Thousands of Brummies cheered Bellingham on to Champions League glory with Real Madrid earlier this month and hope to see him lead England to the Euro 2024 trophy next month.

The Bellingham Blues story began over a decade ago as an under-8 and ended with him moving to Dortmund in a £20million-plus move four years ago. To his credit, he waited until he was 17 to sign his first professional contract with the Blues to ensure his boyhood club was compensated handsomely when the world’s biggest clubs came calling.

The money the Blues received from Dortmund saved the club from financial difficulties under its former owners. “I have to take every opportunity to express my gratitude to the family and to this boy,” Blues chief executive at the time, Xuandong Ren, told BBC WM. “This boy will go a long way.

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“He could have easily looked after himself and not the club, but he chose the best possible way to look after the club. We cannot imagine, without Jude’s decision, where we would be, as a club, in such a pandemic.”

Fast forward three years and the Blues have been taken over by the current owners, Knighthead Capital Management. The Americans put the Blues on a strong financial footing and spent millions repairing and improving the club’s facilities.

However, the club could have breached EFL financial rules had Bellingham not left Dortmund for Real Madrid last summer and given the Blues a healthy cash boost. The Blues received another sum of money after inserting a sell-on clause in the deal that took Bellingham to Germany.

Knighthead co-founder and Blues chairman Tom Wagner said: “The reality is the previous ownership has been relying on that sale for some time, so a lot of those funds have already been effectively spent in the past. It certainly helps and helps us avoid a possible excessive loss penalty. We are grateful that it helped us avoid a situation that could have been quite unbearable.

“I think it’s great that we’ve developed a player of Jude’s quality, not just a Birmingham star but an England star. We hope to develop other players over time and look forward to continued success with our academy, which has proven to be one of Birmingham’s hidden gems.”