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They are the ingenious Frenchman who arrives at the draw on a motorbike and the once idolized tennis player Bjorn Borg.
Now, after passing through Juventus and Paris Saint-Germain, Jean-Claude Blanc, 60, will be an influential character at Manchester United.
Blanc, chief executive of INEOS Sport, will provide strategic advice to United, along with Sir David Brailsford, sporting director of INEOS, and Omar Berrada, United’s new chief executive, who joins from Manchester City.
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He is an experienced operator, having been chief executive at Juventus during a turbulent moment in their history, and then at PSG after the Qatari takeover.
So who is this tennis-obsessed Frenchman? What has been his career path to date? And what can United fans expect following his time in Italy and France?
As a young man, Blanc, passionate about skiing, aspired to work in the sport.
He grew up adoring Borg, the icy Swede who won five straight men’s singles titles at Wimbledon between 1976 and 1980, as well as six French Open titles, and imagined himself acting as his agent and negotiating contracts for him.
Blanc’s first assignment was at the 1992 Albertville Winter Olympics, held in the region of eastern France where he grew up. To prepare for this position, he spent a year in Los Angeles, learning from and listening to the organizers of the 1984 Summer Olympics in the American city.
From there, he studied an MBA at Harvard Business School, also in the United States, before joining Amaury Sport in France, owner and operator of the Tour de France. For five years, from 2001 to 2006, he headed the French Tennis Federation. where it is on a par with the Roland-Garros organization.
He then turned to football and was hired as general manager of Juventus in 2006, a time of crisis following the Calciopoli scandal that engulfed the Italian club. He called it “very, very hard mentally and physically. “
John Elkann, the scion of the Agnelli family (nephew of Gianni Agnelli, former president of the Turin club), put together a new executive team. This included Blanc following a chance meeting between the pair at a dinner in Paris.
Juventus had just been relegated to Serie B for the first time in their history, as part of their punishment against Calciopoli, and the following season with a deduction of nine points (reduced from the original 30).
In an interview with The Financial Times, Blanc recalled: “You arrive in this environment that is necessarily dynamic, because you have a mountain of problems to deal with at once. Practically 100 days are decisive for the club’s future. If you make a bad decision in those 100 days, it’s over. Then it would take 20 years to return. In those 100 days, we took many good decisions.”
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One of his first acts was to install fellow Frenchman Didier Deschamps as manager following a meeting at a restaurant in Savona, in the Liguria region of Italy. He then managed to persuade a host of Juventus’ star players to stay and play in the second division, including Alessandro Del Piero, Pavel Nedved and Gianluigi Buffon. However, they still had to contend with the loss of established international players such as Fabio Cannavaro, Patrick Vieira and Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
Giovanni Cobolli Gigli was appointed president of Juventus following the reshuffle. He left the club in 2009.
Speaking about Blanc, he told The Athletic: “He takes care of the technical side of Juventus; Recruitment and control of the team. I take care of the administrative aspect and the relations of Juventus with establishments such as Serie A. The 3 years we’ve been running in combination have been intense. He’s a high-level guy. He’s smart. I knew he was the most level-headed in his class. So he had, let’s say, the presumption of someone who was the most sensible of his kind. I don’t say this to criticize, I say it to paint a picture. He’s a smart negotiator, someone who knew the world of sport because he worked in other sectors.
“I discovered that he is someone who can deal with complex disorders such as those affecting Juventus, especially in the first days after the Calciopoli affair. “
Cobolli Gigli credited Blanc with convincing Deschamps to sign for Juventus on a “relatively modest salary. “
Despite the deduction of their problems, Juventus finished the 2006–07 season as champions and promoted to Serie A.
They followed that up with an impressive third-place finish in the best flight under new coach Claudio Ranieri and a return to the Champions League. They did better in 2008-09, ending Jose Mourinho’s second Inter Milan.
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Blanc oversaw Juventus’ move to a new home.
It has become the first Italian club to build its own stadium, inaugurated in September 2011 in a friendly against England’s Notts County, a club that plays in black and white stripes.
Cobolli Gigli explained: “With the stadium there were two alternatives. Or restructure the old stadium with an investment of €15 million, or €20 million, which is problematic because we would still have an old box with the stands away from the box (due to the running track between the two). Or we can simply build a new stadium on the site of the old stadium.
“We worked on the basis that Italy could win the rights to host the Euros and take advantage of subsidies from the authorities to invest in the stadium. In the end, Italy were unsuccessful but we decided to go ahead regardless. Blanc pushed hard for the club to take this decision and it was the right decision. The stadium was built with a shopping mall next to it, a pre-emption of the development of the so-called Continassa area upon which Juventus would subsequently build a hotel and its current training ground. This was a decision we all took together, but Blanc pushed for it.”
Blanc’s last two seasons at the club, however, were overshadowed by the disappointing effects on the pitch as Juventus regressed. Big-budget signings, such as Diego from Werder Bremen, have not worked out, while one of Blanc’s most recent acts has been his failure to point to Rafa Benitez to the manager.
He was then marginalised by Andrea Agnelli, who became Juventus’ hands-on president.
Blanc, a Saint-Etienne supporter, didn’t have to wait long to return to football.
Following the Qatar Sports Investments (QSI) takeover at Paris Saint-Germain in June 2011, he was installed as chief executive, with the remit of turning what was a struggling Ligue 1 club into a European-level powerhouse.
Blanc stated that PSG’s goal is “to be the largest sports franchise in the world. ” In his position, he worked alongside sports director Leonardo.
A former PSG employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity, like others in this article, to protect relations, told The Athletic: “The Qataris were looking to create one of the biggest sports clubs in the world. They were looking to expand into sports and a component of that project was to be trendy and virtual on and off the soccer field.
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“They spent an enormous amount of money on things like collaborations with Jordan (clothing lines featuring NBA basketball star Michael Jordan), virtual performances, and media. They made TikTok before anyone else. Jean-Claude was there from the beginning and put everything in its place.
During Blanc’s 11 years at PSG, the club underwent a remarkable transformation: he enjoyed good luck domestically and saw his turnover increase from around €90 million to almost €700 million. The club is now valued at between €3. 2 billion and €3. 5 billion. However, they recorded a pre-tax loss of €375 million in their latest account circular, a record for the club.
And despite their domestic dominance, PSG failed to win the Champions League and their obsession with star players ultimately proved to be a costly experiment that failed.
GO FURTHER
PSG and the rubble of the Champions League calamity
In the summer of 2022, PSG president Nasser Al-Khelaifi affirmed this when he said he was no longer looking for “flashy and ostentatious” at the club. As PSG moved towards a new style built on a Parisian core with younger players, Blanc was on the verge of disappearing.
Yet, in a further parallel to his time at Juventus, Blanc was also entrusted with a big stadium project at PSG — even if some of the resulting issues remain unresolved.
PSG have been locked in a dispute with the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, for around six years as the club want to buy the Parc des Princes stadium where they play their home matches and then increase its capacity from 48,000 to 60,000. This was a key item in Blanc’s in-tray but remains an ongoing issue and leaves PSG in a frustrating limbo position.
However, it should be noted that the vast majority of clubs in France do not own their stadiums. In addition, before the country hosted Euro 2016, PSG modernized the Parc des Princes by replacing all the seats in the stands to make it more comfortable for fans, adding two extra rows at the front to increase capacity, and expanding the number of VIP seats from 1200 to 4500.
Blanc’s knowledge of stadium projects should prove helpful for United, with Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s INEOS setting aside funds to revamp Old Trafford and boost the ground’s capacity.
GO FURTHER
A glimpse of what a revamped Old Trafford could look like
A former colleague of Blanc’s said: “You have to realise where PSG were. He was on the verge of relegation in 2008. Es very exciting one, but the violence in the stands is terrible. The club is more of a cup club because it’s very volatile.
“Jean-Claude was one of the solid people on stage who managed to turn the situation around. They renovated the stadium and modernized it. There is a VIP section. They renovated the toilets and the food distribution. Everything in the club needed to be restructured and he was the central user of the scene.
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“A criticism that would be levelled against him would be that some romantic fans would feel their club has changed too radically. He was part of this removing of the soul of what PSG was — this volatile, romantic, cup club that was fiercely Parisian. But that’s not really justifiable in modern football anymore.”
Blanc was credited with playing an important role in the creation of PSG’s new €300million training centre at Poissy, west of Paris — a project that started eight years ago. The new facility covers 74 hectares (183 acres), includes 17 football pitches and brings together PSG’s stable of sports clubs onto one site for the first time.
Blanc was described by those who worked with him as a “politician and businessman. . . very charming, modest and friendly. ” Another former colleague said he was “an excellent gentleman, respectful and dignified in cases that were not easy. “
They added: “His private humility is one of his greatest strengths in a macho industry. He is an incredibly respectful and humble man. He’s great with everybody, and in return, he gets that respect from everybody. His role was the scenes. It all happened through Jean-Claude. He was at the budget level. Lasting 11 years is incredibly impressive.
Blanc had a farewell reception in January, where he won 3 signed shirts from the PSG men’s and women’s soccer groups and the handball team, as well as a poster with all the men’s kits from his 12 years of stay. Later, a video was published in which some of the highlights of his time appear, including the signings of David Beckham and Ibrahimovic.
After his time in Paris, Blanc left the north of France to move to the sunnier climes of the south, as CEO of INEOS Sport. This has enabled him to take on general roles in the INEOS sports portfolio: football, Formula 1, sailing, cycling, rugby and athletics.
Blanc was first spotted at INEOS club Nice, in their 3-0 win at Monaco in February and travelled to Old Trafford in March with Ratcliffe, Brailsford and INEOS Sport chairman Rob Nevin.
In his remit, Blanc oversees the goings-on at Nice, a club who underwent significant change following a disastrous summer transfer market in 2022 that saw them sign ageing stars such as Aaron Ramsey and Kasper Schmeichel.
Francesco Farioli, 34, who had worked under now Brighton head coach Roberto De Zerbi in Italy, was hired as manager last summer. Florent Ghisolfi was brought in as sporting director from Lens last year following impressive performances that saw them reach the Champions League. He was joined by former Lens employee Laurent Bessiere, who is now Nice’s performance director, as well as Fabrice Bocquet, the 40-year-old former Lorient chief executive. Nice are currently second in Ligue 1, eight points behind PSG.
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Bocquet described Blanc as “a bit like the Lionel Messi of sports business”. He told French newspaper L’Equipe: “It is not only a question of expertise but of interpersonal skills. He brings his vision, his network, his calm, his experience.”
It was originally thought that Blanc, who had been appointed as one of INEOS’ representatives on United Football’s board of directors after Ratcliffe accepted his deal to buy a 25 per cent stake in the club on Christmas Eve, would take on the role of chief executive. However, it turns out that returning to the grueling day-to-day demands of the club’s CEO position didn’t appeal to him. Richard Arnold stepped down as chief executive in November, with Patrick Stewart acting as interim CEO before Berrada took over.
Blanc joined Brailsford in the stands to witness United’s 2-0 win over League One side Wigan Athletic in the FA Cup earlier this month.
As INEOS slowly begins to put its stamp on United, Blanc will be at the centre of all decisions, providing qualified oversight.
For the Frenchman, his arrival in Manchester marks the definitive end of an already intense career.
(Top photo: Jean Catuffe/Getty Images)