Top 5 craziest football club owners, presidents and chairmen

We all dream of someday having our very own football club - a big stadium filled to the brim with excited spectators, skilled footballers and weird mascots, a perfect utopia that follows the rules set down by us,the club owners.But the 5 men listed below took the concept of owning a football club to another level altogether.Calling them crazy would be an understatement. From hiring and firing coaches at the drop of a hat, to parading elephants on a football pitch, these men have been there, done that and then some more. Their antics and general behaviour crossed the line on so many occasions that rather than blaming them, it's the people who allowed them to run a football club that should be brought to justice.Seriously, how crazy can an owner be? Let's find out.

#1 Massimo Cellino, Leeds United

Who is he?

Massimo Cellino is an Italian businessman and the head of a corn-manufacturing company. He is the current owner of Leeds United. Before setting his sights on Leeds United, Cellino previously owned Italian club Cagliari.

What’s his crazy claim-to-fame?

Where to begin? For starters, Cellino has a deep-rooted hatred of the number 17. So much so that he had all the seats at Cagliari’s stadium with the number ‘17’ replaced with the number ‘16b’, and there is a proposal to do the same at Elland Road too. He is also scared of the colour purple.

That’s right. The owner of a football club, a multi-millionaire and self-made man, is scared of a colour.

Cellino also has two prior criminal convictions, one for embezzling 7.5 million pounds from the Italian Ministry of Agriculture and the other for false accounting while he was the owner of Cagliari.

After taking over Leeds, the first thing that Cellino noticed was the club’s annual wage bill – 18 million pounds. So he proceeded to do what any smart businessman would – cut costs. Only, the costs that he cut involved players having to pay for having their football kits washed. The players were also told that they would have to pay for their own lunch!

Oh, and he also hired and fired 36 coaches in 22 years at Cagliari. Clearly this can only end well for Leeds.

#2 Zdravko Mamic, Dinamo Zagreb

Who is he?

A former football administrator, Zdarvko Mamic has been the executive director of Croatian club Dinamo Zagreb since 2003.

What’s his crazy claim-to-fame?

Too many to list. But let’s give it a go anyway.

In 11 years as owner of Dinamo, Mamic has hired and fired 15 managers, making Roman Abramovich look like a beacon of saintliness.

Once, after his team Dinamo won 2-0 against arch rivals Hajduk Split, Mamic crossed over to where the Split staff and fans were and started celebrating in front of them. This led to a scuffle between Mamic and a former Split player, and the two men had to be separated.

Mamic has, on more than one occasion, been reprimanded for abusing and threatening journalists with violence. In March 2013, he was arrested for verbally assaulting the Croatian Minister of Sports. He was also charged with physically assaulting a member of the Croatian FA.

Last, but not the least, Mamic was alleged to have broken a city planning official’s hands after the latter refused to sanction his plans to build a skyscraper in Zagreb.

#3 Aurelio De Laurentiis, Napoli

Who is he?

Aurelio De Laurentiis is a very popular Italian film producer, and also the current chairman of Italian club Napoli.

What’s his crazy claim-to-fame?

To give you an idea what league of crazy De Laurentiis belongs to, here are a few of his quotes on various subjects.

Upon hearing rumours that EPL clubs wanted to sign his star player Marek Hamsik, De Laurentiis warned Hamsik of the perils of being in England by saying – "If they want to go to England then in the end they're going to go, but they need to understand this: the English live badly, eat badly and their women do not wash their genitalia.”

Responding to rumours that star player Ezequiel Lavezzi and his agent Alejandro Mazzoni were planning to leave Napoli, De Laurentiis said – “If [Alejandro] Mazzoni (Lavezzi's agent) starts being stupid then I will chop his b*lls off."

Still not satisfied? Here’s more. The venue was the Italian Cup draw, and the announcers had just begun drawing teams out of the hat, when De Laurentiis launched into a furious tirade, accusing the FIGC of “fixing the draw” against Napoli and then stormed off on a Vespa belonging to a passer-by. Right out of a movie, if the movie’s title was “Crazy antics of a crazy person.”

New signings are also a source of entertainment for De Laurentiis, as he makes every new player wear a rubber lion mask at the time of the unveiling. Not kidding. Just look up new player signings at Napoli.

More recently, De Laurentiis declared his interest in signing Manchester United midfielder Maraoune Fellaini, claiming he loved the Belgian’s “lion-hair”. Well, that’s one reason to sign a player. Suffice to say De Laurentiis is not aware that Fellaini trimmed off his trademark afro soon after the World Cup.

#4 Sam Hammam, Wimbledon/Cardiff

Who is he?

A Lebanese businessman by trade, Sam Hammam was chairman of Wimbledon FC during the mid-90s. He also holds a lifetime membership of Cardiff City, another club that he once was chairman at.

What’s his crazy claim-to-fame?

Hamman was already in the news for his slighly unusual and unorthodox ways of running a football club, but no-one could have imagined the depths of his insanity.

One of his more infamous stories involves inserting a special clause into the contract of one of his players at Cardiff City, Spencer Prior. For no apparent reason, except perhaps insanity, Hammam had a clause inserted into Prior’s contract that said that the centre-back would have to “have physical relations with a sheep and eat sheep’s testicles” before every match!

The icing on this crazy cake is the fact that Prior, the centre back, actually went ahead with the second part of the clause and agreed to eating sheep testicles just to get Hammam off his back.

When not feeding his players animal genitalia, Hammam would resort to wacky antics, such as parading an elephant around the stadium before a game or locking opposition players in the dressing room till they agreed to sign for his club.

What a legend!

#5 Luciano Gaucci, Perugia

Who is he?

Luciano Gaucci is an Italian enterpreneur and horse-racing owner. He was also the owner of Perugia, an Italian club.

What’s his crazy claim-to-fame?

Remember Colonel Gaddafi? The Libyan dictator, oppressor and all-round bad person? Well, Gaucci was the man who signed Colonel Gaddafi’s son, Saadi Gaddafi, to Perugia as a professional football even though he displayed none of the qualities associated with a professional footballer. You know – talent, skill, athleticism and the works. Saadi never actually played for Perugia (surprise, surprise!) in his three years at the club and later tested positive for a banned substance, thus ending one of the most protracted and question-raising transfers in modern football.

Remember the FIFA WC 2002? South Korea’s Ahn Jung-Hwan scoring a golden goal to knock Italy out of the World Cup? Well, it turns out Jung-Hwan was contracted to Gaucci’s Perugia at the time, and Gaucci wasted no time in cancelling his contract, for having the sheer temerity to score a goal against Italy. Here’s what Gaucci had to say on the matter, “I have no intention of paying a salary to someone who has ruined Italian football.”

Gaucci’s antics as owner led to Perugia going bankrupt in 2005, with Gaucci being sentenced to three years in jail for tax fraud. Of course, like all insane people, Gaucci did the only thing he knew – he went into hiding in the Dominican Republic for the next four years.

It’s a crazy world out there, huh?