A window on the past: Czechoslovakian-born Robert Maxwell owned Derby County, wanted to buy Manchester United

Czech businessman Daniel Křetínský has bought 27 percent of the shares of the London club West Ham United. He was not the first citizen of a Central European country to financially enter the top English football scene. Press tycoon Robert Maxwell owned Derby County and wanted to buy the iconic Manchester United.

His original name, Abraham Leib Hoch, later used by Ján Ludvík Hoch, means almost nothing to anyone; he entered the world of business, media and football as Robert Maxwell. he was born on June 10, 1923 in Slatinski Dole in Subcarpathian Rus, which was then part of Czechoslovakia, today his birthplace is part of the Ukrainian village of Solotvina.

He had Ruthenian-Jewish roots and spoke several languages. He learned Yiddish as his mother tongue, Hebrew in the Jewish school, Czech in the state (general) school, and also spoke Hungarian and Romanian. He knew and used all these languages even in his later years. When Nazi Hungary occupied Subcarpathian Russia in March 1939, he fled into exile.

In France, he became a soldier in the Czechoslovak Corps and began using the name Ivan du Maurier. After its defeat and the evacuation of the Czechoslovak Foreign Army, he joined the British Army, with which he marched victoriously (including the Allied landings in Normandy) to Hamburg with the rank of captain.

He was awarded the British War Cross for bravery, which was personally presented to him by General Montgomery in January 1945. He changed his name several times during the war, introducing himself as Leslie Jones and finally Ian Robert Maxwell.

After the war he went into business, becoming a world press magnate, owning many titles (including the London Daily Mirror, the New York Daily News) and publishing houses, as well as airlines from the USA to Japan. He was also a writer himself, a journalist and novelist. And he was interested in football.

He became chairman of Oxford United, and in 1984 tried to buy one of the world’s most famous clubs, Manchester United, but the then owner Martin Edwards turned down his offer. Three years later, the Czechoslovakian-born player, who visited Prague during this period and was received by the president of the socialist state, Gustáv Husák, bought Derby County, the 1971/1972 and 1974/1975 English league champions.

To restore his faded glory, Maxwell also looked to his original homeland, and in August 1988 the promise of an engagement with Derby County and the completion of all the formalities was behind the illegal departure of Slavic stars and CSSR representatives Lubos Kubik and Ivo Knoflicek.

They left the preparation of Slavia Prague in the Federal Republic of Germany, because they did not have passports, they did not get to England right away, they stayed in Spain. When Maxwell got them Bolivian documents, they finally crossed the Channel.

“When we landed in London at Heathrow, he greeted us and asked us in nice English if we needed anything for the family. I was staring like a fool,” said Ivo Knoflíček, a compatriot who did not know his story at the time.

This was followed by a press conference with two future Derby County reinforcements. “Mr Maxwell was there, but he didn’t speak Czech at all, everything was in English,” Luboš Kubík says. “I didn’t know he spoke Czech and he comes from Subcarpathian Rus,” he admits.

However, they recognised his press empire. “He invited us to the Daily Mirror building, it had about ten floors. Maxwell used to land on the roof in a private helicopter, and he used to fly that to the stadium,” Knoflicek reveals. ” Nowadays it’s normal for billionaires, but back then it was something,” emphasises the 1990 World Cup participant in Italy.

It was not possible to legalise the stay of Czechoslovak emigrants, they could not play for Derby County. Maxwell died of natural causes on his yacht in May 1990 near the Canary Islands. A Czechoslovakian native who owned a club in the English top flight.

Source: Derby County, Premier League