One is a former squash coach with a penchant for gambling on anything and everything. The other is an analytically minded peer in the House of Lords who was once the youngest chief executive officer of a FTSE 100 company.

Frasers Group Plc founder Mike Ashley — the one-time squash coach — and Next Plc CEO Simon Wolfson may be worlds apart, but between them they’ve done more to shape the development of retail on Britain’s high streets in the past three decades than any other entrepreneur. Now, they’re going head-to-head in a contest to consolidate Britain’s highly competitive retail industry, largely by snapping up rivals that have failed to weather a global pandemic and the worst inflation in 40 years.