Manchester United’s owners the Glazers could possibly be warming to the idea of selling up, with Ineos Chemicals boss and Nice football club owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe one of the names mentioned as a potential buyer of the club.
Red Devils supporters are understandably beginning to get aroused about a potential change in ownership as their long-brewing dissatisfaction continues unabated with the Glazer family. United’s current owners have been in charge since Sir Alex Ferguson’s time as manager but now, amid unrest around factors on and off the pitch, news has emerged that the Glazers could be open to selling if the price is right.
Britain’s richest man Sir Jim Ratcliffe has long been touted as one of the individuals keen on a take-over and now, with his representatives saying he is open to taking a stake in the club, the billionaire’s earlier comments on United have resurfaced.
Back in 2019, The Mirror splurged with an exclusive that Ratcliffe didn’t see value in the market when it came to English clubs.
“After considering the cost involved and the necessary investment he chose Nice ahead of Premier League clubs he was in negotiations with,” a business confidante of the 69-year-old said.
At Nice, Ratcliffe’s primary focus is on recruitment and he has been outspoken in his brusque comments that United have done poorly in that department. He took that further by criticising their immense spending on poor value in the transfer market and a lamentably poor choice of managers. These are presumably the two key areas he will demand to see far better management in should a takeover be achieved.
“They haven’t got the manager selection right, haven’t bought well,” Ratcliffe told the Times in 2019.
“They have been the dumb money, which you see with players like Fred.
“United have spent an immense amount since Ferguson left and been poor, to put it mildly. Shockingly poor, to be honest. We have a different approach here to be moderately intelligent about it. Try to do it more grassroots, trying to locate young talent.
“Some clubs seem to have an ability to do that, Southampton, Lille. United have done it really poorly. They have lost the plot.”
Ratcliffe met the Chelsea Supporters’ Trust earlier this year when the Blues underwent an ownership battle which was eventually won by Todd Boehly’s group as the former had entered the bid late after the deadline for submission was over.
Invariably still a Manchester United fan, though he has yet to bid for the club, Ratcliffe has also spoken in the past about the fact that United are “in a big pickle” on the business side of things, something he will definitely demand is changed if he has a say.
“You know, I have a split allegiance, effectively, really,” he said in May. “When I was in London for many many years, Chelsea I could go and watch, it was quite difficult to go and watch United.
“Yes, I mean, I can understand that (the calls for him to buy United) but Manchester United is not for sale,” he added. He also said in 2019 that the club were in “a big pickle as a business”, though there have since at least been apparent changes when it comes to the possibility of a sale.
“This is not about the money that has been spent or not spent,” a spokesperson for Ratcliffe told The Times. “Jim is looking at what can be done now and, knowing how important the club is to the city, it feels like the time is right for a reset.”
The Glazers are said to want £5bn to sell United, and a similar sum was involved in Boehly’s takeover of Chelsea.
Fan protests directed at the Glazers have again been planned in advance of the home Premier League game against Liverpool with Man Utd fan group, the 1958, describing them as “an ownership that is systematically starving and killing the greatest football institution in world football, for greed”.