Let me clarify the anti-semitism comment. I said there was a narrative out there that could be considered anti-Semitic. In no way was I saying that if you criticize the Glazers you were anti-Semitic. If anyone read it that way, I’m sorry, not my intention.
Fair play for apologising. In a similar sentiment, I apologise if I came across as overly dismissive. There may well be a tiny sub-section of anti-Semitic United fans who's fundamental problem with the Glazers ownership is because they are Jewish, but I've never come across any. I've been a season ticket holder for the best part of 20 years and have been going to FC and United games since my mid-teens and even in the terraces and pubs it's not a sentiment I've ever heard uttered. A lot of United fans have a problem with 'their' club being owned by any individual or group. Some couldn't make their peace with the takeover and formed FC, some made their peace with it and are now largely resigned to the status quo or voicing their dissatisfaction about specific aspects of the current ownership model. Despite an animosity-filled, unwanted and bitterly opposed hostile takeover, I think you would be hard pressed to find any examples of anti-semitism aside from perhaps some online backwaters.
There are a lot of investment opportunities that offer well over 30% return annually. If the Glazers bought Man United just to make money, it would be a poor investment in comparison. My point is that their motivations are not as simplistic as most in the Caf make them out to be. I doubt they bought United to just make money, and oh yeah, they hate football, just doing this so they can make a mediocre return.
Come on. 30% AER is incredibly rare for any investment these days. The sorts of investments you are presumably talking about (real estate, equity partnerships) mostly require specialist knowledge, connections, and crucially, a lot of cash. The Glazers bought Man Utd without spending a penny of their own cash using loans that they then saddled the club with. I agree with you that status / ego may have played a part in their decision, but I would disagree wholeheartedly that it was a sub-par investment for them.
I think their thought process presumably went something like this...
"Soccerball is a sport that's hugely popular in the rest of the world and our minority shareholding in United has been generating us a nice little return. There's an opportunity to buy the shares of exiting shareholders and own the club outright? Well soccerball is fast becoming the global game and is penetrating worldwide markets. There is clearly the opportunity for a lot of growth. We have a good track record in sports investment as we own the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at a time when NFL franchises are becoming money-printing machines. United are the most profitable club in the world, and they will be at the front of the queue to capitalise. There's already a manager in charge who essentially runs every aspect of the club, so we don't need to impose sweeping management changes. Let's focus on cashing in on the past success of the 'brand', exploit emerging markets, take healthy dividends and ride the wave of the explosion of money in football so that when we decide to sell, we will do so at three of four times the initial value."
Bear in mind that when they bought United, we were an anomaly in world football at that time in that we were a football club that actually earned a lot of money and generated profit.
Similarly, they didn't have to front up hundreds of millions of their own cash as they bought us on debt. Plus, the structure was already in place to enable the club to capitalise on the growth of the sport with minimal effort from them - they have been very hands-off owners.
Imagine a property investment where you buy the property at 100% LTV, the property generates sufficient revenue just by existing to pay your mortgage, your salary and allow you to release equity each year. Then when you get bored/have milked it for all it's worth, you can sell it at several times the initial value. That's essentially what the Glazers viewed United as.
I’m saying they aren’t as rich as many of the owners. When you spend £417m on transfers and your net worth is £5b, that’s almost 9% of your net worth. By comparison, the owners of City spent less than 2% of their net worth in transfer funds.
I still have no idea why you're bringing in their personal net worth into this argument as it defeats your own point. The Glazers haven't spent any of their personal net worth on transfers, they have allowed the club they own to spend money it generates from fans. Even if you want to argue that any money generated by United is de facto theirs because they own the club, that flies in the face of business law and the idea of limited liability. I think a lot of United fans would be far more comfortable with their ownership if they WERE multi-billionaires as they would not have had to buy the club on debt and gross profit made by United could be reinvested instead of being taken out of the company. You won't find many United fans who are calling for a sugar daddy to chuck their own money at transfers, most are calling for United being released from the shackles of debt and allowed to spend on transfers, the stadium and facilities commensurate to their turnover and gross profit.
It has nothing to do with being “benevolent”. It’s a business. Football is a business. For the players, for the agents, the clubs. I mean, I thought everyone understood that, but I guess there are still some people who are just too naive.
I don't think anybody with a passive interest in football is unaware of how corporatised and business-driven it has become. However, there are still far more successful models than ours in football today involving fan ownership. Similarly, there are clubs run for the profit of their owners that are still able to be far more successful at the football side of the equation than we are.
Aside from maximising our commercial revenue by whoring our name around the world (which admittedly is now a model a lot of other clubs like Liverpool are trying to replicate), I don't think the Glazers have demonstrated too much business acumen during their ownership. They have:
- Failed to invest in the squad at a time when the transfer market was relatively tame, causing us to waste millions for equivalent quality players in a hyper-inflated market.
- Been forced to pay way over the odds on transfer, wages and agents fees to persuade players to join because of our position of comparative weakness when they decided to invest in the squad
- Let the contracts of key players run down to their last year according to some sources because of their hard-nosed 'no negotiation until the final year' (presumably to save on short-term wage costs), causing them to either have to break the bank to keep a player (De Gea, Martial), or lose them for nothing (Herrera)
- Extended the contracts of very average players who are clearly not good enough (presumably because of not wanting to invest in replacement squad players) creating a bloated squad and a massive wage bill totally unconnected to the quality of our squad
- Allowed the most crucial operational position in the club to go to a mate who helped them buy the club in the first place despite multiple years of his stewardship resulting in appalling results and several personal embarrassments for the club
- Not invested a penny into Old Trafford (excluding continuing the expansion that was already going on when they bought the club), seeing the once greatest stadium in the country fall woefully behind the stadiums of our rivals, thus losing out on the long-term profit that a heaving maximum capacity stadium would bring
- Have overseen a culture of commercialisation and sponsorships which appears to be affecting the attitudes of the players and managers, who have all talked about how making money is the primary focus above any on field success
- Loaded the club with debt for the first time in almost 100 years. Debt which, at one point, was so expensive that if it wasn't for the explosion of the profitability of the sport, TV deals and a refinance through IPO may have (by some professional's analysis) destroyed the club
- Failed to plan at all for the succession of Ferguson
- Failed to allow / insist that Ferguson replaced ageing stars in his final years, resulting in a virtually impossible job for anybody coming in (especially due to the hyper-inflated transfer market)
- Have presided over a period involving a large loss of club credibility among fans, rival fans, agents, players and rival clubs. The perception of a savvy, well-run club who others aspire to be has been replaced with the image of transfer dithering, paying over the odds, offering mega-wages and being the lifetime home for Phil Jones and Chris Smalling under their watch
You can argue the degree to which each point is directly caused by an action / inaction of the Glazer family, but as the owners and the ones with the power and authority to initiate change, they take the responsibility. Same with any other company.