Hear, hear.
Are we… a sleeping giant?
- Thread starter Fortitude
- Start date
I think a more realistic end to the window will be Robinson/spence and Adams/Berge for a combined 70-80m
I'd be absolutely fine with that (esp w/ Berge, not so sure about Adams). For me what's lacking is the right profiles in the squad, not the superstar name.
Im resigned to never seeing Utd winning the league for the remainder of my life. Was Rock of Gibraltar really worth it Sir Alex?
The only way we can guarantee success now is to be taken over a nation state. Again, we'll always be a big club in terms of support because generations of fans don't just disappear and stop supporting us.
The direction of football has been making me feel a bit ill for a few years now ()
I think I actually want us to go bankrupt, merge with FC United in the Northern Premier League and then we can all have a few years powering through Non League and the EFL so we don't have to deal with the modern football circus. Make Eric Cantona director of football for a bit.
In the process, we become a cool football club again and end up taking 10,000 to places like Alfreton, Whitby and Fylde. Have local derbies against Bury and then Rochdale and Oldham.
The club becomes more affordable again for less objectionable people to buy us and by the time we reach the Premier League again, we'll be ready to take on the world.
I can dream
The direction of football has been making me feel a bit ill for a few years now ()
I think I actually want us to go bankrupt, merge with FC United in the Northern Premier League and then we can all have a few years powering through Non League and the EFL so we don't have to deal with the modern football circus. Make Eric Cantona director of football for a bit.
In the process, we become a cool football club again and end up taking 10,000 to places like Alfreton, Whitby and Fylde. Have local derbies against Bury and then Rochdale and Oldham.
The club becomes more affordable again for less objectionable people to buy us and by the time we reach the Premier League again, we'll be ready to take on the world.
I can dream
That actually sounds lovely. Modern football feels dead in a lot of ways. From the corruption, down to the tactics and lack of flair
I don't particularly like Glasgow Rangers for various reasons but I was incredibly jealous when they dropped down to the fourth tier in Scotland.
We're a sleeping giant and time isn't on our side. We're in so much debt and under an ownership that has no ambition to change that, and no desire to invest in the club in any shape or form.
I honestly believe unless the club is sold soon, decline in popularity and revenue will increase over time to the point where we can no longer be considered a giant.
Some say only a state backed ownership can save this club, I really don't think that's needed. All we need is a debt free club and someone ambitious. INEOS and the Glazers are at this moment are a spreading cancer.
I honestly believe unless the club is sold soon, decline in popularity and revenue will increase over time to the point where we can no longer be considered a giant.
Some say only a state backed ownership can save this club, I really don't think that's needed. All we need is a debt free club and someone ambitious. INEOS and the Glazers are at this moment are a spreading cancer.
We were a supermassive giant star. Proper black hole now.
I agree.
More like a sleeping ant I would say.
Ain’t that the truth? I was re-reading Jim White’s book last week and he delves into the awakening, bringing in Sky, the advent of the PL, the amount of money coming in and so on. If the league had remained as it had been in 1993, would United have risen so high and so fast?
A lot of the fanbase you speak of left and started their own club. It’s hard to gauge the impact that had.
It's always funny when people talk about "why aren't the fans doing more" and "why are we so accommodating". Many of those who formed FC were called judas scum and many more protesters were told to stop moaning in the early years of the Glazers.
It's also been a very deliberate strategy from the club over the last 20 years to fill the ground with more customers than fans. Increase prices and increase % of hospitality tickets. These things alone might explain the lack of protest.
It's why they want to build a new ground and have even more gentrification essentially. It's also funny that anyone against any of these things gets told "well concerts are also expensive now" and "move with the times".
We dozed of years ago, little ambition to resolve problems with the ground or the team. The future will be the same story of small gains and then falling back to mediocrity.
We may not be able to financially spend the most as we have done in the past, but we can still spend enough to be a top team if the club is well managed in other areas.
More like a giant put into a medically induced coma by our ownership.
Manchester United "I'm tired, Robbie"
We are a falling giant not sleeping, but I would rather we go down to league 2 than be owned by a nation state,especially any of the gulf states.
Not to digress but it's heartbreaking to see the owners of City funding the war in Sudan(which is the worst humanitarian crisis ATM) in exchange for smuggled resources which they sale in Dubai and Abu dabi to fund city.
I don't like the argument that no corporation is 'pure', because there are levels of evils.
Not to digress but it's heartbreaking to see the owners of City funding the war in Sudan(which is the worst humanitarian crisis ATM) in exchange for smuggled resources which they sale in Dubai and Abu dabi to fund city.
I don't like the argument that no corporation is 'pure', because there are levels of evils.
I think we are, but I also think there's more to come. Glazeos only really seem to have ambitions to get into the CL for the money it brings and that's about it. I think we'll remain sleeping as long as they're around which will be a long time.
The concern is good players generally don't hang around while that's happening. If we aren't ambitious and aggressive for success, and the likes of sesko and santos hit the heights individually while we are aiming for 4th place, they will go to sides competing for the top prizes. We have fans who think it will be fine consolidating for the next 3 years, our best players won't hang around, they will have better options for succes
Agreed with the second part. I think we can spend just about enough to challenge every year though. Numbers are backing it, the problem is we cant choose the right manager which would elevate some players. If we dont have a progressive manager we will always roll dice before every season, there are at least 10 progressive managers these days and if we cant cope with the modern game handle pressing and press others, we will forever be discarded, unless a weak season comes fro title challengers.
Now Guardiola and Klopp are gone you'd think we have a better chance. But we have decided not to act and keep safety Carrick. Safe to the eztend that we will fight again for top4 instead of claiming it early and challenge. Big question marks over Iraola and Alonso yet, but they are not Rosenior or Slot, they are much better managers, we can only hope Liverpool will underinvest, but they will still punch above their weight. Chelsea I think might be back , they always have this, somem bad season and change managers often to be in the mix always with some occassional good runs in the CL. Only we seem inept to attract the right manager.
Moyes likely was a Fergie decision - hard to argue against the man who ran the club for nearly 30 years. And Moyes? continuity and tradition, all that shit. Old school manager good for lower / mid table clubs. Catastrophic fail in the end and showing defeatist and naive mentality tryna bring Fabregas, Bale, Kroos or Ronaldo only ending up with Fellaini and Mata
LVG - past it manager at the time who was once known for total voetball and promoting youth players, man with enough authority to get things in line again, only to show as the biggest coward and egomaniac, playing horizontal possession football on his half and falling out with many players. di Maria and Falacao/Welbeck fiascos, later Schweinsteiger, Schneiderlin..
Mourinho - looked like a disaster decision from the begining, came after the club again needed a strong hand. But a dinosaur past it manager didnt move us forward but break us apart for another couple of years. Lucky win in EL with one of the easiest draw we could have imagined didnt save the fact that the team needed to rebuild again. Many of the players lost their value or didnt fit any modern style we would be crying for.
Ole - done feck all after 5 decent wins against bottom sides promoted from an interim to full time manager -vibes dont cut it, but ultimately another three years wasted!
ETH - another bad decision - another idiot on board - manager coming from a one team league dominating possession having at disposal by far the best talents and resources in the country, how did it work for him? We all know he brought some shite players int squad and shortly reverted to some coward football, inept to adapt to the fastest league in the world. Left a bloated squad for another rebuild
Amorim - the most promising of all, after how he rebuild Sporting, still caught up with a too big step from one league to another unable to adapt with his stronger philosophy, wouldnt consider him the most progressive with his style, but rather progressive ideas for the team, helped to clear out the team and recruit the right profile players , first manager not to leave worse team, and a bright moment in recruitment and first for Ineos/Berrada
MC - came as interim for stabilization, and did wonderfully well to took us from 5th(point behind 4th) to safely 3rd. Played what he knew midblock counter attacking football which worked, with one game per week and other teams horribly imploding with Rosenior, Slot, Spurs even Howe must be said.
Now the decision has been made to extend - Did he deserve it? absolutely yes from his perspective. Just wonder if we are not back to Ole stage again. Once again he will not have luxury of playing once a week. Better managers came to bigger teams. And he's NOT by the eye of an test a progressive manager taking the team to play too much above their weight. We had a lot of dull games where we looked slow unable to press 10 men Newcastle and we played just the league games! with Bruno and Casemiro having wonder seasons saving a lot of points by themselves.. It will be interesting but I hope we will be ready to act when its clear its not going the right direction. 2 y extension shows we are being a bit cautious and possibly ready to bring someone like Enrique later on if he becomes available or another manager who emerges. For me it's a shame we didnt gamble on Iraola because he's got experience in PL, showed he can elevate his squad from relegation battle to European cups playing nice progressive football while losing 5 key players! But let's see, maybe he fails after the squad decline as Salah out, Van Dijk, no defense and lack of attacking options too and worse squad than Carrick. Will be interesting how they compare and with Alonso also with worse squad but not playing in Europe. De Zerbi will be in the mix.
Just hope we are ready for the plan B.
Haven’t we been one of the biggest spenders on and off for a long time in terms of the signing side of things? Huge money wasted for years signing the wrong players on insane fees according to United fans but now we seem to be taking a different approach it’s penny pinching and no money to spend?
Feels like people get two sides of it mixed up. Have we been run pretty poorly by the Glazers? Definitely. Have they got quite a lot wrong? Definitely. Have we spent throughout their time as owners? Definitely. Are we still a huge club? Comfortably one of the biggest world wide.
I think it tells you just how big our club is when you consider how terribly the club has been run by the Glazers in the eyes of most United fans. Run that shit for decades but still a massive club that without the debt they’ve brought on would be making profits and also how big we are commercially. Obviously wouldn’t take it for granted because time can change anything but right now we are still a giant.
Feels like people get two sides of it mixed up. Have we been run pretty poorly by the Glazers? Definitely. Have they got quite a lot wrong? Definitely. Have we spent throughout their time as owners? Definitely. Are we still a huge club? Comfortably one of the biggest world wide.
I think it tells you just how big our club is when you consider how terribly the club has been run by the Glazers in the eyes of most United fans. Run that shit for decades but still a massive club that without the debt they’ve brought on would be making profits and also how big we are commercially. Obviously wouldn’t take it for granted because time can change anything but right now we are still a giant.
Ask kids what they think of Manchester united. They won't say a giant...
Have you gone around asking kids to know the answer to that?
Sleeping? Definitely - comatose due to appalling greed and shocking business/football acumen and financial stewardship.
Giant - most definitely - I write this as I’m travelling in East Africa where we are still ‘Manchester’ to everyone interested in football and every other snide shirt is still a United one.
How long this will continue is open to debate but to dismiss United as being irrelevant is nonsense - ‘hated, adored, never ignored’ is still true even though our team is way below the level it should be.
Giant - most definitely - I write this as I’m travelling in East Africa where we are still ‘Manchester’ to everyone interested in football and every other snide shirt is still a United one.
How long this will continue is open to debate but to dismiss United as being irrelevant is nonsense - ‘hated, adored, never ignored’ is still true even though our team is way below the level it should be.
It's pretty grim and I think devilish made a point in the original post. INEOS needs to sell off assets rapidly to reduce their debt to equity and they've already cancelled the dividend. INEOS bonds/debt has already been downgraded to B+ with a negative outlook so it's mired in junk bond status. In these circumstances we're surely going to be the last in line for any cash infusion to support the team ambitions?
It's just such a shame; there was a lot of hope and promise but this bunch are going to be total let-downs, sorry for being so negative.
Red dwarf!
A dying giant.
We're sleepy giants weighed down by the Glazer family on our shoulders.
We are never waking up properly until their poison is driven out once and for all.
We are never waking up properly until their poison is driven out once and for all.
I believe we are closer than ever with the Pep and Klopp era finally over, however I was hoping we would be more aggressive this summer. Its hard to say how the window will have gone until the window is finished.
We'll only know if it's been a good transfer window at the end of May.
Is Manchester United a football giant? In my opinion it is. United's blend is unique. We've got the history, we got the trophies, we got a huge fan base which started being built by Sir Matt back in the 50s and the local fan base is extraordinary. I've travelled to places like Turin and the people are cold there and they keep you at an arm's length. Every local Manchester United fan I had met is passionate and frustratingly nice. That's a huge resource for the club and it breaks my heart seeing being treated the way it does.
Are we a sleeping giant? Well the numbers do not lie. We haven't won the league title since 2013 and we haven't won the CL since 2008. This is partly down to bad luck (ex having to go toe to toe against Pep's Barca) but we all know that we haven't been good enough for most of the time.
Being a sleeping giant isn't really a huge concern though. Some clubs do pass from a dry period. We''ve been there before and what followed was SAF's era of dominance. What really terrifies me is the financials. As I said before United hasn''t made a profit since 2018-2019, we're 1.3B in debt and since the Glazers bought us we've paid between 850m and 1b in interest repayment, 166m in dividends. OT was left to rot and its estimated that it would cost between 2b and 4b to build a new stadium. Meanwhile we need to invest heavily on the squad to the tune of 200m-300m per year for half a decade. Mistakes will be made along the way, those mistakes will need to be ratified and it will be expensive to do so. This won't be sorted by having a strict wage structure, invest wisely and focus on efficiency. The latter policies are there to maintain success not to dig a club out of a financial crater the size of Mariana trench. What we need is a huge investor who can wipe up the debt, build a stadium on little to no debt and invest heavily on the squad up to a point were it can comfortably make it to CL qualification year in year out. After that is achieved then the United engine can generate enough wealth and in such scenario efficiency measures could take us to the next level and be able to keep us there. We can't expect United to dig itself out of this whole without extensive external investment though.
That's why I was so disappointed that INEOS bought a stake in Manchester United. Their efforts and investment while well intentioned is a drop of the ocean to what United need. This is not about having Mbappe and Haaland upfront. It's a necessary step we need before this sleeping giant become a dying one.
Are we a sleeping giant? Well the numbers do not lie. We haven't won the league title since 2013 and we haven't won the CL since 2008. This is partly down to bad luck (ex having to go toe to toe against Pep's Barca) but we all know that we haven't been good enough for most of the time.
Being a sleeping giant isn't really a huge concern though. Some clubs do pass from a dry period. We''ve been there before and what followed was SAF's era of dominance. What really terrifies me is the financials. As I said before United hasn''t made a profit since 2018-2019, we're 1.3B in debt and since the Glazers bought us we've paid between 850m and 1b in interest repayment, 166m in dividends. OT was left to rot and its estimated that it would cost between 2b and 4b to build a new stadium. Meanwhile we need to invest heavily on the squad to the tune of 200m-300m per year for half a decade. Mistakes will be made along the way, those mistakes will need to be ratified and it will be expensive to do so. This won't be sorted by having a strict wage structure, invest wisely and focus on efficiency. The latter policies are there to maintain success not to dig a club out of a financial crater the size of Mariana trench. What we need is a huge investor who can wipe up the debt, build a stadium on little to no debt and invest heavily on the squad up to a point were it can comfortably make it to CL qualification year in year out. After that is achieved then the United engine can generate enough wealth and in such scenario efficiency measures could take us to the next level and be able to keep us there. We can't expect United to dig itself out of this whole without extensive external investment though.
That's why I was so disappointed that INEOS bought a stake in Manchester United. Their efforts and investment while well intentioned is a drop of the ocean to what United need. This is not about having Mbappe and Haaland upfront. It's a necessary step we need before this sleeping giant become a dying one.
A bit controversial but we will be sleeping under the current ownership for a long time, what we need is an oil country to buy us out and invest.
I was thinking along those lines as well
Red dwarfs are cooler, smaller stars. The most common and longest-lived stars in the universe. Example: Proxima Centauri. Reminds me of the 90s re-emerging reds aiming for European glory once again.
Red Supergiants: Gigantic, unstable stars nearing the end of their lives, such as Betelgeuse. Late SAF period, sugardaddy and state-backed clubs galore while we get the leeches.
Black Holes: The ultimate collapse of the most massive stars, where gravity is so intense that not even light can escape. It's full circle, I read the thread title and remembered RAWK chatter about sleepy giants. We've become Liverpool
YES! IF (and there a many IFS):
- Santos is as good as he looks thus far. He'll give us mobility and passing as a DM which we have sorely missed.
- Sesko can score 20 PL goals. He is capable but it 's a big ask
- Bruno can age slowly. If Bruno loses a half a step because of age it could be trouble
- Cunha improves on his last campaign. He could a difference maker for many matches
- We can get Lewis Hall or equivalent. I love Shaw but he does not present an attacking force anymore and we desperately need FBs who can attack
- Heaven continues to improve and can start at least half of our matches
- Santos is as good as he looks thus far. He'll give us mobility and passing as a DM which we have sorely missed.
- Sesko can score 20 PL goals. He is capable but it 's a big ask
- Bruno can age slowly. If Bruno loses a half a step because of age it could be trouble
- Cunha improves on his last campaign. He could a difference maker for many matches
- We can get Lewis Hall or equivalent. I love Shaw but he does not present an attacking force anymore and we desperately need FBs who can attack
- Heaven continues to improve and can start at least half of our matches
Fair point!