Club Sale | It’s done!

[JPRouve]

A state like what owns Newcastle, Man City or PSG is in charge. You bring the tribal fan base of the club over to your side. It generates positive publicity. You can invent sponsorships by telling a company who you are literally affiliated with to just sponsor the club for an arbitrary amount. The fans are happy and quiet because the club is successful and has infinite money, and so will defend the owners which in return is defending the country/state. The state in question wants to distract from oppression and human rights violations.

To be clear that is not what PSG or City owners wanted to do and why they purchased Football clubs in particular QSI. The reason QSI bought PSG is because they wanted to diversify their portfolio and PSG was packaged with considerably more valuable assets in real estate in Iles de France and also a pretty large multinational.

Those deals are way bigger than football fans seem to think. Also none of these nations need sportwashing, they are openly "business buddies" with the wealthiest and most powerful nations.

 

[red thru&thru]

Yeah, just like the FIFA WC highlighted the issues in Qatar until the football started then everybody forgot about it and hailed the event as the best ever and the fat cats and morally reprehensible regime leaders all slapped each other on the back and congratulated themselves.

Yep. Once the owner began to invest in and around the ground and the local community, things would change.

However, having said that, if it were to be Dubai, I believe they're already at a point that doesn't need "sportswashing."

 

[crossy1686]

How much revenue do we make?

Not enough to compete with where transfer fees and salaries for top players are heading. Chelsea just threw down £89m for a kid with 29 professional games in the Ukrainian league because someone whispered "future ballon d'or winner".

And revenue is totally irrelevant. What's our net income? We can make £50b revenue but that's no good if our outgoings are £50b also.

 

[bosnian_red]

This just isn't true anymore and people need to move past this idea that United can hold its own in a landscape where City, PSG, Newcastle, maybe Liverpool, plus whoever's next exist. You're about to see the beginning of the Super League start, except it will be still called the PL.

Why can't we? United is still among the top earners in world football despite 10 years of shite.

 

[KiD MoYeS]

Wonder if he drinks in 'spoons

He's a Brexiter, of course he does. If you had to ask, then brexitwashing is working.

 

[bosnian_red]

Not enough to compete with where transfer fees and salaries for top players are heading. Chelsea just threw down £89m for a kid with 29 professional games in the Ukrainian league because someone whispered "future ballon d'or winner".

Ok. We just threw the same amount for Antony because Ten Hag wanted him.

 

[TheReligion]

Based on what?!!
We haven’t dropped to mid table with a billion pounds worth of debt weighing on the club, with owners who take out plenty without putting anything in and with many of our main competitors financially doped by oil states. Why would that suddenly happen now?

This is why the United forum can be insufferable at the best of times.

 

[SAF is the GOAT]

Can anyone here go to his French team forum and ask the fans their about him ?

I think we can get a pretty good idea about him as an owner

 

[crossy1686]

Why can't we? United is still among the top earners in world football despite 10 years of shite.

And look at how the landscape has changed in the last 10 years. United were once front runners with clear daylight, City overtook us last season, legally or not, the books say they did. Now fast forward another 10 years and look where we are, further behind is the answer.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

You can go on about who has the best morals all you want, the Glazers only care who gives them the best offer.

 

[TsuWave]

Jim Ratcliffe is a brokey compared to an oil state.

I want a first eleven full of quality players and a stacked squad, a new stadium and infrastructure.

state only please.

 

[LordSpud]

"(Ineos) never wants to be the dumb money in town, never, never," he (SJR) told The Times in 2019. (United) haven't got the manager selection right, haven't bought well. They have been the dumb money, which you see with players like Fred. "We won't look elsewhere until we have had a good run here (at Nice). We need to find out how to be successful before you ever want to write a big cheque. It's quite difficult."

How's Nice doing?

 

[Spoony]

To be clear that is not what PSG or City owners wanted to do and why they purchased Football clubs in particular QSI. The reason QSI bought PSG is because they wanted to diversify their portfolio and PSG was packaged with considerably more valuable assets in real estate in Iles de France and also a pretty large multinational.

Those deals are way bigger than football fans seem to think. Also none of these nations need sportwashing, they are openly "business buddies" with the wealthiest and most powerful nations.

Sarkozy wanted the Qataris to buy PSG, it was apart of a massive deal with the French to get their vote for the WC. Funny world eh.

 

[StiffTackle]

Do you understand sportswashing as a concept? It is an attempt to utilise sports to minimise the attention towards heinous acts and medieval customs.

Do you think Newcastle United fans think about journalists being chopped up? Or Manchester City fans consider gay people being executed? Probably not as much as their great new signings etc.

I find this perspective interesting. I dont think anyone looks at the countries that purchased City and Newcastle and suddenly thinks there isnt bad things being done by them in those countries.

I think the real sports wash is that City fans, Newcastle fans and fans of every other team know what they are upto and continue to invest time, attention and money into the game whilst pandering to talking points but taking no actual action. As fans, by continuing to consume the premier league product with them involved we are all normalising ignoring the atrocities they commit, regardless of whether they own our specific club or not.

Ive accepted the fact that I dont care enough about the things they do to stop watching the premier league. That apathy is the success they are looking for. We clearly all feel the same whether we admit it or not - so why pretend that us not having dubai ownership makes us less complicit?

 

[Zippycup]

If Sir Jim buys us we drop to midtable in 5-10 years. We need top top dollar. But if everyones happy with just being lumped in as part of the also-rans like Everton, Southampton and the like then thats cool lets get him in!

What is going on tonight with the shockingly poor posts?

 

[RedDevil@84]

Not at all but ask your average Newcastle United fan about Saudi atrocities and watch the whataboutery they retort with. I've seen it with mates who support Newcastle. Sportswashing works.

I am sure sportswashing works, but I am somehow not sold on how much of an influence it has. From a business point of view maybe it brings more money. Because new businesses that wouldn't have done business, maybe open to the idea. But that is purely a business strategy and not really hiding their wrong doings.
But people seem to exaggerate the influence of sportswashing and lose their minds over it. I doubt the Saudis hardly ever cared about approval from people in general, leave along the fans of the clubs that they buy.

 

[Nou_Camp99]

To all the sportswashing experts, can you please explain to me how City owners are sportswashing ?

No vague or superficial answers please.

Etihad is a failing company. It's never posted a profit once in its entire existence. Unlike Emirates which is a far bigger and superior airline which is based out of Dubai.

The UAE has bought City as a means to enhance tourism and promote their own businesses. They haven't bought it because they love football or because they think it's a business opportunity. They could have made money far easier than buying a PL football club and pumping in the initial 1.5 to 2 billion or so that they did.

Surely you didn't need this explaining?

 

[crossy1686]

Ok. We just threw the same amount for Antony because Ten Hag wanted him.

Yep, and as a result of our summer 'overspend' - that's what the club are calling it, 'overspend'. That's not a word you've ever heard from City or PSG. - the Glazers couldn't take a dividend, the put a load of the transfer fee on a credit card and now we have no wiggle room for these transfers to fail.

What happens in Antony doesn't make it for whatever reason? We're stuck with him, like we are with Martial or Maguire. Other clubs can afford to just piss these players off at cost and get someone else. We can't turn around as quickly as them so we already can't compete.

 

[Member 101269]

Interest payments that the owner makes vs what the club makes. It is very different. The owner is not the club, and so the clubs internal money wouldn't be used to pay the debts. The owner and his funds would be used to pay the debt.

Taking out a loan to pay for a stadium, facilities etc is club debt. Taking out a loan to buy the club is debt to the buyer and has nothing to do with Man United. It wouldn't influence our operations. If the individual ever struggles financially to pay that loan, they sell the club which has 0 debt. If the club has debt and owners can't pay the debt, then the club goes bankrupt.

Please spare me. It's debt, there is a wonderful article written an academic colleague that discusses value constructs and it's relationship with organisational rent. Rent being "above normal returns". Then another article written by another colleague that discusses changes in rents when entering a new industry. Ultimately. the capital required for united from IEOS diminishes any rents (indirect or direct).

 

[bosnian_red]

And look at how the landscape has changed in the last 10 years. United were once front runners with clear daylight, City overtook us last season, legally or not, the books say they did. Now fast forward another 10 years and look where we are, further behind is the answer.

Others have closed the gap due to absolute garbage management and constant failure. Us being top 10 years ago is irrelevant to now. It's a wonder we are where we are in fact. Real Madrid, Bayern and Barca all earn a feck ton still.

The landscape changing means yes, we are not alone at the top. But it'll never change for us to not be able to compete, unless the club makes stupid decisions over time. The clubs who are fecked over, are clubs like Brighton. Clubs who in the past through decision making like theirs could have qualified for the CL/Europa League regularly and grown in stature to become a big 6 side like what Spurs did. Now they have a ceiling. Clubs like United who are already at the top are fine, barring a disaster of their own making where they fall down and stop making big money.

 

[DomesticTadpole]

"(Ineos) never wants to be the dumb money in town, never, never," he (SJR) told The Times in 2019. (United) haven't got the manager selection right, haven't bought well. They have been the dumb money, which you see with players like Fred. "We won't look elsewhere until we have had a good run here (at Nice). We need to find out how to be successful before you ever want to write a big cheque. It's quite difficult."

How's Nice doing?

10th in Ligue 1.

 

[wolvored]

If Sir Jim buys us we drop to midtable in 5-10 years. We need top top dollar. But if everyones happy with just being lumped in as part of the also-rans like Everton, Southampton and the like then thats cool lets get him in!

can you give me saturdays lottery numbers?

 

[dalriada]

To all the sportswashing experts, can you please explain to me how City owners are sportswashing ?

No vague or superficial answers please.

I'm less concerned about whether or not we call it "sportswashing", more that the notion of a football club being owned by a state that uses its national wealth to fund the club is wrong. Especially when that state is in the hands of an autocratic extended clan that allows its citizens no say in how that national wealth is used, and employs some vicious practices against them that violate what we would regard as basic human rights. That's a fundamentally wrong method of providing fans in the UK (or elsewhere) with sporting success by spending limitless money with no accountability or commercial disciplines.
I'm not a "sportswashing expert", but I would say what the City owners do (and the Newcastle and PSG owners) is to buy sporting success to present their owners' regimes in a better light, and that to me would qualify as sportswashing.

 

[LordSpud]

10th in Ligue 1.

Worrying.

 

[bosnian_red]

Yep, and as a result of our summer 'overspend' - that's what the club are calling it, 'overspend'. That's not a word you've ever heard from City or PSG. - the Glazers couldn't take a dividend, the put a load of the transfer fee on a credit card and now we have no wiggle room for these transfers to fail.

What happens in Antony doesn't make it for whatever reason? We're stuck with him, like we are with Martial or Maguire. Other clubs can afford to just piss these players off at cost and get someone else. We can't turn around aa quickly as them so we already can't compete.

That's how it's supposed to be. And yes it was an overspend. If a club feels they can't compete with 'only' 100-150m net per season, then they need to rethink their strategy.

We still compete. But yes bad decisions have harsher consequences for non oil clubs. Doesn't mean they can't compete.

 

[Red in STL]

He's a Brexiter, of course he does. If you had to ask, then brexitwashing is working.

Not to me - I live outside Brexit's purview

 

[crossy1686]

Others have closed the gap due to absolute garbage management and constant failure. Us being top 10 years ago is irrelevant to now. It's a wonder we are where we are in fact. Real Madrid, Bayern and Barca all earn a feck ton still.

The landscape changing means yes, we are not alone at the top. But it'll never change for us to not be able to compete, unless the club makes stupid decisions over time. The clubs who are fecked over, are clubs like Brighton. Clubs who in the past through decision making like theirs could have qualified for the CL/Europa League regularly and grown in stature to become a big 6 side like what Spurs did. Now they have a ceiling. Clubs like United who are already at the top are fine, barring a disaster of their own making where they fall down and stop making big money.

Failure over the last 10 years has been kind to us because we had the finances to bounce back to a degree, this won't always be the case, especially are commercial and advertising revenue continues to rise for all clubs. Brighton are now as rich as we were back in the early 2000's, with inflation comes higher prices of everything, including players and wages for the best of the best.

We're spoiled right now, all things being normal, a team like Brighton shouldn't be able to get promoted and muscle their way into the top 6 within a couple of seasons, where else does that happen? We're a financially rich league, all the teams have big money now and can compete for players. We're going to get dragged down into this mix and find it very difficult to come up for air at some point.

 

[crossy1686]

That's how it's supposed to be. And yes it was an overspend. If a club feels they can't compete with 'only' 100-150m net per season, then they need to rethink their strategy.

We still compete. But yes bad decisions have harsher consequences for non oil clubs. Doesn't mean they can't compete.

I feel like you've not been paying attention to transfer fees for decent players these days. They aren't coming down, they're only going up. Soon that will get you one player a summer with zero room for failure.

 

[bosnian_red]

Worrying.

And last season they were 5th and runners up in the cup.

The only way to judge an owner fairly is how they rank year after year on the pitch relative to where they rank in terms of money they spend/generate. A team spending top 3 in the league and earning top 3 in the league should be expected to be top 3. A team who is mid table with income and spend... Shouldn't be expected to be top 5.

 

[TheReligion]

Worrying.

Stop trolling

 

[Judas]

What a stupid WUM post

Majority of his posts like that, pointless stuff.

 

[Mr Pigeon]

I was interested so I asked Midjourney AI to create a United home shirt with INEOS as the main sponsor. The results were better than expected...

 

[DomesticTadpole]

And last season they were 5th and runners up in the cup.

The only way to judge an owner fairly is how they rank year after year on the pitch relative to where they rank in terms of money they spend/generate. A team spending top 3 in the league and earning top 3 in the league should be expected to be top 3. A team who is mid table with income and spend... Shouldn't be expected to be top 5.

So does that mean he doesn't spend money?

 

[Sassy Colin]

Why are people so sure that Jim Radcliffe will be the owner we've all been waiting for?

 

[TheReligion]

Majority of his posts like that, pointless stuff.

I get accused of policing the place but I’ve noticed that myself

 

[TheReligion]

Why are people so sure that Jim Radcliffe will be the owner we've all been waiting for?

Why are others so sure he’s not?

 

[mu4c_20le]

A British Utd fan wants to buy the club and people are hoping sportswashing states outbid him, some fecking morons on here.

This made me laugh out loud in public. Not cool

 

[crossy1686]

Why are people so sure that Jim Radcliffe will be the owner we've all been waiting for?

 

[ShinjiNinja26]

Hopefully with Ratcliffe now going public first we’ll soon start seeing bigger and better candidates stating their intentions to buy as well. Ratcliffe/INEOS certainly isn’t my preferred option, far from it.

 

[bosnian_red]

I feel like you've not been paying attention to transfer fees for decent players these days. They aren't coming down, they're only going up. Soon that will get you one player a summer with zero room for failure.

You realize that multiple clubs find players for reasonable fees? And then generate more money to spend through sales? It's called managing smartly. Chelsea did it for the past decade very well before their takeover. Just because some players go for 100m doesn't mean you as a club needs to get that player. You move on to a different, more attainable target and work within your limits. I promise you that a 100-150m net spend every summer is still more than enough, and will still keep us among the biggest spenders in world football.