Servicing and eventually paying back a multi billion pound acquisition loan whilst also having to spend £400m on wages and transfers in addition to paying for a stadium is a different kettle of fish to what the Glazers were doing. I don't think anyone can do it commercially, its just not feasible.
Club Sale | It’s done!
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Of course it does, it's basically another form of advertising. They're buying positive associations, which help obfuscate the corruption and human rights abuses of the regime. Someone says Qatar or Bahrain to you, among your first thoughts are the world cup or the grand prix and the country starts becoming a destination, a normalised member of the international community, rather than an oppressive and murderous regime.
Obviously it's not perfect and Qatar's human rights record has been put under the microscope, but plenty of people have also praised the organisation of the tournament and the abiding memory will be positive, eg Messi achieving his dream and all that. Plenty of people say advertising doesn't work on them, despite the likes of Coca-Cola and Unilever spending billions on it every year because it does. It's basically the same thing.
I think little has been said about the geological aspect of mixing oil-states with football. It's more been about sportswashing the image of the states themselves so far.
Long term the World will have fewer oil-ressources and more countries will have to deal with climate change in a huge way. If that World is to be achived in a more sustainable way, then oil (which is used to manufacture extremely consumed products like plastic) should play a lesser part. So football becomes a vessel for not just sportswashing states, but indirectly greenwashing oil too.
So it's not just a commercial interest we're dealing with for states themselves. Buying a sportsclub is also directly or indirectly a commercial for oil by pairing a beloved football brand with a state that fully thrives on oil. Without the oil, these states would be mere villages/undeveloped cities in the sand, and was just that before the discovery of oil.
Imagine if the development of oil-owned clubs continues. If the major top 4-6 clubs are all oil/state owned (they pretty much decide the direction of the league (or the super league).
There's so many factors to this beyond just supporting your club without caring much for the owners as long as we're competitive. Eventually football will change massively if both United and Liverpool are sold to owners like this. So going along with a new state-backed owner also affects the league as a whole.
Long term the World will have fewer oil-ressources and more countries will have to deal with climate change in a huge way. If that World is to be achived in a more sustainable way, then oil (which is used to manufacture extremely consumed products like plastic) should play a lesser part. So football becomes a vessel for not just sportswashing states, but indirectly greenwashing oil too.
So it's not just a commercial interest we're dealing with for states themselves. Buying a sportsclub is also directly or indirectly a commercial for oil by pairing a beloved football brand with a state that fully thrives on oil. Without the oil, these states would be mere villages/undeveloped cities in the sand, and was just that before the discovery of oil.
Imagine if the development of oil-owned clubs continues. If the major top 4-6 clubs are all oil/state owned (they pretty much decide the direction of the league (or the super league).
There's so many factors to this beyond just supporting your club without caring much for the owners as long as we're competitive. Eventually football will change massively if both United and Liverpool are sold to owners like this. So going along with a new state-backed owner also affects the league as a whole.
Fun fact: only 4% of Dubai's economy is oil based.
And no, football clubs being owned by Arab states isn't going to change the narrative regarding natural resources and climate. Qatar pretty much owns half of London anyway. If you want to make a difference go after the countries that are the biggest consumers - namely China and the US.
Latest rumours point to a bid by evil empiror Ming the Merciless from the planet Mongo. Make of that what you will.
What a load of nonsense.
That's also nitpicking one stat to fit your view without looking at the whole picture as was the point of my post. In the whole UAE which Dubai is a part of it's 85%.
In Qatar it's 60%, so it's depending on what possible owners you look at. Saudi Arabia (Newcastle) is the largest exporter of Petrolium in the World.
Perhaps it’s not one big scam then and both things are actually true about these nations. Is it because we would prefer to hate them that we oppose them doing anything good? Or we think that because there are things we don’t like about them, anything good they do is with the motivation of somehow tricking everyone into not paying attention?
What is more likely is that they have questionable human right ideals (according to your way of thinking) AND they love sport and want to promote their country as tourist destinations. This idea is that these people belong only in the shade and we don’t want them to do anything that holds them in a positive light is odd. ‘Sportswashing’ is a stupid term. They are not ‘washing’ anything. Qatar just held a World Cup where absolutely NONE of their beliefs were ‘washed’ away or even hidden in the closet while the spotlight was on them. They still aggressively opposed drinking, they still openly and aggressively banned LGBT displays. And they also showed the good in their country. Both of which are all true. What it seems to be is that people resent them being viewed as actual people with different sides to them. They do things we don’t like, and the preference is that this is always the only possible association with them. However, football isn’t ‘sportswashing’. They likely simply do not define themselves as a people based solely on their LGBT views, yet that is the preference of the west to define them by.
Nothing wrong with ANY nation promoting itself. But in doing so, they make no secret at all of their beliefs, so I’m not sure what sport is supposed to be washing or hiding. They are who they are, and are taking their place on the global stage as they are entitled to as sovereign states. The good that their sport involvements highlight about their nations are real good things, not pretend good things put there to distract everyone from the fact that they don’t like alcohol.
100m per year should have been enough though if we didn't piss it up the wall
Should have been yeah but they left Ed Wood-for-a-head in charge of it all with no plan and no proper structure at the club. It's all their fault basically.
This thread is so sad and predictable, we as a fanbase rightly critised City, Newcastle, Chelsea. Now so many are throwing around the excuses or worse welcoming them because they want shiny new signings.
People don't have to abandon their love of United but at least show some conviction. We shouldn't hide behind excuses or willingly choose indifference suddenly.
This club being a plaything of such a regime is sickening.
People don't have to abandon their love of United but at least show some conviction. We shouldn't hide behind excuses or willingly choose indifference suddenly.
This club being a plaything of such a regime is sickening.
What annoys me is I am big Mets fan and their owner Steve Cohen is a billionaire and he is going wild with his team. So much fun, just spending money on the team and making fans dreams come true.
Someone like Ratcliffe in comparison seems like such a loser, worrying about finances, just have fun with it, spend the money and see your team win.
Someone like Ratcliffe in comparison seems like such a loser, worrying about finances, just have fun with it, spend the money and see your team win.
Well you don’t need to doubt it. It’s happened before and I’m sure it will happen again, for a minority of fans at least.
People rightly opposed to ME investment wouldn't really care where they invest so long as it's not United.
To be honest I don't get the demonising of fans who still want to carry on supporting if it to were happen and also vice versa.
It's not like any fan has any control of who owns the club, commercialisation of the club happened well before sugar daddies came into football. If you decide to not support the club that's OK and the same if you carry on.
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I want to know what the Scousers think of all this.
AFCUM to be formed?
I have no desire to see us spend 200m a year - strange assumption. I appreciate some people want to us operate like real life FM/FIFA (possible they need to grow up) but it's not for me. We spend enough as it is.
Most important for me is maintain a competitive level of spending, clearing the debt and invest in infrastructure.
Anyone who thinks the new owners will spend less than 200m is having a laugh. Its not realistic.
They need to spend 500m each year for 3 years to get back us on top. And 300m per year to maintain the lead in the following years.
They need to spend 500m each year for 3 years to get back us on top. And 300m per year to maintain the lead in the following years.
Plastic
The point is Arab states are looking to diversify their economy and move away from an oil-dependent economy. Dubai is testament to that. It also explains why a lot of them are investing in football clubs. The UAE itself is also investing billions in renewable initiatives particularly with solar energy.
This idea that this is some heinous collective plot from them to 'oilwash' doesn't make sense, not when you consider their current trajectory of investments.
Is this on transfer fees? Then it's excessive.
But if your including stadium and training infrastructure upgrades it sounds about right
It's obviously not half if you're nitpicking but my original point stands. They're investing practically everywhere.
No chance that is enough. It is at least £2billion a year for the first 5 years for us to be in top 4, on top of one one off investment of £7bn in year 1.
They want the Olympics and I think they'll go big again. But this time let's see how much nations sell for... Eh France? We love your money and we pretend to hate you.
The capital's biggest landowners: Qataris own as much land as the Queen and TfL put together. A company part-owned by the Qataris own almost as much land in the capital as Transport for London and the Queen put together, a new ranking has suggested, while the City of London was ranked second
That's not even including the required 50,000 seat capacity stadium for the reserves and youth teams.
This is the biggest load of nonsense post I have ever seen in my life.
We all want lots of shiny new signings do we? Well the Glazers have never failed at doing that so that's absolute nonsense mate. If you think this is about new signings then you have no clue about what's happened over the last 17 years.
I just want owners who will clear most of it not all of the debt and invest into ALL areas of the club not just new players and managers. Right now due to the valuation that's very likely to middle eastern money. If you can find someone in the west who has billions to burn then be my guest.
Anyone but Glazers. It's time they went.
Do the financials get reset if we get taken over in terms of FFP? You’re only allowed a maximum loss of 105m over 3 years under EPL rules and we lost 115m last year and 90m the year before - a lot of that can be written off such as infrastructure spend and being COVID related - but with the 300m currently owed to clubs on transfers plus whatever we do in January there isn’t much scope to spend huge going forward and still be within FFP unless we sign some big new commercial deals. Can that 300m owed to clubs debt be taken off the club books during a takeover?
Thus far, reports have suggested that a nation state is unlikely to buy the club, but also that Avram Glazer met with ME-based investors whilst in Qatar for the World Cup. The Glazers are reportedly open to both a partial and full sale, as confirmed by Avram himself to The Athletic last week, so we may not be getting any new "benevolent overloads". The Raine Group LLC have been appointed to oversee the process, but we are probably still some weeks or possibly months away from having an idea who might be investing/purchasing.
I like your reasoning
Transfer debt wouldn't be included in FFP calculations. For the purposes of FFP, those transfers will have begun being amortised, regardless of the payment structure that United agreed with those clubs. It is true that United have been rubbing up against what is possible within FFP constraints though, so any prospective new owner will not be able to come in and spend £300m+ on new players. There's no cap on infrastructure spending, though, so they would be able to invest as much as they like in the stadium/training ground without breaching the regs.
what report was this?
The large piece in The Athletic last week:
https://theathletic.com/3991146/2022/12/15/united-sale-manchester-glazers/
cheers, will have to dig out my mates login!
I wouldn’t say reports, all I’ve seen is one? Even this was trumped by Ornstein days later
So if we agree to spend 150m up front on Mbappe the financials and thus FFP would show 150m plus his wages across the length of his contract rather than 150m up front?
I don’t see how we won’t be very close to breaching FFP this year given the huge outlay in the summer on top of the big losses the last 2 years.
Isn’t Dubai also broke and been bailed out by Abu Dhabi twice in the last ten/fifteen years.
That transition has clearly worked exceptionally
Athletic football club united of Manchester?
I don't think its necessary to spend 500m in three years, thats essentially buying 2 new teams when we already have the basis of a top squad. If we make one big effort next season and spend something like 250m on a striker, center mid, back up RB and a proper CB upgrade on Maguire and Lindelof then we will be fine such that we can drastically reduce our transfer spending to around 70m per season for about 5 years.
We could also benefit from the current successful loans being enjoyed by Laird, Hannibal and Amad to supplement our squad depth.
My view is that we have the basis of a competitive squad and transfer spending from hereon in shouldn't be worrying if we get someone who can bring in a cash injection to complete the holes in our first eleven in one go. The worrying thing is the stadium and training ground, the good thing is that these are assets that add value to the club and its capacity to generate more money.
Brilliant points
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