I think it shows poor leadership if you've made an internal decision, with such shit comms, that you've essentially got whistle blowers going to the media about it.
That hostile vs supportive list is fecking grotesque.
How do you know the "whistleblower" is being entirely genuine and doesn't just hate his and someone else's guts, wishing to undermine the club from the inside (or even outside) and so releasing dodgy sounding information to try and shift perceptions?
It won't be the first time a rat has tried to undermine the club with leaks.
There are a lot of people out there trying to bring Utd down, and they will be working overtime to try and find angles to bring things in to disrepute, and have sensed an opportunity to create speculation where there is clearly likely intentionally, necessarily and understandably a lot of secrecy. The club will have been having to discuss a lot of sensitive information as part of the investigation and so it will have needed to be behind closed doors, and there will naturally be a lot they will be unable to say to the public - so some bad faith PR people and journalists will claim they are saying questionable things on their behalf.
As an additional note, some of what has been reported is weird spin on what is a completely understandable and standard process - it would have been incompetent of the club, or any organisation, to have not drawn up plans considering the ramifications of whichever decision they will end up taking, in advance of the decision being finalised.