Club Sale | It’s done!

Status
Not open for further replies.
Born and bred, life long Manchester United fan Ratcliffe will be awaiting the result of his bid whilst watching Chelsea with his season ticket.
 
If Qatar buy us then we should become unstoppable right? All that self-sponsorship on top of the billions we already generate.

How do people feel about this? I imagine it will get very boring very quickly...
 
Would not be surprised if there is a couple of private bids.
I understand their wariness because of a possible outcry and protest but surely it would be wise for them to test the waters and see how fans feel about them before shelling out north of £5bn and then finding themselves in an unhappy marriage.

Maybe it'll be after round 2 to make sure they don't spend energy explaining and defending themselves unnecessarily.
 
The thing is though, the quotes about Al Thani bidding also didn't come from him. They came from sources as well. Just relax.

No, important members of that bid have made an official statement about the bid. It’s directly from the horses mouth.

Journos have no clue currently on the INEOS bid hence the nonsensical “put the Manchester back…” comments.

INEOS will surely made a statement in due course. Jim has already done a long interview regarding it so why you are all so desperate I don’t know. You guys relax is my entire point.
 
Why are people worry about Sportwashing part?
United will be more inclusive, cater to the west standards whilst also include their country because that is what Sportwashing does
 
Well, it's the best people have to go on, considering he hasn't even made an official statement. For someone who cares so much, the least he could do is come out with an actual release and explain to the fans. Which is what Qatar have done. Ratcliffe's attitude is similar to what Nice fans have issue with. Already off to a good start then.

I don't think he's a serious bidder. More of a charlatan drumming up attention.

If he makes concrete statements, he'd be in trouble if he somehow won. So he can't.

Would not be surprised if there is a couple of private bids.
A bit surprised there has been no third or more bidder announcing their intention.

I think it's possible that there is from America/Asia or whatever, but I'd have thought that an ME bidder would have wanted to get out in front on the PR side, explaining what they can do for the city etc and preparing for the regulatory battles. Doesn't rule it out, but it's possible they decided at the last OPEC meeting or whatever that 'this one is for Qatar.'
 
If Qatar buy us then we should become unstoppable right? All that self-sponsorship on top of the billions we already generate.

How do people feel about this?
Since the club is self-sufficient already, I'm sure all owners would rather not spend too much and save money. And after City's case I don't think self-sponsorship is a good idea.
All we need is the money the club made actually being put back into it and without the owners taking dividends. Improve facilities, youth teams and have the cash ready for when we need to purchase a top player. There's no need to spend money like City or PSG.
 
YoI’ve just changed your entire point without admitting you were wrong.
Not really? the bid was confirmed and a short statement was given to Crafton, it's CLEARLY from Radcliffe/INEOS

Are you actually trying to tell me this is faked?
 


Their subscribers which is probably a very low % of actual United fans.

The online polls are massively in favour of Qatar and after Jim’s statement yesterday you’d be mad to want him

fecking paywalled content full of Chelsea fans the daft a holes
 
No, I think the Athletic made it up and others,
like posters here, are running with it.

Jim has already done a full interview about the possibility and in due time we’ll learn more, why so fecking impatient?
Why are you so triggered about it? Did INEOS release any statement that they are bidding for us? Or maybe it's something The Athletic also made up?
 
If Qatar buy us then we should become unstoppable right? All that self-sponsorship on top of the billions we already generate.

How do people feel about this? I imagine it will get very boring very quickly...

There’s enough mega rich teams around that I’m almost certain it won’t become a one horse race.
 
Since the club is self-sufficient already, I'm sure all owners would rather not spend too much and save money. And after City's case I don't think self-sponsorship is a good idea.
All we need is the money the club made actually being put back into it and without the owners taking dividends. Improve facilities, youth teams and have the cash ready for when we need to purchase a top player. There's no need to spend money like City or PSG.
Agree, but I think we'll do it anyway.
 
So you haven't got a clue. Glad we cleared that up.

I'm not concerned because A, Ratcliffe is unlikely to win the takeover race to become United's new owner and B, on the off chance he does. No one is going to spend billions on a football club only to then run it into the ground by loading debts on the club that it could never dream of servicing, it makes no sense. The only way Ratcliffe/Ineos would ever make money from buying United is to grow the company, increase the value of the asset and hope to one day sell it on. Running it in to the ground and crippling it with debt isn't really conducive to that goal.
How will they finance infrastructure improvements that are sorely needed?

More debt added to the purchase debt?

They are just piling debt upon debt.
 
Their subscribers which is probably a very low % of actual United fans.

The online polls are massively in favour of Qatar and after Jim’s statement yesterday you’d be mad to want him

I'd be curious as to a poll of all brexit supporting fans. I think Jim could win that one.
 
I’ve umm’d and ahh’d over this for the last few days since the Qatar interest has manifested itself, and seemingly every 5 mins spent thinking about my personal opinion on the matter, I’m just left torn.

I think it’s great that so many people are highlighting their human rights record & lack of support for women and the gay community - but, then what? What are you expecting to happen after that?

It kind of reminds of the reaction when something overtly racist happens - like Rashford, Saka & Sancho missing their pens in the Euro Final and the trolls came out in force, but as a country we all banded together to stomp out racism, and make it clear that it’s wrong. Great. Then what? Not much else you can do beyond that right, you just have to live life knowing that people who hold such views live among us and could be in positions of power. It’s disappointing but life can’t stop.

I’ve spent the last 10 years or so being part of social movements, primarily rooted in Black & LGBTQ progression - and one of the hardest parts about it is, you can care so deeply about an issue, and put your heart, soul & every ounce of effort into wanting to see change - and it still won’t move the needle, because the people who have the power to make change, are often the very people you’re fighting against or the people who are indifferent.

So yeah, it’s great to see so many people pushback on a country with an ideology that isn’t accepting of all people - but I want you all to realise that you’re going to have to live with the disappointment that your good intentions & moral code isn’t enough.
Maybe one day in the future Qatar will change its laws on human rights & equality, hopefully soon, however this guy buying Manchester United, will not have an impact on that. The best that we can hope for, is that he personally doesn’t believe gay people & women are less equal, in the same way I have to try and believe everyone I come across isn’t racist.
Side note: Sir Jim being a tax-haven living Brexit voting gammon doesn’t sit well with me either, (though obviously doesn’t compare) there’s no such thing as a good billionaire.

If Al Thani buys us, he has to invest in the women’s team & their facilities, and also make it clear that everybody regardless of their sexuality is a part of this club. Beyond that, I’m not expecting much else.

I don’t know if that makes sense, and maybe in another 5 mins my mind will change again - but ultimately, the closest thing I can compare the feeling to, is that reluctant acceptance that people treat others differently for things they have no control over, and you can’t change their mind about it. Anybody who’s part of an oppressed minority can probably relate.

On to the football side of things, we don’t need someone who needs to falsify sponsorships in order for us to generate revenue. Even after 10 years of almost no success we generate £700M in revenue, and without the glazers & their debt, I calculate approximately £150-200m that we could spend on a yearly basis - depending on where we finish in the league - without needing to dip into cash reserves. And for a manager like EtH that’s more than enough.
That being said, the glazers have clearly sucked us dry, so whoever does come in - needs to pay off the debt, not just move it via accounting. And, for the first window at least inject some cash for us to spend - we can be self-generating afterwards. Sir Jim’s offer is the least appealing based on this.

The others are nice to haves - yes it would be nice to have a new stadium, new facilities etc but it won’t stop any on-field success we have, it would simply make sure we’re not falling behind our competitors in those spaces.
If someone comes in & makes us debt free, we can still finance a new stadium & upgrade our facilities, because EtH won’t need to spend £200m every single year - so a new stadium might take 8 years instead of 3-5 for example.

I’ll wait until more details come out, SJR needs to be more transparent about how he’s raising his funds & how he plans on investing in the club if he’s having to loan from 2 different banks - both of which are also very questionable.

I like the Progress Pride flag that Arsenal have in their stadium, maybe we could get a banner with that flag hung in the stadium, that would be great.
That's a very nice post. Everyone is going to have their own way of coming to terms with what's going on and those without any concerns at all are a tiny minority. Given the nature of the concerns people on both sides of the debate are being goaded into taking extreme positions in order to defend their reasoning and it's quite ugly tbf.
 
Amazing we have got this far and people still can't spell Ratcliffe's name.
Have you watched this good United player called Ericsen? I've seen him mentioned so many times but never could see him in our squad.
 
There’s enough mega rich teams around that I’m almost certain it won’t become a one horse race.

Agreed. In a funny way it evens out the top of the table really and it will come back down to best coaching, management etc.

Feel for the rest of the league though the gap might get wider.
 
I really hope it isn’t. Feck Brexit Jim. The Qatari’s vision for the club is far better.

Yeah screw all those people who died building their illegal world cup they bribed their way to host. Screw their blatant disregard for basic human rights. Our fans have suffered a few seasons in the Europa League. Oh the humanity.

It's sad just how quickly sportswashing works on people. No doubt you've been very critical of what's happened at City over the years.

We don't need ME money to be competitive. Manchester United being used as a political tool just doesn't sit right with me at all.
 
Well besides having a parent company that bring in 60+ billion in revenue every year.

So basically nothing like.

We don’t even know anything about the bid yet in fairness, just some guessig by journos.
We are all guessing of course,
The way I see it is if the parent company was willing to "take care" of the debt, being as rich as they are, it'd have been their first selling point for fans. Their revenue bring no guarantee as what and how they're willing to invest into the club. Not many thought the Glazers were gonna that bad when they bought the club
 
Their subscribers which is probably a very low % of actual United fans.

The online polls are massively in favour of Qatar and after Jim’s statement yesterday you’d be mad to want him

fecking paywalled content full of Chelsea fans the daft a holes

National newspaper polls are surely more representative than Twitter polls?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.