Dear INEOS: If we had a decent interim manager the last 5 weeks, we...

I’m not fan of Ineos however United fans need to just for one moment understand just how bad the situation was when they took over.

1. The Glazers gambled hugely in the last 3-4 years, the profit that the club was making under Sir Alex had dried up to such an extent that all cash reserves where depleted and the club had to use a company credit card Facility of £300m.

2. From 2015/16 season, the club tried to buy players like Di Maria, Sanchez, Pogba, Falcao, Lukaku, Ronaldo, Cavani and many more with instalments as well as cash and decided to put the players on huge wages.

3. Please open the link I’ve provided on the clubs true profit and loss over the last 14/15 years. The last time the club made a profit was 2019 and subsequently since then they have had record losses in last 4 years. The days of making £148m profit with their accounts are long gone.
They were rightly fined by UEFA last season and without Sir Jim’s $200m(£159m investment), potentially next season we could have started with a points deduction

https://www.statista.com/statistics/383903/manchester-united-profit-loss/
(It might behind a paywall but you can open free for the first time)

4. The club had no available cash, none which is why they couldn’t do nothing this January with regard to Transfers. The debt which was originally £358m in 2011/12 has now spiralled out of control with historic club Debt now at $650(£518m), the club revolving credit facility $344m(£274m) and Existing Owed $379(£301m) Transfers. In 2013 the club owed £34m in transfer amortised fees.
That total of £1.092 of debt means the club is at breaking point. There’s no point turning over £650m if you lose £400k per week!
https://www.manchestereveningnews.c...man-united-finances-debt-glazers-28038776.amp

5. Sir Jim knew that he had to operate in a very smart way, first task was to invest capital/Cash to make sure the club could operate in the same way, not fall short of PSR/FSP, his $200m investment prevents this as it prevents the club from losing more than £115 allowed over 3 years. The second reason that he allocated £120m of the $300 promised was free up the credit card facility and make sure the club could effectively have a working capital of at least £160m should they need this in the summer. His biggest task however was to remove nearly all of the Exec Directors who had overseen such a huge decline in the club on and off the field in the last 15 years, all while still trying to be the friends of the Glazers so he could take more and more control.
https://theathletic.com/5340986/2024/03/14/man-united-debt-jim-ratcliffe/

6. Before he replaced the manager, he needs a new CEO, DOF, CFO, COO, Technical Director, Recruitment Director and many others whilst at the same time streamline the 1100 employees who work for the company and show very little in achieving goals and KPI’s Set. The most important new recruit to Sir Jim’s new Board and Senior Management structure of the club is not as most people believe Omar Berrada, Jason Wilcox or even Dan Asworth no it’s the recent bombshell news that Roger Bell will take over from Cliff Baty( A Glazer Man). This means that Sir Jim with only 27.7% has managed to be in a position where he really is calling all the shots. The CFO of a club like United needs to be best in class and here you have a lifelong Man United Fan in Roger Bell who is used to producing balance sheets with a profit and quickly turning around to Acting CEO Jean Claude Blanc, David Brailsford and Sir Jim and providing areas within the club that are not working, this is why the staff are now being ordered back to offices, company credit cards stopped unless good reason and there will be huge redundancies applied, so excuse me, I’m no fan of ETH either but how on earth would any fan expect Sir Jim and David Brailsford to have time to sack ETH when there is a huge financial compensation outlay to consider which will have a profound effect on the clubs ability to spend under PSR/FSP in the summer.

Summary
At this exact moment, Sir Jim and Ineos are playing the waiting game, they have probably considered that he needs to be sacked, however they will allow, Berada, Wilcox and Ashworth to have the final decision. They may have decided that as long as he gets Europa League Football, either by wining the FA Cup or Coming 6th, they may give him the first 10 PL games, simply because they probably did t realise just how bad things were behind the scenes, no fitness coach, poor medical department and many other issues which did not help him in achieving success.

Sacking ETH might not be necessary if another team like Bayern want him which would mean no compensation would be required, however should his team fail to provide any evidence that they have the ability to perform for him in the last 5 games, then he’s gone and so to is a marquee player like Bruno or Rashford because that £60-70m will be necessary to back the new coach.

Let’s be clear here, he has no more lives left and probably needs to go unbeaten to the end of the season with at least 3 or 4 victories. Even if he won the FA Cup and Came 6th, it wouldn’t surprise me if he was replaced as early as June 15th

 
could have secured an EL spot and be playing some entertaining, solid football. Instead, we are likely going to finish 7th, will not be in the EL next season, and the football has been really poor. EL football is worth about $25 million to most clubs.

I am very unimpressed with your management of the club thus far.

Signed,

A frustrated fan
Dear Frustrated fan,

You were told when we took over, very clearly, that our plan to return United to the upper echelons of European football would take a minimum of 2/3 seasons. We also stated that we would “walk to the right solutions rather than running to the wrong ones”.

To date we have been involved in the running of the club for just 2 and a half months. We have already invested $200m as we said we would, and are in the process of restructuring the sporting side of the business with all the hiring and firing that this process entails. We are working hard to get as much of our structure in place as soon as possible to ensure a productive and progressive summer period, building towards next season.

Please remember that we have an opportunity to qualify directly for the EL if we win the FA Cup. We have a real chance to achieve this aim in a one off cup game, and I’m sure Erik and the squad will give it there all.

In the meantime, please be less of a spoiled entitled internet fan, and have a little patience and resolve. It’s all well and good going for instant results, but we feel it would be better to endure a little pain now, to build for long term sustained success that the club has been accustomed to in the past.

Lots of Love, INEOS.
 
On principle I would say absolutely but thanks to Glazer dragging it out until Christmas last year and ETH actually getting worse with less games in the schedule, it‘s just awkward timing now.

I do hope going forward that we will be more proactive instead of throwing seasons away. We shouldn’t be afraid or ashamed to sack managers/head coaches. The United job is a high pressure role and not many people can handle it sadly.

Fortunately with the structure that INEOS are looking to implement such as Ashworth, Wilcox and Berrada, we just need head coaches as opposed to managers. Head coaches agree to carry out what the guys above him say. Managers traditionally used to have their way of doing things which the club would agree too and being chained to that. It’s part of the reason why I think ETH will be sacked but it’ll look like a mutual parting. ETH upon joining reportedly demanded and got certain things from Arnold and Murtough (two guys no longer here) so in some ways, he will have less power and the INEOS hires will outvote him on certain things.
 
I’m not fan of Ineos however United fans need to just for one moment understand just how bad the situation was when they took over.

1. The Glazers gambled hugely in the last 3-4 years, the profit that the club was making under Sir Alex had dried up to such an extent that all cash reserves where depleted and the club had to use a company credit card Facility of £300m.

2. From 2015/16 season, the club tried to buy players like Di Maria, Sanchez, Pogba, Falcao, Lukaku, Ronaldo, Cavani and many more with instalments as well as cash and decided to put the players on huge wages.

3. Please open the link I’ve provided on the clubs true profit and loss over the last 14/15 years. The last time the club made a profit was 2019 and subsequently since then they have had record losses in last 4 years. The days of making £148m profit with their accounts are long gone.
They were rightly fined by UEFA last season and without Sir Jim’s $200m(£159m investment), potentially next season we could have started with a points deduction

https://www.statista.com/statistics/383903/manchester-united-profit-loss/
(It might behind a paywall but you can open free for the first time)

4. The club had no available cash, none which is why they couldn’t do nothing this January with regard to Transfers. The debt which was originally £358m in 2011/12 has now spiralled out of control with historic club Debt now at $650(£518m), the club revolving credit facility $344m(£274m) and Existing Owed $379(£301m) Transfers. In 2013 the club owed £34m in transfer amortised fees.
That total of £1.092 of debt means the club is at breaking point. There’s no point turning over £650m if you lose £400k per week!
https://www.manchestereveningnews.c...man-united-finances-debt-glazers-28038776.amp

5. Sir Jim knew that he had to operate in a very smart way, first task was to invest capital/Cash to make sure the club could operate in the same way, not fall short of PSR/FSP, his $200m investment prevents this as it prevents the club from losing more than £115 allowed over 3 years. The second reason that he allocated £120m of the $300 promised was free up the credit card facility and make sure the club could effectively have a working capital of at least £160m should they need this in the summer. His biggest task however was to remove nearly all of the Exec Directors who had overseen such a huge decline in the club on and off the field in the last 15 years, all while still trying to be the friends of the Glazers so he could take more and more control.
https://theathletic.com/5340986/2024/03/14/man-united-debt-jim-ratcliffe/

6. Before he replaced the manager, he needs a new CEO, DOF, CFO, COO, Technical Director, Recruitment Director and many others whilst at the same time streamline the 1100 employees who work for the company and show very little in achieving goals and KPI’s Set. The most important new recruit to Sir Jim’s new Board and Senior Management structure of the club is not as most people believe Omar Berrada, Jason Wilcox or even Dan Asworth no it’s the recent bombshell news that Roger Bell will take over from Cliff Baty( A Glazer Man). This means that Sir Jim with only 27.7% has managed to be in a position where he really is calling all the shots. The CFO of a club like United needs to be best in class and here you have a lifelong Man United Fan in Roger Bell who is used to producing balance sheets with a profit and quickly turning around to Acting CEO Jean Claude Blanc, David Brailsford and Sir Jim and providing areas within the club that are not working, this is why the staff are now being ordered back to offices, company credit cards stopped unless good reason and there will be huge redundancies applied, so excuse me, I’m no fan of ETH either but how on earth would any fan expect Sir Jim and David Brailsford to have time to sack ETH when there is a huge financial compensation outlay to consider which will have a profound effect on the clubs ability to spend under PSR/FSP in the summer.

Summary
At this exact moment, Sir Jim and Ineos are playing the waiting game, they have probably considered that he needs to be sacked, however they will allow, Berada, Wilcox and Ashworth to have the final decision. They may have decided that as long as he gets Europa League Football, either by wining the FA Cup or Coming 6th, they may give him the first 10 PL games, simply because they probably did t realise just how bad things were behind the scenes, no fitness coach, poor medical department and many other issues which did not help him in achieving success.

Sacking ETH might not be necessary if another team like Bayern want him which would mean no compensation would be required, however should his team fail to provide any evidence that they have the ability to perform for him in the last 5 games, then he’s gone and so to is a marquee player like Bruno or Rashford because that £60-70m will be necessary to back the new coach.

Let’s be clear here, he has no more lives left and probably needs to go unbeaten to the end of the season with at least 3 or 4 victories. Even if he won the FA Cup and Came 6th, it wouldn’t surprise me if he was replaced as early as June 15th


Pleased for you.
 
I’m not fan of Ineos however United fans need to just for one moment understand just how bad the situation was when they took over.

1. The Glazers gambled hugely in the last 3-4 years, the profit that the club was making under Sir Alex had dried up to such an extent that all cash reserves where depleted and the club had to use a company credit card Facility of £300m.

2. From 2015/16 season, the club tried to buy players like Di Maria, Sanchez, Pogba, Falcao, Lukaku, Ronaldo, Cavani and many more with instalments as well as cash and decided to put the players on huge wages.

3. Please open the link I’ve provided on the clubs true profit and loss over the last 14/15 years. The last time the club made a profit was 2019 and subsequently since then they have had record losses in last 4 years. The days of making £148m profit with their accounts are long gone.
They were rightly fined by UEFA last season and without Sir Jim’s $200m(£159m investment), potentially next season we could have started with a points deduction

https://www.statista.com/statistics/383903/manchester-united-profit-loss/
(It might behind a paywall but you can open free for the first time)

4. The club had no available cash, none which is why they couldn’t do nothing this January with regard to Transfers. The debt which was originally £358m in 2011/12 has now spiralled out of control with historic club Debt now at $650(£518m), the club revolving credit facility $344m(£274m) and Existing Owed $379(£301m) Transfers. In 2013 the club owed £34m in transfer amortised fees.
That total of £1.092 of debt means the club is at breaking point. There’s no point turning over £650m if you lose £400k per week!
https://www.manchestereveningnews.c...man-united-finances-debt-glazers-28038776.amp

5. Sir Jim knew that he had to operate in a very smart way, first task was to invest capital/Cash to make sure the club could operate in the same way, not fall short of PSR/FSP, his $200m investment prevents this as it prevents the club from losing more than £115 allowed over 3 years. The second reason that he allocated £120m of the $300 promised was free up the credit card facility and make sure the club could effectively have a working capital of at least £160m should they need this in the summer. His biggest task however was to remove nearly all of the Exec Directors who had overseen such a huge decline in the club on and off the field in the last 15 years, all while still trying to be the friends of the Glazers so he could take more and more control.
https://theathletic.com/5340986/2024/03/14/man-united-debt-jim-ratcliffe/

6. Before he replaced the manager, he needs a new CEO, DOF, CFO, COO, Technical Director, Recruitment Director and many others whilst at the same time streamline the 1100 employees who work for the company and show very little in achieving goals and KPI’s Set. The most important new recruit to Sir Jim’s new Board and Senior Management structure of the club is not as most people believe Omar Berrada, Jason Wilcox or even Dan Asworth no it’s the recent bombshell news that Roger Bell will take over from Cliff Baty( A Glazer Man). This means that Sir Jim with only 27.7% has managed to be in a position where he really is calling all the shots. The CFO of a club like United needs to be best in class and here you have a lifelong Man United Fan in Roger Bell who is used to producing balance sheets with a profit and quickly turning around to Acting CEO Jean Claude Blanc, David Brailsford and Sir Jim and providing areas within the club that are not working, this is why the staff are now being ordered back to offices, company credit cards stopped unless good reason and there will be huge redundancies applied, so excuse me, I’m no fan of ETH either but how on earth would any fan expect Sir Jim and David Brailsford to have time to sack ETH when there is a huge financial compensation outlay to consider which will have a profound effect on the clubs ability to spend under PSR/FSP in the summer.

Summary
At this exact moment, Sir Jim and Ineos are playing the waiting game, they have probably considered that he needs to be sacked, however they will allow, Berada, Wilcox and Ashworth to have the final decision. They may have decided that as long as he gets Europa League Football, either by wining the FA Cup or Coming 6th, they may give him the first 10 PL games, simply because they probably did t realise just how bad things were behind the scenes, no fitness coach, poor medical department and many other issues which did not help him in achieving success.

Sacking ETH might not be necessary if another team like Bayern want him which would mean no compensation would be required, however should his team fail to provide any evidence that they have the ability to perform for him in the last 5 games, then he’s gone and so to is a marquee player like Bruno or Rashford because that £60-70m will be necessary to back the new coach.

Let’s be clear here, he has no more lives left and probably needs to go unbeaten to the end of the season with at least 3 or 4 victories. Even if he won the FA Cup and Came 6th, it wouldn’t surprise me if he was replaced as early as June 15th

The whole idea of naming an interim manager is to give the directors time to look for a permanent manager. That would be walking, not running. In addition, with an interim manager we could start the process and take our time. If we fire after the last match, then they will have to run to name a manager in order to prepare for the next season.

I think the decision has probably already been made to fire ETH. If true, it makes even more sense to have an interim manager.

If they haven't already decided to fire ETH, then I worry about their decision making.
 
How times change.
These days we're hoping to change manager to get INTO the Europa league!
 
Absolute state of this.

Patience is needed and people need to realise this quickly.

INEOS are sorting out upstairs before they get anywhere near the manager or the playing field - let them work ffs.

It's almost like some internet fans are utterly clueless idiots or something isn't it.
 
How about we forget looking for Messiahs and casting Hail Mary's and do the job professionally?
 
Issue with trying to rebuild United is a lot of fans who signed up 10, 15, even 30 years ago for success want it again NOW and aren’t willing to go through the potentially long period a proper rebuild would take. The same fans will then say in hindsight how we shouldn’t have spanked so much money all at once.

I’m happy the new owners are taking their time to assess things and not making rash decisions Woodward style to try and make a statement.
 
There’s also no guarantee of a new manager bounce, which is even more doubtful in light of the absence of quality candidates who would be willing to take the job for one month.
 
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could have secured an EL spot and be playing some entertaining, solid football. Instead, we are likely going to finish 7th, will not be in the EL next season, and the football has been really poor. EL football is worth about $25 million to most clubs.

I am very unimpressed with your management of the club thus far.

Signed,

A frustrated fan
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Div's are bad practice these says you should work on your semantics. The label on your class is spot on though.
 
The whole idea of naming an interim manager is to give the directors time to look for a permanent manager. That would be walking, not running. In addition, with an interim manager we could start the process and take our time. If we fire after the last match, then they will have to run to name a manager in order to prepare for the next season.

I think the decision has probably already been made to fire ETH. If true, it makes even more sense to have an interim manager.

If they haven't already decided to fire ETH, then I worry about their decision making.

If they fire ETH, then they will replace him with a full time coach like Tuchel who can work for 2-3 years with what’s available. He might only be given a two year contract like Pochetino was as they are easier to pay off now. If United were going to appoint an interim they should have done this in March after the defeat of Fulham or Chelsea. The cost to pay off ETH and his staff is probably £10m, if the club went for Amorim or De Zerbie, that’s another £15m, United is so strapped right now, I genuinely think cash is so tight, this is having an effect on who is sacked and hired.

As much as I hate this scenario, they may just say we are where we are, we’ll give ETH the first 10 PL games next season and if he’s not in the top 3, he’ll get sacked at Xmas. He will know then that unless he has an exceptional start, he’s gone plus he’ll need to improve to be given an extra year or new contract.

If the club has no European football he will have no excuse of too much football but he’s had no European football at all in 2024 and it’s made no difference so that might also be what’s get him sacked this summer!
 
Absolute state of this.

Patience is needed and people need to realise this quickly.

INEOS are sorting out upstairs before they get anywhere near the manager or the playing field - let them work ffs.
No ... We need absolute short termism. Only the present exists, the future and the past are mass delusions
 
The whole idea of naming an interim manager is to give the directors time to look for a permanent manager. That would be walking, not running. In addition, with an interim manager we could start the process and take our time. If we fire after the last match, then they will have to run to name a manager in order to prepare for the next season.

I think the decision has probably already been made to fire ETH. If true, it makes even more sense to have an interim manager.

If they haven't already decided to fire ETH, then I worry about their decision making.
They’ve already discussed this and already have their minds 99% made up. I think there’s a small chance a great last couple of games and a cup win could change things but won’t happen, unfortunately.

You‘re talking about someone who’s built up a multi billion industry and you think he’s winging this? (while his appointments in a couple of months would suggest the exact opposite)
 
That strategy did work so well under Ralf to be fair to the poster. Remember that first 45 minutes against Palace, the players actually broke into a sprint at times. Who cares about the following 5 months of shite.
Sub in a newly signed interim after the 1st 45 mins if things take a turn. Visionary owners would have a manager's bench next to the players one.


The scenes when Pep doesn't make the matchday squad because he's been poor in training ...
 
Sub in a newly signed interim after the 1st 45 mins if things take a turn. Visionary owners would have a manager's bench next to the players one.


The scenes when Pep doesn't make the matchday squad because he's been poor in training ...
That would be great. Seeing them practice standing in a box and pretend shouting?
 
Div's are bad practice these says you should work on your semantics. The label on your class is spot on though.
I knew(hoped) someone would say that. :lol:
 
We actually could have had a much better platform to build from in the summer, just by releasing a coach along with the rest of the hierarchy that will/should no longer be here.

Nothing would have been lost lifting the mood with an interim, and we would have had a real shot at CL football, nevermind EL.
 
Bottlejob of Spuds proportion to let this guy stay for the end of the season.
 
100% agreed and I think we could have got CL even. But no point crying over split milk.

I just wish they got an interim for the FA cup final.

INEOS could hire Ole for the day, like people do with wedding planners to make their big event go smoothly. He has a good record against Pep.