Protest marches won't have any effect apart from bad publicity and the usual suspect getting their faces on the TV.
So, the Glazers. Are they parasites? Blame game topic.
- Thread starter Henrik Larsson
- Start date
As the old saying goes.
penny-wise and pound-foolish
Prov. thrifty with small sums and foolish with large sums. (Describes someone who will go to a lot of trouble to save a little money, but overlooks large expenses to save a little money. Even in the United States, the reference is to British pounds sterling.)
Sam: If we drive to six different grocery stores, we'll get the best bargains on everything we buy. Alan: But with gasoline so expensive, that's penny-wise and pound-foolish.
Pretty much sums up of our transfer policy.
The only thing that will impact on the Glazers is sponsors pulling out. Its all about the income to them - nothing else. We can protest all we like but it will change nothing.
We also let ourselves be used by agents to get their clients payrises at their present clubs. Somebody has to be more canny about agents motives.
I agree with a lot of that. A couple of weeks back I was the first one on the "The squad is fine" train, and to an extent I still am. I dont think we need 8.5 world class signings in order to avoid relegation, however there are weaknesses in the squad that need to be addressed.
I think it was just watching some of the other top teams - realising that even Arsenal have far more strength in depth than us now, watching the football Chelsea played last night and seeing Fabregas, it was almost like a "heres what you COULD have had" moment.
The thing(s) that irk me, are when our CEO is making bold claims about transfers incoming (last summer and this) and then nothing to materialise, when we talk about "no budget" and then hear stories of how we are skimping out on potential targets due to cost. Herrera said in an interview that he would have joined last year but we refused to meet his release clause - which we did this summer. Fellaini had a release clause and we let it expire, and then paid more for him. This sort of incompetence embarrasses the club.
I dont think its about being spoilt so much as simply wanting to see a real statement of intent from the Glazers that they want to keep United on top.
This sounds approximately right. Again, over years when the squad didnt require major investment, this is fine, however in the last 2 years we have had a wealth of experience leave the club and have not really replaced them yet. Its now that we finally see what the Glazers are made of, and so far they have disappointed.
The other thing I dont get is that with the Adidas deal apparently being reliant on us qualifying for the CL this season (or losing 30%) you would think the club would be desperate to ensure we get top four.
That is the main problem I have with the club. The Billy Big Bollocks statements they keep coming out with. They build up the fans expectations when they have no intention of meeting them. If they stopped doing that then maybe we would all calm down. Everything is geared towards getting the fans to part with their hard earned money.
Of the £700mil plus that the owners have taken out of the club through charges and interest in under 9 years, how much has been invested in the squad in comparison?
They spent something like under £200mil of their own money actually acquiring the club and have just sold some shares for this amount like its their own personal ATM. They are in essence in the process of asset stripping by fractional sell offs and I wouldn't be surprised to see this happen more regularly over the coming months/years.
The rough value is 2billion which means they have theoretically made 1000% profit on their initial investment. How much exactly do they need to make and take out of the club before people will stop excusing the fact that they are businessmen? Yes, they are in it to make money, but they have already made enough money of a return on their investment then they every could of dreamed, how much will be enough before people realise these owners are prepared to run this club into the ground before they leave and at this stage the Glazers simply cannot lose no matter what happens. .
People keep saying that the PLC was no better, but was the PLC consistently taking as much from the club proportionately to revenue then it was investing in the squad?
The reason that £125mil has had to be spent on the squad in the last 18 months is because there has been f**k all proper investment in the squad since the owners joined. People didn't care because SAF was doing miracles with the players he had. As I said, how much has the owners invested in the squad relative to what they have taken out and relative to the success the club has had ?
Yea that stuff does frustrate, no argument there. If Woodward just shut his gob and cracked on he'd not be exposed to half as much grief, but he makes a rod for his own back with the comments he makes.
I do think he has a remarkably tough job on his hands though, taking over as SAF leaves, then having to contend with not being able to offer European football and the fact that we're in a period of real transition and uncertainty.
No matter what he does he'll get shit from somewhere. Spent too little, overpaid for X player, didn't get the right targets in etc, he can't really win unless he bring Ronaldo back on a free for minimum wage.
Funny you should say that he had a "remarkably tough job on his hands" , when people don't afford DM the same leeway.
Not really sure what any of that had to do with what I posted, but never mind.
At the end of the day, they are businessesmen and they are in it to make money. If you want an owner who has no interest in making money and will just pour it in then you're looking to turn us in to City.
Football is an industry, and we are a business in it, the pie in the sky options some people are asking for are pipe dreams.
There really isn't much out there as a viable alternative.
Again not sure if the relevance but yes DM had a tough job on his hands and not for one minute did he look capable of taking it on.
Wha ? Moyes is part of the reason why even £120 million in 1 year isn't enough and why Woodward's job is rougher than when Fergie retired. Instead of solving problems with the squad he sanctioned the £27 million for Fellaini and £37 million for another #10 when we could've instead bought a CM like Strootman, an experienced CB like Garay + £surplus 25 million change left in the bank. He's also the reason we're out of Europe making negotiations tougher for top players.
Probably because he was new to the job then, this is a different season. We cannot afford to be used as a CEO apprenticeship scheme. They should have made sure they employed somrbody competent. How come other clubs can sign some real bargains, we used to manage it? We just overpay for players and the ones we get cheap are usually cheap for a reason. You don't have to spend loads of money, it is contacts and football knowledge that is needed. Ed has neither and just get lead by the nose by agents.
A lot of this is clearly true, the point about SAF appointing Moyes still doesn't hold much water for me though, perhaps he endorsed it but if your the owner of a company you ultimately make the big calls.
Which is the whole point in actual fact, your the owner so the buck stops with you, there's no hiding from it, no amount of blame shifting, it's your company at the end of the day and the decisions are on you.
If my company ultimately fails due to negligence or poor decision making from my employees who is ultimately to blame ?
I take your point, but one of the things that most people have ceded about the Glazers is how good they are at remaining 'hands off' and not interfereing with SAF - with great success as the result.
If SAF's final decision was to stand in front of the owners and say 'this is the man to replace me' why would they argue? They own a business in an industry (football) in which they are not experts, so they take the advice of the experts under their employ.
For my money, the Moyes appointment came from SAF, and as much as I respect the man he's not infallible and he got that very wrong.
Presumably you give ultimate credit for the 5 league titles and champions league win to the Glazers too then?
Moyes didn't buy shaw or Herrera... Who exactly decided to buy them?
There are a lot of questions surrounding who exactly is deciding who to purchase specified players!
The Glazers are parasites but, I do not think they are preventing us from competing with the big boys. They have shown they are willing to spend in terms of transfer fees and wages. We just need to start spending in a smarter way.
Sorry mate but I don't exactly understand what was implied there ? Anyway they fill 2 positions of need - CM and LB. Van Gaal ratified the purchases as he stated in an interview... United gives its manager the ultimate say in player personnel decisions. They weren't bought against his will.
Ferguson was in and cleaning up long before the Glazers, that squad has not been maintained as it could have been.
Not sure I will ever be convinced it was all Fergusons idea, certainly Bobby seemed to have had an influence, quotes regarding Mourinho etc.
What I am convinced of is the Glazers "hands off" approach is due to not having much of an idea what football is all about. I am also sure we can all agree that the Glazers are simply "business men" and with that their interest lies only in the financial sector of the club. We can all agree that onfield success can directly affect the finances but for the long run then a period without success can be easily sustained, we only have to look at Liverpool and Arsenal for living proof and you can bet it's not gone unnoticed by our owners.
The Glazers are parasites that have made us rich beyond measure without the need to suck on any arab cock.
Not bad going really.
Not bad going really.
Wut ?
As opposed to the paupers United were before their arrival what with the largest revenue stream in world football every single year from 1995/ 1996 to 2003/ 2004 ?
He ratified the purchases, but they weren't players he scouted and pinpointed as preferable targets. .
What I am asking is who is deciding our target players ? They weren't LVG targets, they were in essence given to LVG. . These players cost £60million, but they were chosen before LVG was even made coach . . LVG has actually not been able to make one signing since he joined . .
1. Because Madrid were not always the top spenders in Europe all those years - Serie A was where the majority of big deals were going down. So unless you include numbers for Milan, Juve etc then it is not a complete picture.
I have also asked you where your numbers come from as Im not sure they are correct anyway.
2. Well my whole point was that we never got close to breaking the world transfer record. As you note yourself the closest we got was Veron and still we were 25% below the record at the time.
3. No - whether Real are stronger now or 10 years ago have nothing to do with the subject at hand. It is about spending not quality of players and in relative terms they spend far more now than back then.
4. I already mentioned myself that we were the top spenders in England until the sugar daddies arrived at Chelsea and then City so there is no argument there.
However, this was at a time when PL was far behind the biggest leagues in Europe - Keane was a British record at £4m, the world record was £12m at the time! Cole was a similar story - this actually backs up my earlier point about how we rarely competed with the biggest spenders even preGlazer. By the time we got closer to the top with Rio, Veron etc - Abramovich then arrived on the scene and changed everything at home as well as abroad.
All you did was give 1 year of wages and then show net spending vs Madrid over several years - very limited info to make any conclusions from.
I have mentioned repeatedly, unless you compare wages+fees over a period of time then it doesnt mean a lot plus there are other relevant clubs, not just Real - feel free to put together the numbers if you want to do a proper comparison.
My view is that not that much has changed over time in terms of where we stand in buying power. Maybe we are now 5th/6th rather than 3rd/4th (we seem to be spending a lot again so this could change quickly) but although we have been one of the bigger players in European transfers for some time now, there has always been a few clubs spending more than us - the exact same is true today just that those ahead of us have changed e.g. Real/Milan/Juve to Real/City/Barca/Chelsea.
Anyway I think a more interesting discussion is about value for money - I think that is where the bigger difference has come in recent times, on the whole Fergie always bought well with a lot of bargains. More recently a lot of money has been spent but Im not sure if it was spent wisely.
Using the term "parasites" insinuates our financial position has been made worse.
When in fact they have kept us apace as one of the largest brands in world football, developed revenue streams that are the envy of every club in world, and have put us on course to one of the, if not the only independently wealthy club in the world.
Outside of hiring Moyes and not physically forcing Fergie to buy midfielders there isnt a lot they have done wrong.
1.
Fact - United's revenue streams were the envy of every club in the world even before they took over. The Vodafone and 13 year Nike deals were record-breaking. United had the #1 highest revenue in the world in 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 according to Deloitte. We haven't been #1 ever since the takeover and are currently #4. So yeah we've been worse than prior to the takeover.
Fact - United was THE wealthiest independent club in the world before the takeover with the highest value. United also had no debt, a rarity among football clubs. Now despite paying over half a billion we're still £350 million in debt and have to pay £20 million in interest per year even if you leave aside the debt capital. So again it's worse compared to the pre-takeover days.
2.
Isn't a lot they have done wrong ? More than half a billion reasons to say otherwise mate.
The important question then is, where would we be in that list if the Glazers hadn't taken over?
We can only hypothesize but I doubt our revenues would've been much lower when in fact they were the highest for such a long long long time. The club's world-wide appeal was massive even then and that draws sponsors evinced by the world-record £303 million - 13 year Nike deal in 2002.
That 13yr deal is actually one of the reasons our revenue is not as high as it could be - in hindsight it was a mistake to sign such a long term contract as we could have got a lot more for past few years as shown by the new deal with Adidas.
In general revenue comparisons are often misleading as you are not always comparing like with like. The Glazers are unlikely to care much about who has the highest turnover, more important to them will be the bottom line profit.
And the big area that we can never compete with Real/Barca is on their individual TV deals - they are happy to screw the whole of the Spanish league whereas we have agreed to share the pot more equally in the PL.
Hindsight is panacea to be fair. Infact - United's €31.5 million deal was the world record till just recently. Even Barcelona's most recent renewal (2nd highest in world at the time of signing) was worth €33 million and Madrid's was €38 million and Chelsea's deal till 2024 is €36 million per year. So essentially United started earning a comparative amount of money from 2002 - more than a decade in advance. If you take cumulative value from 2002 ours was still superior by far. So I fail to see why it was a bad deal. You look at the Adidas deal now but it runs uptil 2025. What if Madrid of Barcelona better triple digit deals by 2020 ? Will the Adidas deal represent poor value ?
I wouldn't put a lot of the blame regarding our squad getting increasingly weaker. I know the Glazers could have possibly made more money available for us but some of our signings have been very poor choices.
It all started during the summer when we sold Ronaldo and Tevez and replaced them with Valencia, Obertan and Owen. If money was a problem at that moment in time then we might have struggled to buy better players but Ferguson always said the money was there if he wanted it. Those three signings were never gonna be enough to replace Ronaldo on his own never mind Tevez as well.
Recently we have spent £27.5 million on Fellaini (who we bought as a CM where he seems lost playing) £37 million on Mata when we already had Kagawa, Rooney and Januzaj to play in his position.
We also spent over the odds in the past. Anderson for £27 million and Nani for £25.5 million to name two
We also have made loads of unknown signings that simply did not work. There were all for relatively small amounts individually but it all builds up.
Zaha - £15m
Bebe - £7.4m
Obertan - £3m
Manucho - ?
Tosic - ?
De Laet - ?
Mame Diouf - ?
I wouldn't blame the Glazers for the above reasons. However they might be at fault when it comes to not offering money even when Fergie said it was available.
It all started during the summer when we sold Ronaldo and Tevez and replaced them with Valencia, Obertan and Owen. If money was a problem at that moment in time then we might have struggled to buy better players but Ferguson always said the money was there if he wanted it. Those three signings were never gonna be enough to replace Ronaldo on his own never mind Tevez as well.
Recently we have spent £27.5 million on Fellaini (who we bought as a CM where he seems lost playing) £37 million on Mata when we already had Kagawa, Rooney and Januzaj to play in his position.
We also spent over the odds in the past. Anderson for £27 million and Nani for £25.5 million to name two
We also have made loads of unknown signings that simply did not work. There were all for relatively small amounts individually but it all builds up.
Zaha - £15m
Bebe - £7.4m
Obertan - £3m
Manucho - ?
Tosic - ?
De Laet - ?
Mame Diouf - ?
I wouldn't blame the Glazers for the above reasons. However they might be at fault when it comes to not offering money even when Fergie said it was available.
Respectfully, Fergie is as much to blame given his insistence there was no value in the market; and trying to get bargain basement players who were crap like Bellion. Garay was being linked to us in Fergie's last year.
Fair enough. Maybe he was. But with all due respect isn't it a grey area and something the general public/ media isn't privy to ?
Can we conclusively say that Sir Alex genuinely believed there was no value in the market or was it an extension of the club policy ? This was a man who didn't mind paying blockbuster fee for Keane and Veron and Cole and Yorke and van Nistelrooy and Stam and Ferdinand and Rooney. Yet suddenly he started pinny pinching and searching for value post 2005 ? Dunno about the others but I have a hard term believing that.
Anyway this thread seems to be morphing into an infinitesimal loop with the same cyclically repeated arguments. I'll take my leave before my constant anti-Glazer whining becomes unbearably annoying. Or maybe it already has.
The bottom line is a club with the global appeal of United should be competing with Barca, Real and Bayern for the top players in the world. The reality is we sold the best player on the planet, failed to replace him and now can't even compete with Chelsea or City (let alone the top table in Europe). That is down to the owners. In an era of unprecedented money in the English game and unprecedented revenues at United, our owners have simply allowed us to fall too far behind. That's what the Glazers have brought to the party.
GARY NEVILLE: “They’ve spent £140million in the last 12 months and they’ve got Zaha, Herrera, Shaw, Fellaini and Mata. Last season I’d argue that some of those buys were panic buys, who didn’t fit the philosophy – and they’re paying for it now. For that money, or a bit more money, you could have got Gareth Bale, Toni Kroos, Cesc Fabregas and Filipe Luis. For the same level of money that they’ve spent you could have got those four players into that squad."
Food for thought. Arguably Woodward has done a good job in persuading the Glazers to invest, its not his fault the players his managers choose to buy ....
Food for thought. Arguably Woodward has done a good job in persuading the Glazers to invest, its not his fault the players his managers choose to buy ....
Fair enough. Maybe he was. But with all due respect isn't it a grey area and something the general public/ media isn't privy to ?
Can we conclusively say that Sir Alex genuinely believed there was no value in the market or was it an extension of the club policy ? This was a man who didn't mind paying blockbuster fee for Keane and Veron and Cole and Yorke and van Nistelrooy and Stam and Ferdinand and Rooney. Yet suddenly he started pinny pinching and searching for value post 2005 ? Dunno about the others but I have a hard term believing that.
Anyway this thread seems to be morphing into an infinitesimal loop with the same cyclically repeated arguments. I'll take my leave before my constant anti-Glazer whining becomes unbearably annoying. Or maybe it already has.
It's impossible to answer that question but there were definite signs that Fergie was getting more conservative with old age - the Pogba situation being a prime example of something that I'm sure he would have handled differently had he been a bit younger. If I had to guess, I'd say it was a combination of reduced budget combined with an old man getting annoyed that things weren't how they used to be. So we end up with a surplus of players who are low maintenance but less talented (Valencia, Young etc).
I know where you are coming from but we never were able to attract the truly top talents, whether because of wage structure or the city of Manchester who knows...What we did have was the pick of payers from the English league (whether British, Irish or overseas), supplemented by relatively low cost imports, particularly from Northern Europe. Since the arrival of Abramovich and the Abu Dhabi Group, we no longer have the deepest pockets domestically, plus the local talent pool has dried up to the extent that there are few players from the 5 UK/Irish national sides that would improve us. Our entire strategy needs a thorough overhaul as what worked in 1996 or even 2004 no longer applies.
If Manchester City can attract Silva, Aguero, Toure, Kompany et al then you can be damn sure Manchester United could too. That argument doesn't wash. United are enjoying massive revenues, some of which like the TV deals have NOTHING to do with the work of the Glazers. But that revenue just hasn't been reinvested in players. Our pockets are plenty deep but our owners have always had their fingers in the till. It really is that simple.
City can only attract those players (excluding Kompany was bought before they really started spending) by over-spending massively and then signing sponsorship deals on non-commercial terms with Abu Dhabi companies. I don't see that as a legitimate stick with which to beat the Glazers. The sad truth is that most of our buys since 2007 have been flops, including, more damningly, in the last two years when we have started to spend big gain. In 2014 (as opposed to 2010), it's more a question of spending well rather than scrimping.