Would you be okay with state or state-backed ownership?

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sullydnl

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Starting a different thread for this specific discussion as it's something of an elephant in the room when it comes the broader talk about ownership.

I think it's fair to say we have criticised state backed clubs a lot on here in recent years. We're also in the midst of a broader discussion regarding the rights/wrongs of Qatar hosting the World Cup. And now with the club up for sale, we've already been linked to potential Dubai and Saudi ownership.

For some, it's a necessity for us to be competitive as a football team going forward. For others, it's the worst possible outcome on ethical and moral grounds, something they say would prompt them to stop supporting the club entirely. And others are somewhere in the middle.

So I'd quite like to get a sense of where the majority stand on this issue. A poll would be useful, if possible.
 
Reasons for no are obvious but the likely reality is going to be that if we don't get them, another club will get them, ebrase them, brag that they have them and then win title after title while we continue to fight for 4th with new American Owners.

In short, just fecking get it over with. Buy us and make us successful you cnuts.
 
I think given the numbers involved there’s a high chance it happens if I’m honest.

How do I feel about it? Well it’s selling your soul to the devil really. Ethically and morally it’s all kinds of wrong but in terms of the club it would make it the most powerful in world football and ultimately bring dominance and success.
 
As long as it's not Saudi, give me an oil state over any clueless Yank who treats the club like a personal piggy bank.
 
No, I'd rather we continue to struggle than be financially doped up. What's the point of anything when you have unlimited funds? Build a team properly like Klopp did, or SAF did, or even say Brighton do.

Are the Glazers any good? No, I dislike them as much as the next person, but a state owned club is the next rung of the ladder down. At that point you might as well pack it in because the contest of football is dead and all that remains is who spends the most amount of money. Have people not been watching City and PSG spend crazy amounts of unearned money in a quest to win everything? Where's the sporting challenge in that? Great for United, but what about the rest of the league?

If anything having 3-4 oil clubs in our league would actually make me more open to a USA style system with fixed budgets and drafts (even though I dislike it because it rewards the owners more than players). Too often in the modern world free market capitalism goes mental and just becomes ruined by greed, and society and everything else decays because of it
 
No. It’s an absolutely bizarre thing to be owned and financially backed by an entire state, that you don’t even reside in. It isn’t even about the state in question, it simply removes a crucial layer of your identity by default.
 
I would hate it but in the end I would still be celebrating every signing, every win and every trophy their money brings us, so yes I'm against it but I'm big enough of a hypocrite to ignore it when the club ultimately goes down that road.
 
I'd be uneasy about it all.

I dont get where the joy is in sport without the struggle to get there, if United get a state backed regime and they get it right it won't matter what anyone else does and I'd rather it not become Bayern Munich in England.

I also don't agree with this win at all costs mentality no matter who the owner is, how can we as a fan base look at ourselves for over a decade we have railed against this exact same thing and now it's well if you can't beat them.

If it was Saudi's I'd be out completely the rest I could maybe stomach, but public executions and beheadings etc not for me Clive
 
Nah, that is where I draw the line. Winning is not THAT important to me.

Capitalism is for the time being inescapable. Sports washing isn't.
 
Kaos said:
As long as it's not Saudi, give me an oil state over any clueless Yank who treats the club like a personal piggy bank.
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Newcastle took them off the table so no worries on that score,interesting to hear The Sun mentioned in todays paper about Kuwait,Bahrain & Oman as possible state backed options as well.
 
Yep 100% times change.

I'd snap your hand of if Dubai was on the table as an investor, they'd make United a top team again and not skimp on anything.
 
For what it's worth, my answer would be no.

I understand that for us to compete with state-backed clubs on an equal footing we would likely need to be in a similar position. But I don't need us to compete with them on an equal footing. I just need us to be competitive enough to have hope of winning major trophies in any given season, which I think we can be without that ownership given how wealthy we are as a club.

The ethical issues are the problem. And if this WC has taught me anything, it's that those issues would effect how I enjoy football. I thought I'd be able to compartmentalise and enjoy the football itself once it got started but the surrounding mood has dragged it down. And I'm obviously far more invested in this club than a given World Cup, so it would be far more of an issue.

The idea of not supporting United at all seems strange but I honestly don't know how I would feel watching us amidst all those surrounding issues. And I am certain that the day we become state owned is the day my accounts on the likes of the caf or other football-related sites get deleted, because I don't want the constant exposure to the noise and criticism that would constantly and correctly surround the club, or the bullshit tribal justifcations that our fans would then trot out in turn. Which I guess means being less interested in and spending less time on football generally.
 
Let's face it, with the money being asked no owner is going to be perfect.

Ineos is a chemical company with a piss poor environmentally record.

Apple literally uses foxconn who work their employee's to suicide on minimum wage.

Facebook sells your privacy.

Dubai has dodgy human rights records.

Musk is a complete loon.

The investment funds will be run to bleed the club, money is sometimes from questionable private locations.
 
The club makes more than enough money to compete at the highest level. We don’t need state owners, we just need owners who won’t bleed the club dry for their own maximum profits. So, no.
 
Hal9000 said:
Let's face it, with the money being asked no owner is going to be perfect.

Ineos is a chemical company with a piss poor environmentally record.

Apple literally uses foxconn who work their employee's to suicide on minimum wage.

Facebook sells your privacy.

Dubai has dodgy human rights records.

Musk is a complete loon.

The investment funds will be run to bleed the club, money is sometimes from questionable private locations.
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Absolutely nailed it with this post
 
I wouldn't like it. Any state that might buy us would be a shite oil state. And with unlimited money any victory would be hollow.

No one really cares about City's trophies because everyone knows it is just because of unlimited money.
 
Massive Spanner said:
The club makes more than enough money to compete at the highest level. We don’t need state owners, we just need owners who won’t bleed the club dry for their own maximum profits. So, no.
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So to those saying no who would you actually accept as owners,bear in mind there are reports INEOS don't want to be involved with bid.
 
It's kind of a "what can I do about it". Wouldn't be happy about it. Wouldn't stop supporting the club as at the end of the day, it's still the football club, it's still football... what else would I fill all this spare time with if I took some sort of moral stand. It would just suck using a club like United to help in sports-washing, but if it's a source that isn't using it for sports washing, then meh, why not? I don't want the source to have horrible human values (hard to find in billionaire's, but some better than others). That doesn't rule out everyone from the middle east, though people will jump to that if anyone from that part of the world takes over.

I just want an owner who loves football, is level-headed, doesn't oppress groups of people, and just wants to own the club for the good of the club. Don't need to invest billions of their own money, just clear the debts, make up for some of the neglect over the past 20 years and renovate a bit, and then let the football club just keep all of the money it generates within the club to continually expand. Unlikely, but that's the goal.
 
bosnian_red said:
It's kind of a "what can I do about it". Wouldn't be happy about it. Wouldn't stop supporting the club as at the end of the day, it's still the football club, it's still football... what else would I fill all this spare time with if I took some sort of moral stand. It would just suck using a club like United to help in sports-washing, but if it's a source that isn't using it for sports washing, then meh, why not? I don't want the source to have horrible human values (hard to find in billionaire's, but some better than others). That doesn't rule out everyone from the middle east, though people will jump to that if anyone from that part of the world takes over.

I just want an owner who loves football, is level-headed, doesn't oppress groups of people, and just wants to own the club for the good of the club. Don't need to invest billions of their own money, just clear the debts, make up for some of the neglect over the past 20 years and renovate a bit, and then let the football club just keep all of the money it generates within the club to continually expand. Unlikely, but that's the goal.
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Yeah hard to walk away whoever owns us,however in an ideal world we aren't state backed but if so nothing I can do about it anyway
 
croadyman said:
Newcastle took them off the table so no worries on that score,interesting to hear The Sun mentioned in todays paper about Kuwait,Bahrain & Oman as possible state backed options as well.
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One of their princes just gave a blessing for someone in their "private sector" to bid for us.
 
feck no. It’s not even necessary, not when the club has the revenues it already has. Not to mention the potential. With Meta, Amazon, Apple, Radcliffe, Ortega and several others interested, why take Saudi, or even Dubai money? I don’t want owners that are ethically compromised to the point of being human rights violators. Jesus, some things are more important than whether you can spend silly money on Kylian Mbappe.

All I want is an owner that wants United to run as a supremely efficient organisation. To seek out competitive advantage through operational excellence, rather than financial weight. To invest in much needed infrastructure that has a zero or minimal carbon footprint. And to take us to the next level of technological/digital development. Innovators, not nation states.
 
Actively hoping that they take us over.

Its the only way to compete. Could care less about the rest of the political BS.
 
No thanks.
Football is changing, but I'm not changing with it. If United or any other club get state backing, I feel it becomes a different entity.
 
I would hate it for several reasons. You don’t even need to spend like an oil state to compete with them, we just need the right buyer. More likely we end up sportwashed though.
 
Whoever buys Utd will not be a saint, you want to moralise, take your pick, from homophobia, racism, pollution, exploitation, human rights etc... no matter who we get they will have things you can criticise.

The one thing I would say in favour of state ownership, they are not buying the club to asset strip, or make a profit, they are buying bragging rights, and to be honest you only have to look at the transformation at City, not just the team but the overall investment and from a selfish point of view can see that there would definitely be advantages in state ownership.

The second thing in favour of state ownership is that an individual, company or consortium, is unlikely to change their ways, cannot see Ineos stopping petrochemical production whilst there is a profit to be made. There is arguably more scope for a state to change its standpoint on certain issues, and their human rights records.

TBH though I have not say, no control, I am not going to stop supporting Utd irrespective of anything so quite honestly meh!
 
No. And on that breaking news about Saudi, I’d have a really shit decision to make if that happened.
 
I've spent 19 years despising everything about oil backed clubs. Amplified 14 years ago when City became state owned. I'm no hypocrite and I don't belive in "win by any means necessary" or "if you can't beat them, join them".

I do feel conflicted. Recent events have made me question if supporting a top flight Premier League club is still for me.
 
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