Manchester United co-owner Sir Jim Ractiffle reveals the only scenario which would see him sell his shares at the club, albeit it’s unlikely to occur anytime soon.
In December 2023, the British billionaire acquired a 25% stake from the Glazers who remain the club’s majority owners. However, the 72-year-old and his group, INEOS, took over the club’s day-to-day operations.
But after taking over a club that is seemingly heading into a financial disaster, the 72-year-old found himself forced to take a series of drastic cost-cutting measures, including massive redundancies. Unfortunately for Ratcliffe, this marked him as one of the most unpopular men in Manchester at the moment, something he’s struggling to deal with.
“Change requires some unpopular decisions,” said Ratcliffe during his interview with Gary Neville on The Overlap. “And I have to accept I’m going to be unpopular.
“I don’t know how long I’ll be unpopular; maybe I’ll be unpopular for a long period of time, but I think it’s worth being unpopular to fight our way through the changes that are necessary to get Manchester United back to where it should be, and hopefully, the attitudes will change a bit if we come out the other side with a successful outcome.”
“I think, ultimately, we’ll come out of this difficult period, and we’ll find ourselves in a much sunnier place, I do. I mean, otherwise, I couldn’t deal with what I’m having to deal with at the moment because it’s not very nice when you go home to Manchester, and you’ve got people saying some quite unpleasant things; that’s not very nice; I don’t need that, really, to be honest, at my age.”
Sir Jim Ratcliffe would sell Man Utd if he loses faith in the project
Hence, Ratcliffe insisted he’s only in it for the love he bears for the Red Devils. Nevertheless, he admits he’ll consider selling the club to Arab investors in case he ends up losing belief in the cause.
“[I’m doing this] because I really like Manchester, you know, Manchester United’s been my boyhood club, and I believe that we can sort it out; if I didn’t believe it, I wouldn’t do it, would I? I’d sell it to the Qataris or something… [but] I think we’ll get there with Manchester United.”
This is obviously a reference to Sheikh Jassim, the chairman of Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB), who launched a bid to buy the club from the Glazer family in 2023 but to no avail.
For an avowed Manchester United’s lifelong fan, he is in it for the dividends he may be able to pocket, rather than for the rejuvenation of the club as a whole and pertinently improve the football ⚽️ fortunes of the club which is in an abyss with the delayed appointment of Ruben Amorim to turn around its football ⚽️ fortunes.
Ruben Amorim is more concerned of what amount of compensation he will get if he is sacked which looks a more likely outcome than his ability to improve the football ⚽️ fortunes in the near future.
He is stubbornly (pun) adamant to only work with his system of playing than go for any winning system with the current players at his disposal to move up the table.
He must realise that time is at a premium with only 11 more league games to play and if the team gets relegated because of this brute adamance, then the only outcome would be to
S A C K him.
If he only cared about money he would have listed Ineos on the stock market by now and have billions in the bank. He may be deluded but he does believe he can fix the problems at United.
You seem to know a lot about Ratcliffe thinks, lucky you, it must be very handy knowing what others think
We can’t keep sacking managers after 20 games, where do you get the idea he’s more interested in his payout IF he gets the sack ??? Give us some proof on YOUR thinking. And as far as sir Jim, why hasn’t he listed Ineos and made billions already if he’s so greedy?? Me thinks you know far less than you think 🤔
Are you for real?
The sooner Ratcliffe and the Glazers go and the Qataris rake over the better.
@GrahamJones. I agree with you on this.
We have to give Ratcliffe and amorim a chance to do something rome wasn’t built in a day
Man United took some time to achieved their glory again under Sir Alex, which took a couple of years to get the team playing their best football. Plus the Coach got rid of those players who were trouble and couldn’t play together with attitude problems so sometimes the problem isn’t the manager but the players and the management that overseas everything. Sir Alex also had his issues with the management but use his Scottish power to run the club with no interference from above him!!!
Ratcliffe isn’t a UTD supporter if he were ge wouldn’t have bought neice try to buy Barcelona and try to buy Chelsea he is no different than the Glazers in it for what he can get out of it PARASITES ALL IF THEM
Look at clubs taken over by rich Arab states: Man city, Newcastle, PSG etc..in football money talks, so it is naive to think Man u fortunes would improve if the status quo continues to exist. I say sell to the Arabs, the sooner the better!
Everyone has their on strategy but in order for the whole plan will go through is whether those strategies will work together . Like a good swiss watch; the whole mechanics must work. For the moment our Red Devil watch is not clicking nicely. A gear is wrong somewhere, or maybe the whole schematic plan was at fault. Time is clicking