The Glazer family: majority owners of Manchester United and among a large section of the club’s support, about as popular as a beat-boxer at a eulogy.
For nigh on a decade-and-a-half, the LUHG (Love United Hate Glazer) movement have been doing all manner of things in protest of their ownership, from donning the green and gold that United wore at their inception (as Newton Heath LYR) to forming a Supporters Trust, with some even going so far as to form a new club in what they feel is the club’s true spirit, FC United of Manchester.
Thus far, these measures have not had the desired effect of making them bugger off.
The main gripe is the mortgage that the Glazers effectively put on the previously debt-free team, when they performed their original leveraged buyout, as well as taking a cut of the profits and perhaps most heinously of all, putting Ed Woodward in charge of football operations.
Actually, if I’m honest, I may be alone in finding Woody’s appointment the most heinous. Others are far more focused on the debt and the fact that the people responsible are making eye-watering levels of cash from the endeavour. I’m more ambivalent about the whole thing, but the bottom line is that many would eagerly scrub their nethers with a hedgehog if it would make the Florida-based entrepreneurs part ways with the Red Devils.
Well rumour has it that they might finally get their wish. In recent months there have been various reports that a group may have serious interest in purchasing MUFC. The most recent rumours put Manchester United officials in Saudi Arabia, having takeover talks with none other than the Crown Prince himself, Mohammed bin Salman.
Worth a reported $1.8 trillion, he certainly has the cash and while we don’t officially know much, and while the Glazers party line is that they don’t have plans to sell, things do seem to be gathering steam.
This has certain quarters of the fan base in raptures. Many are declaring that this will get the club back to winning ways. Some are crossing every available digit and appendage, wishing desperately for this to happen. Others are reveling that this would put the club back on the same kind of financial footing as rivals Manchester City, who themselves of course, are owned by Sheikh Mansour of the United Arab Emirates.
I… am frankly horrified at this reaction.
Now before proceeding, I’d like to point out that I suffer from a mildly neurotic brain that will prod me mercilessly if I’m not careful about what I’m about to write. There are many allegations aimed at “MBS”. There are many claims, a great deal of hearsay and while his critics have constructed a damning profile, I obviously don’t know anything beyond what has been reported in the media.
So now that I’ve laid down that piece of security against a trillionaire Saudi Prince stumbling on my humble blog and suing me into oblivion, I shall continue.
For the people who may have spent much of the last couple of years huddled weeping under a 1994 Eric Cantona duvet (I’m assuming there’s a few of you), the most recent high-profile story to paint bin Salman in a bad light, was the murder of Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi Arabian consulate in Turkey.
After initially denying involvement by Saudi Arabia, the most recent word from bin Salman was that he was responsible because it “happened on his watch”. He still publicly maintains however, that he had no prior knowledge or personal involvement in the incident.
Worryingly, this is not the only allegation of draconian measures being taken against dissidents to the Crown Prince.
Consider also that “MBS” gives high priority to how he is perceived around the world. He’s implemented more progressive measures (for the stringently conservative Saudi Arabia at least) towards freedoms for women for example… yet despite reforms, women who campaigned for them were still arrested for speaking out.
Now consider that owning a major football team might be an effective way to promote this person around the world and tidy up an image that’s been somewhat tarnished of late.
Yet this doesn’t seem to have fazed what looks like the majority of United fans commenting about these rumours across the web. They’re all for it. They’re overjoyed. They’re expressing no reservations. They’re not questioning the move one iota. It seems that as long as the Glazers are gone, that’s what truly matters. That makes me question more emphatically than ever if for some, the specter of the Glazers as the enemy has overtaken rational thinking over what’s truly best for the club.
Reaching out desperately to bin Salman as a saviour while something like the Khashoggi assassination looms large, is a Mr Magoo level of shortsightedness. It’s a bit like asking a hobo in bloodstained clothes, who keeps stroking a hatchet and muttering about consuming the souls of the young, to watch your kids, because you suspect your regular babysitter of renting pay-per-view movies without your permission.
The issue of the Glazers has mostly been one of principle. It’s not truly financial: our revenues and profits are higher now than they ever were under Martin Edwards or the PLC. It’s not even about success: while things have gone south since the retirements of Sir Alex Ferguson and David Gill, the vitriol was just as sharp when we were still champions of England and Europe.
The true principle, as I understand it, is that our football club shouldn’t be used as a cash cow, least of all by people with no true connection to it.
But while these questions hover about this prospective owner, aren’t there far greater principles at stake? Wouldn’t it be far worse, regardless of what success may come, for our club to become a propaganda vehicle in the construction of a cult of personality?
Now I’ve peppered this post with a great many disclaimers. “Alleged”, “reportedly”, all used in good faith. This isn’t about whether or not Mohammed bin Salman is who his critics declare him to be.
It’s about the fact that far too many Man United fans don’t seem to be concerned one way or the other.
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