Arsenal
Aston Villa
Chelsea
Crystal Palace
Everton
Fulham
Leeds United
Liverpool
Manchester City
Manchester United
Newcastle United
Nottingham Forest
Southampton
Tottenham Hotspur
West Ham United
Wolverhampton Wanderers
Opinion
Resurfaced footage shows Sir Jim Ratcliffe has badly misjudged one thing about Man United
Resurfaced footage of Sir Jim Ratcliffe shows that he badly misjudged one thing about Man United – as well as perhaps telling us something about the lifestyle of a billionaire.
Ratcliffe is now United‘s single largest individual shareholder after he acquired a 28 per cent stake in the club for £1.25bn earlier this year.
He has since taken a far more hands-on approach than the Glazers, who are rarely seen at matches.
The Manchester-born billionaire, who made his fortune in the chemicals industry, has grand plans for Old Trafford. He wants to build a new stadium that could bring in £200m in matchday income per year.
But one comment on a podcast appearance a short while ago suggests he might not quite have had the authentic matchday experience in English football.
- READ MORE: Man United may be very interested in Leeds United’s Red Bull takeover after £30m crisis twist
Ratcliffe gaffe on Old Trafford refreshments
Speaking on the podcast earlier this year, Ratcliffe elaborated on his plans to turn Old Trafford into a multi-use venue that punters spend time at outside of 90 minutes.
“If you can get people, instead of spending two quid on a burger at half-time, they stay there for a couple of hours and they spend 15 quid,” the 71-year-old said.
“Then that’s good for us, a win-win. The fans benefit as they have stuff to do and the club benefits so it can buy better players”.
Anyone who has been to Old Trafford, or just about every other football ground in the world for that matter, will know that a burger is likely to cost five times that amount.
It may seem trivial, but there is a serious point here. And that is that owners live in such rarefied air that they seldom understand the true matchday experience.
And that is not a good thing for supporters of the clubs over which they have total control.
Owners and supporters will always clash over matchdays
Clubs now realise that their most valuable asset, their stadium, cannot be allowed to be in use for just 90 minutes every other weekend.
These venues have enormous money-making potential, and most clubs are now getting wise to that.
However, this is often at odds with ordinary match-going fans, who don’t want to feel like customers when they have already invested so much time and money into supporting their clubs.
This conflict is at the heart of modern football. Owners are quick to leverage the optics of having a huge, passionate fanbase but local supporters themselves are so rarely catered for.
Instead, and this will surely be the direction that the Ratcliffe-led regeneration of Old Trafford goes, the matchday experience is treated as a day out or a tourist experience.
But ultimately, this one of the growth areas that sustains the obscene level of spending that we see from United and many other clubs, which is pined for by supporters.
There is not a perfect solution to this dilemma, but we can’t have it both ways.