From running out of cash by Christmas to record revenues. Manchester United minority owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe truly is a miracle worker. Despite Sir Jim’s dire predictions United generated the unprecedented sum of £666m, which keen-eyed readers of symbols will recognise as the sign of the beast, or the devil, or the (Red) Devils if you will.
Of course, headline figures do not tell the whole story. United recorded an operating loss of £18.4m. Though that is down on the previous year, it takes the total losses under the stewardship of majority owners, the Glazers, to an eye-watering £522m over 20 years. Oh, on top of that sits half a billion pounds of debt courtesy of the leveraged purchase made by the Glazers in 2005.
By the by, the accounting period ended in June so the numbers did not include the £200m United spent in the summer on Matheus Cunha, Bryan Mbeumo, Benjamin Sesko and Senne Lammens, one of whom is injured, one unused and another under-used as yet. Only Mbeumo is punching his weight, which explains to some extent United’s worst start to a season in the Premier League.
The accounts also revealed the scale of the job cuts made by Sir Jim, who lessened the payroll burden by the axing of 300 staff, an annual saving of more than £10m – if we assume the victims were earning the average UK wage of £37,000, though many will be on less. That United enrich Casemiro annually by almost twice that £10m figure understandably leaves fans bemused about the acumen of those running the football side of the club.
As does the performance of a team managed by a coach who remains in post despite a points average of one a game. Perhaps record revenues, which show earnings before tax, interest, depreciation and amortisation of £182m – also a United record and the highest of any club in the post-Covid world – will soften the blow should Sir Jim’s well-oiled axe fall on Ruben Amorim, as reports increasingly suggest.
According to some accounts Amorim is into “three games to save his job” territory, in other words the fixtures against Chelsea, Brentford and Sunderland before the October international break are loaded with danger. The cost of putting Amorim out of his misery is reportedly £12m, should the axe fall in the first year of his contract.
However, if Sir Jim is still counting beans, and United do not improve, the November international break might be more bloody for Amorim.
The record revenues underline United’s generative power even in a period of unprecedented failure on the pitch in the Premier League era. Though Ratcliffe layered his United investment in romantic terms, the boyhood fan from Failsworth indulging his passion for the club by buying a stake to restore the Theatre of Dreams to the summit of the game, the reality is arguably more hard-edged.
Your next read
Ratcliffe is Britain’s richest man, a capitalistic speculator who amassed his vast wealth in part by buying institutions cheaply and selling them at a profit. United were valued at £790m when the Glazers closed the deal in 2005. Ratcliff paid £1.3bn for less than 30 per cent of the club 18 years later, quintupling the value of the Glazers’ investment.
Thus is the ownership of elite Premier League clubs about profit generation as much as trophies, and that is where Ratcliffe’s heart lies. If United are raking in record revenues when they are losing every other week, you can see how the numbers might grow should they ever find a coach fit for purpose, especially in this period of unremitting global expansion by the Premier League.
To maximise returns, Ratcliffe has hacked back the wage bill to make the company appear more productive and attractive. United have already upgraded the training complex to the tune of £50m.
Plans for a new home, a “Wembley of the North” at a cost of more than £4bn, is part of a massive expansion aimed at making United the most valuable sporting brand on earth – and by extension increasing the value of Ratcliffe’s investment.
Win or lose the Ineos portfolio, in retreat elsewhere, is growing at United. It’s just the optics that need to improve, and that is all on the team. This dire sequence must end soon, and Sir Jim won’t be sacking himself if it doesn’t. Over to you, Ruben.
from Football - The i Paper https://ift.tt/5KM1TBc
Post a Comment