A long look at Manchester United, Sir Jim Ratcliffe, the Glazers, spending policy, debt, and the level of support for Michael Carrick. Christian Purslow, as usual, has plenty of insight in the latest @FootyBoardroom#MUFC
https://t.co/qHOQwCdVPR
We’re no longer a football club in the traditional sense. We’ve become a commercialised institution where financial gain appears to take priority over footballing ambition.
The football side is simply kept afloat by doing the bare minimum while expecting the maximum in return. The ambition isn’t to build a great football team it’s to maintain the machine, protect the commercial interests, and somehow expect success to follow.
And that mentality resonates from the very top to the very bottom. It becomes embedded in the culture in the decision-making, the expectations, the standards and ultimately the mentality of everyone within the institution. When the priority is commercial sustainability rather than footballing excellence, that mindset inevitably filters down through every level.
You end up with a culture where mediocrity can become acceptable, short-term fixes replace long-term ambition, and doing enough is celebrated as if it were exceptional. The problem isn’t simply one manager, one player or one department it’s a mentality that has become institutionalised from top to bottom.
#unitedisbroken
Man City cheated, egregiously, for years. The Der Spiegel emals were all real, and authentic. Yep, hacked, but real, and led to successful prosecutions from money laundering to sexual assault 4/n
New season but nothing has changed at @ManUtd. The Glazer family are still majority owners & @INEOS & a racist, asset stripping, scrounging bastard in SJR is running the club. We might win a cup, beat City or PSG but nothing will change until these bastards are forced out. #MUFC
The Cristiano decision days after their White House dinner, hydration breaks, the Trump peace prize, crazy ticket prices, the half-time show and then Balogun...
How Infantino engineered the World Cup to sell his doomed plan. https://t.co/JphsOm9kSz
Latest breaking news
This is incredible. FIFA yesterday issued brief to possibly expand World Cup to 64 teams - decision by August 14.
I wonder who would benefit most... maybe private investors...
⚠️Fact: UEFA is just as bad as FIFA and Infantino — if not worse
Now they want Nasser Al-Khelaifi to take over FIFA. Nasser Al-Khelaifi — PSG president and chair of TV network beIN — has been involved in several high-profile legal investigations and controversies over the years.
🔺 In 2017, Al-Khelaifi was accused of bribing FIFA Secretary Jérôme Valcke, by giving him free use of a luxury villa in Sardinia, in exchange for steering the Middle East and North Africa broadcasting rights for the 2026 and 2030 World Cups to beIN. A settlement was reached.
🔺 In 2019, France indicted Al-Khelaifi on charges of "active corruption" regarding the awarding of the World Athletics Championships to Doha 2019. Authorities suspected that two payments totaling $3.5 million, directed to the son of the former president of the International Athletics Federation, were made to facilitate bringing the sporting event to Qatar. Charges were dropped since France was not deemed to be the correct jurisdiction.
🔺 Al-Khelaifi is currently charged with ’abuse of powers’ in France due to links to the scandal in Lagardere Group.
🔺 Al-Khelaifi is closely linked to Gianni Infantino — the current FIFA president who was then UEFA's general secretary — when a deal was struck between Al-Khelaifi, Infantino and Michel Platini resulting in PSG getting a very lenient 20m fine in 2014 for breaching the FFP rules by an absurd margin, same as City. The fine was originally 60m, but 40m was written off when Infantino got involved and made deals with Al-Khelaifi (PSG) and Khaldoon Al Mubarak (City).
🔺Al-Khelaifi sits on UEFA’s Executive Committee. The same UEFA that has failed to take any action against Barcelona due to the Negreira scandal, which comes across as 1,000x worse than anything Infantino has been involved with. The VP of La Liga’s referee organ was indisputably paid 8.2 MEUR by Barca! The circumstances are so aggravating that it’s tragicomical. The ex VP seemingly tried to black mail Barca when they stopped paying him. Monies were taken out of an account at one bank, taken across the street to another bank, where the payment was made. There were reports for a long time on how if you as a referee made a bad call against Barca — your career was over. This guy who got paid €8.2m by Barca after a season collected the grades of the referees from the observers — changed them with a pen — and consequently decided who should call games in La Liga and who shouldn’t.
Imagine being a fan of any other club than Barca in Spain. They seemingly rigged the competition for over a decade. And nothing is done about it. They changed the laws in Spain to make it harder to prosecute. UEFA should act, has an obligation to act — but they looked away. Etc etc etc.
Al-Khelaifi is on the highest executive organ of UEFA. This is the guy UEFA want to replace Infantion with. Abramovich wasn’t available?
These people make me sick. And it’s my football association and yours’ that elect them. Nobody else. When is enough, enough??