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Manchester United: Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s deal with the Glazers explained and what it means for the Premier League club.

Manchester United: Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s deal with the Glazers explained and what it means for the Premier League club
SirJim Ratcliffe purchases 25 per cent of Man Utd for £1.2bn, with the deal giving the INEOS owner control of football operations and a say in the commercial side managed by the Glazer family; Sky Sports News chief reporter Kaveh Solhekol explains what this might mean for the future.

Kaveh Solhekol
Sky Sports News Chief Reporter

As Manchester United announce that Sir Jim Ratcliffe has acquired 25% of the club, Sky Sports News’ chief reporter Kaveh Solhekol explains what this will now entail for the Reds and the Glazers’ involvement in this agreement.
Sky Sports News chief reporter Kaveh Solhekol explains what Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s acquisition of 25 per cent of Manchester United could mean for the club moving forward…

Has the deal been fully rubber-stamped?
It is quite complicated, they are buying 25 per cent of the Class B shares owned by the Glazer family.

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I think it’s going to happen, it’s going to take a while because it is going to have to go through the regulatory process at the New York Stock Exchange. It Is also going to have to go through a regulatory process at the Premier League which is going to take six to eight weeks.

How much is Sir Jim Ratcliffe actually worth?
He is said to be worth anywhere between £10bn and £20bn.

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Will he look to a full takeover?
There is no formal agreement for Sir Jim Ratcliffe to buy any of the Glazers’ shares in the future, but the Ineos chairman has the right of first refusal on any that they sell in the future.

Who is he going to bring in?
Jean-Claude Blanc
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Former Juventus and PSG executive Jean-Claude Blanc
There is going to be a new chief executive, because Richard Arnold has already left. There is talk that could be Jean-Claude Blanc, he is someone who already works at INEOS and had senior executive positions at Juventus and PSG as well. He is very highly regarded. He may well be the next chief executive, he’s been involved in discussions.

New football recruitment director could be Paul Mitchell, someone who has had success before at Southampton, Tottenham and Monaco as well. He is currently out of work and lives close to Old Trafford as well in the northwest.

There are other names in the mix as well. There has been talk of Dan Ashworth, who has done such a brilliant job at the FA, Brighton, and now Newcastle United. But I’m not sure he would want to leave, because Newcastle are on the up at the moment.

What will Dave Brailsford’s role be?
Si Dave Brailsford (PA images)
Sir Dave Brailsford is expected to have a seat on the Manchester United UK club board along with Jean-Claude Blanc.

Brailsford has a role at INEOS which sees him sort of overseeing all of their sporting interests. Now he is someone who knows Sir Alex Ferguson, Jim Ratcliffe knows him as well and has met him.

I just wonder if Sir Alex Ferguson has been involved in this in the background as well, using his influence to maybe convince the Glazers that Jim Ratcliffe and INEOS are the right people to do business with.

Sir Dave Brailsford's record in cycling
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Sir Dave Brailsford’s record in cycling
But Dave Brailsford is someone who has had extraordinary success in cycling and he is trying to translate that success into other sports, and football as well.

He is somebody who thinks about marginal gains – ‘I’m going to go into Manchester United and I can improve everything by a couple of per cent and we can turn this around’.

How is it going to work?
Kaveh Solhekol on Glazer handing over football operations.
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Sky Sports News’ chief reporter Kaveh Solhekol looks at why the Glazer family are happy to hand over football operations to INEOS as part of the 25% takeover and how this will work in terms of transfers and big club decisions.
We have finally got there, but where have we got to?

It is a step into the unknown, because we have got a situation where somebody is buying 25 per cent of a football club. But he is getting control of football operations, and the Glazer family is giving away 25 per cent of football operations, which in my mind is an admission of failure.

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They are basically saying, since Sir Alex Ferguson left we haven’t done the business on the pitch, we’ve tried everything, we’ve backed managers, we have given them money – it hasn’t worked out. Now these new people have come along, they are only going to own 25 per cent of the club, but we are going to give them control of football.

Timeline of Man Utd takeover process
November 22, 2022: The Glazers confirm they are open to a sale but say other options “including new investment” will be considered.
February 17, 2023: Sir Jim Ratcliffe and Sheikh Jassim Bin Hamad Al Thani make rival bids for Man Utd takeover. Qatari wants to buy 100 per cent of the club.
February 18, 2023: US hedge fund Elliott Management lodge proposal for investment in Man Utd.
February 28, 2023: Glazers split on sale after bids fail to meet £6bn valuation.
March 5, 2023: Sheikh Jassim and Ratcliffe make it through to next stage of the process along with unnamed bidder.
March 10, 2023: Elliott Management make it through to the second stage of the Man Utd sale process.
March 16 & 17, 2023: Qatari group and Sir Jim Ratcliffe meet Raine Group at Old Trafford before being given access to detailed financial information. Sheikh Jassim stays away.
March 22, 2023: Raine extend deadline for second bids after requests from Sheikh Jassim and Ratcliffe. Elliott Management did make minority stake offer before the soft deadline.
March 23, 2023: Ratcliffe makes his second bid.
March 24, 2023: Sheikh Jassim makes his second bid.
April 11, 2023: The Glazers take the sale process to a third round with interested parties asked to submit final offers by end of April.
April 28, 2023: Sheikh Jassim makes world-record bid. Ratcliffe also makes his offer before the deadline.
May 16, 2023: Sheikh Jassim goes in with fourth bid close to £5bn. INEOS proposal values Man Utd at a higher price but is not for the whole club and would give Glazers chance to keep 20 per cent stake.
June 7, 2023: Sheikh Jassim submits a fifth improved bid.
October 14, 2023: Sheikh Jassim withdraws from process.
October 14, 2023: Sir Jim Ratcliffe set to agree £1.2bn deal for 25 per cent
December 24, 2023: Sir Jim Ratcliffe acquires 25 per cent of Man Utd
In a way it suits the Glazers as well, because they can take a step back and they are hoping, if things go wrong on the pitch, they are not the ones that are going to be blamed, it is going to be Ratcliffe and INEOS who are going to be blamed.

But already speaking to people about this deal over the last couple of days, they are saying to me how is this going to work?

Kieran Maguire on benefits of Manchester United takeover for Glazer's.
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Football finance expert Kieran Maguire explains what benefits the Glazers will have from selling 25% of Manchester United to Sir Jim Ratcliffe.
You have just got an extra voice in the room now. So when it comes to signing players, for instance, or firing managers, you have just got an extra layer, an extra owner who is going to be in the mix when it comes to making these decisions.

We are being told that Ratcliffe and INEOS are going to control football operations but at the end of the day they only own 25 per cent of the club. Is that really going to be the case going forward if things go wrong?

What’s his track record in business like?
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Journalist Andy Mitten dissects what Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s takeover of Manchester United will mean for Erik Ten Hag and what the side need to turn things around.
His track record in business is incredible, somebody who goes to college, sets up in business, starts buying assets from oil companies that they no longer want, and builds one of the biggest petrochemical companies in the world.

His record in sport is mixed. He bought Team Sky (cycling team), rebranded it as INEOS Grenadiers, their record has been mixed, they are not as successful as they used to be.

Formula 1, they bought a big stake in Mercedes F1, that hasn’t been going very well because Red Bull have been leading the way, and he is involved in sailing as well.

So, it’s been very, very mixed. But he is somebody who thinks he is surrounded by very, very clever people and he is very clever as well.

What about in football?
Jim Ratcliffe
He’s invested in football. I don’t think Lausanne was a serious play at getting into football, it was more about helping the grassroots club close to INEOS’ headquarters in Switzerland. It’s been very mixed there, they have been relegated a couple of times, but I think that was more to do with helping the Swiss youth and Swiss grassroots football.

Nice, he bought, he wanted to make them into a Champions League club and challenge PSG. That’s been very mixed. I think they have finished sixth, ninth, fifth, ninth.

They are doing much better at the moment, they have got a new sporting director who is going out there to try and find really good young players, they have got a very promising new young manager as well and they are second in the French league.

Why does he think he can bring the good times back?
File photo dated 17/3/2023 of prospective Manchester United investor Sir Jim Ratcliffe, whose team Nice are emerging as Ligue 1 title contenders this season. Issue date: Friday November 3, 2023.
He has had extraordinary success in business.

He looks at football and what people are doing in football and he thinks with my expertise in business I can translate it into football as well – and what I’m going to do at Manchester United is improve everything by a couple of per cent: the coaching, recruitment, data analysis, nutrition, training, the infrastructure, everything is going to improve.

If you improve everything by a couple of per cent, overall, you will improve everything completely and you can transform Manchester United and return them to former glories.

How much is he going to spend on the stadium?
Old Trafford has been home to Manchester United since 1910
Image:
Old Trafford has been home to Manchester United since 1910
We’ve been told he is going to invest $200m straightaway once the deal has been completed on infrastructure, that’s roughly £158m.

When it comes to Old Trafford what are you going to get for £158m? A new roof if you are lucky. You’re not going to get a new stadium.

Tottenham’s stadium, probably, the best stadium in the world, costs up to £1bn. Stadiums in the US, some of the best stadiums in the world, cost around £2bn.

So, this is not going to change anything. I think Sheikh Jassim was claiming that he was going to invest £1.5bn on infrastructure, so this is not a game changer.

Will United’s rivals be worried?
The people who run Manchester City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal, and the people who run Tottenham are not going to be losing sleep over the fact that Jim Ratcliffe has arrived.

He is a brilliant businessman, but the jury is out on what he has achieved in football and what he can achieve owning just 25 per cent of the club.