Ruthless or poor judgement? Ratcliffe at United

Football is full of rich businessmen who naively imagine their success in another field will easily translate to a sport and an industry they have followed from afar. How hard can it be, right? And so many of them start out by talking a good game and end up making a total mess of it. Or if they get things right, it is only after learning from a lot of mistakes.

Football is a sector of ‘business’ unlike any other, one in which the short term often rules and emotions run high.   It is more difficult to calculate the potential of a manager or player than a petrochemical plant.   Or are such individuals targets of the tall poppy syndrome which is largely absent in the US but all too prevalent in the UK?

If you were feeling extremely generous, or if your instinct was to regard billionaires with an awe-struck reverence, you might look at the latest news out of Old Trafford and persuade yourself that Sir Jim Ratcliffe is bringing back the ruthlessness that Manchester United have lost.

Hiring Dan Ashworth — “clearly one of the top sporting directors in the world”, Ratcliffe had previously said — and getting rid of him five months into the job? That’s ruthless alright.

A wide-ranging redundancy programme? Withdrawal of free bus travel for staff attending the FA Cup final last May? No Christmas party? A proposal to halve the club’s £40,000 annual funding to their Disabled Supporters Association? Raising prices for all as-yet-unsold tickets (even for children and pensioners) to £66? Yeah, this is all pretty ruthless.

The first year of a new ownership regime is often like this: sweeping changes, rushed changes, unpopular changes, unsuccessful changes that lead to more sweeping changes just a little further down the line.

But the concern is — and has been for some time — that, for all his hard-hitting words and the tired local-boy-done-good narrative, Ratcliffe’s record in football club ownership does not match the hype. 

There is little in Ratcliffe’s track record in France and Switzerland, with Nice and Lausanne Sport respectively, to suggest his expertise in the petrochemicals industry amounts to any kind of golden touch when it comes to football club ownership.    A distressed asset in petrochemicals is not the same as one in football.

Upon buying his stake at Manchester United, Ratcliffe spoke of the need to “walk to the right solution, rather run to the wrong one”. Wise words indeed, but two of the biggest decisions he has made — retaining Ten Hag’s services at the end of last season and hiring Ashworth to oversee the football operation — have been protracted, expensive and then embarrassingly short-lived.

Ratcliffe has made frequently clear his disdain for the state of the club he has bought into, making withering assessments of the “outdated” structures, the recruitment record, the workforce (even the “high degree of untidiness” in the offices) and of course a team that has not come close to challenging for the Premier League or Champions League titles since Sir Alex Ferguson stood down as manager in 2013.

Few Manchester United supporters would disagree with that diagnosis. Most have applauded it after years of silent complacency under the Glazers and a chief executive, Ed Woodward, who used to speak proudly of a “cultural reset” which he alone seemed to have witnessed.

This summer saw a genuine attempt to reset, with the arrival of what was excitedly portrayed as a brains trust: Ratcliffe, Brailsford, Ashworth, Omar Berrada arriving from Manchester City to take over as chief executive, Jason Wilcox arriving from Southampton as technical director, with input also coming from ex-Juventus chief executive (and CEO of INEOS Sport) Jean-Claude Blanc and former Chelsea technical director Christopher Vivell.

On a positive note, Ratcliffe seems more determined to “fix” Manchester United than the Glazers have ever done. It is positive, too, that he is not afraid to face up to his mistakes. It is just as well because, at this rate, there will be plenty more of them.

One fan commented: ‘People can't wait to pile into successful Brits (I know that's a bit hyperbolic - but there does seem to be a real small mindset to lots of Brits and especially when like to United). We know massive change is needed. We don't know if Ratcliffe is the right person -but let's not jump on bandwagons and gave cherry picked statements.’