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The 10th Anniversary

Discussion in 'Manchester United' started by Christiansmith, May 11, 2015.

  1. Christiansmith

    Christiansmith Well-Known Member

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    It is now 10 years since the GGs took over the premiership's most successful club using the club's own assets. I thought at the time we were ****ed and were going to spend the next 10 years in the doldrums faced with the massive unlimited spending of City and the Chavs and repaying huge loan interest repayments.

    It turned better than expected but without the one man that maintained the success through relatively modest spending, it is still difficult times ahead.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/fo...ford-takeover-is-only-start-of-the-story.html
     
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  2. Bodinki

    Bodinki You're welcome
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    Anyone with a brain knew that United turned over enough money to pay back the debt AND stay competitive.
    And they did, there was a massive over reaction from certain fans.
    Even going so far as to stop supporting the club and start their own.......
     
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  3. Stan

    Stan Stalker

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    Such flippantly disrespectful remarks about the United fans who supported the green and gold campaign and those who set up FCUM demonstrate a paper thin understanding of the situation.

    There's no chance we would have stayed competitive if Fergie hadn't been the manager. Servicing the debt put severe restrictions on United's ability to compete in the transfer market up until recently when new sponsorship deals and TV money made United very cash rich again. The fact is the Glazer's used United's money to buy the club. Very clever as it's made them a fortune but it understandably pissed off a lot of fans. This was obviously magnified by smaller clubs being cash rolled by rich men so you had the farcical situation of a club like United that was generating huge amounts of money not being able to compete in the transfer market with small clubs that generated modest amounts of money.

    FFP is obviously changing this which is why "net spend" has gone from being a term dismissed as an excuse by a certain type of fan to it becoming the most important thing in their lives.
     
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  4. Bodinki

    Bodinki You're welcome
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    But you DID have Fergie as manager.
    The only reason United didn't stay as dominant during the last 10 years as the 10 years before that is because of Chelsea and City getting catapulted into the elite.
    Would you have spent more and won more without the Glazers? We will never know...but you havent done too bad.
    You have the 2nd highest trophy haul in British football in the last 10 years.
     
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  5. Stan

    Stan Stalker

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    What you said:
    What you meant was:
    Not all fans are visionaries like you.
     
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  6. Christiansmith

    Christiansmith Well-Known Member

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    It is all with the benefit of hindsight. The club had massive loans (£800m + at huge interest rates) and the annual repayments went into the hundred of millions. Basically the GGs acquired the club without risking their own but through borrowing from the banks and others. There was no money left to buy players.

    Every one including most of the fans couldn't have expected how it turned out. Ferguson managing on a shoestring, squeezing the last drop of football from Giggs and Scholes as luck would have it, buying RVP and gambling on his fitness and his hunger.
     
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    Last edited: May 11, 2015
  7. Chief

    Chief Northern Simpleton
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    The fact that we are currently undergoing a massive, much needed, rebuild is the effect the debt foisted on us by the Glazers had.

    Anyone who thinks otherwise has their heads right up in the clouds. They are spending big now to attempt to reverse the decline they put us in. It really is that simple.

    And obvious.
     
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  8. Swarbs

    Swarbs Well-Known Member
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    You're exaggerating quite a lot there imo - we weren't exactly throwing cash around under the plc. The old board actually publicly admitted in the the annual report that when we bought Rooney in 2004 that took up our entire transfer budget for the 04/05 and 05/06 season. So the plc wouldn't have sanctioned the purchases of VDS, Evra, Vidic or Park. I also doubt they would have sanctioned spending £60m plus on Hargreaves, Nani, Anderson, and Tevez in 07/08, not without selling a few players to fund them.

    Care to hazard a guess at how the last ten years of Utd history would have panned out without those players?
     
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  9. Chief

    Chief Northern Simpleton
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    We might have bought better.

    Not one of those players was anywhere near the number one in Europe/the world in their position at the time.
     
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  10. Swarbs

    Swarbs Well-Known Member
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    Not under the plc we wouldn't. Like I said - the plc stated that when we bought Rooney in 2004 that was our budget spent for the next two years.

    Shearer, Batistuta, Ronaldinho and more, all missed out on because the plc refused to spend the cash.

    I agree that we haven't been spending the big bucks under the Glazers until recently. But that was ultimately only a continuation of the sell to buy situation we'd been in the previous decade or so. For all the chat about the impact of the Abramovich takeover, Chelsea actually spent more than us on players over the first ten years of the PL as well.
     
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  11. Christiansmith

    Christiansmith Well-Known Member

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    Let's be honest and accept that very few if any clubs in this country have become successful as PLCs. Newcastle was a PLC and was taken over. So sooner or later United would have been taken into private ownership. It is the identity of the owners I (and many fans) have a problem with. City and Chelsea have been taken over by owners whose primary purpose is not to bleed the club dry and to increase their fortune on the back of it.

    The GGs did not acquire the club to make it more successful. I've said it many times in the last 2 years. When United went on the slide post SAF, I had absolutely no doubt that the GGS would splash the cash as if there was no tomorrow breaking the rules of the previous 8 years with fergie. Why? because they realised that unless they spent and kept United up there amongst the elite they would ultimately lose out in terms of value and sponsorships. This year instead of losing moneyt they have INCREASED their income through endorsements and sponsorships. It is no wonder they'll splash even more cash this summer. The GGs may know **** all about football they know a lot about money and returns from investment.
     
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  12. Chief

    Chief Northern Simpleton
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    Some players may well have turned us down, of the three mentioned two were likely to be we didn't break a salary cap and the other went 'home' to succeed ( less said about that the better, eh Alan?!!), but Fergie always got the money he needed to keep the squad fresh. We also always bought marquee signings - Pallister, Keane, van Nistelrooy, Veron etc., when required.

    That stopped when the Glazers came along. Instead of Fergie ruthlessly freshening up his squad he allowed it to age and essentially turn to ****. Instead of signing Stam or Pallister we signed Smalling. (and Vidic I admit but that was one gambol that worked) Instead of signing Keane we got Anderson.

    Sorry, this is not just some coincidence.
     
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  13. Swarbs

    Swarbs Well-Known Member
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    True, but then City and Chelsea have been taken over by owners whose primary purpose is to use the club as a sideshow for their own entertainment or to promote their national airline. We have owners whose primary purpose is to improve the value of the club, not to fiddle around with the manager and playing style for their own amusement. The Glazers may know **** all about football, but at least they accept this and leave the footballing side of the business down to the manager.

    I would argue that had begun a couple of years before the Glazers came along. The time to replace Keane was back when we sold Beckham, but SAF decided that instead of lumping that money on a world class player he'd rather try and turn Kleberson and Djemba Djemba into world beaters. Same with Anderson - the Glazers didn't tell SAF to spent £18 million on a fat 18 year old in the same summer that Sneijder and Mascherano moved clubs for less cash. He had that money to spend and the clout to bring in the best, but he chose to spend it on the wrong player.

    I agree that the Glazers were happy to continue to support SAF's efforts to bring cheaper players through, but then any rational owner would support a manager who did the same. And ultimately when he wanted to spend big on proven players like Carrick, Hargreaves, Berbatov and RVP then he got that money. But I don't think there would be any owner in the world who would have convinced SAF to spend big money on marquee players every season when he'd decided he'd rather take a punt on youngsters and less well known players.
     
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  14. Chief

    Chief Northern Simpleton
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    I still maintain it's no coincidence.

    Well, it isn't anyway as the transfer policy completely changed, as it would under new ownership.
    Instead of the more short term/refresh periodically view, and spend on finished products, that we had under the plc, he/they instead went onto a long term view of buying younger players for less money on lower wages, and most were a gambol as we didn't know if they would succeed.

    I'm 100% certain though that he didn't just decide to do this himself overnight. He was told to.


    It's worked up to a point, we are back on track financially and the Glazers are astronomically rich (yay!!) but we're five years behind where we should be in our squad.
     
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  15. Swarbs

    Swarbs Well-Known Member
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    I guess we'll never know.

    Although I don't think it's as simple as you point out. After all, Phil Neville, Nicky Butt, Wes Brown were all preferred to finished products under the plc, and we spent plenty of money on gambles like Djemba, Kleberson, Cruyff, Poborsky etc. Similarly, we bought finished products like Hargreaves, Carrick, Berbatov, RVP and Young under the Glazers.

    Also I doubt SAF would have accepted the Glazers telling him anything - I'm sure they had an influence, but if they'd tried to restrict him too much, to the point at which we weren't competitive any more, he'd have told them to **** right off and just retired.

    And as for where we are with the squad, I don't think it's markedly worse right now than in 2004 when we has similar baggage like Howard, Silvestre, Bellion, Saha, Kleberson, Djemba, Forlan, Fortune etc. All risky punts and all purchased by SAF under the plc in place of good quality established players.

    I'm not saying the Glazers are markedly better owners than the plc, but I also don't think they are markedly worse in terms of their transfer dealings. Their aggressive approach to market based ticket pricing is the only thing they have done worthy of fan hatred, and for that they deserve all the hatred they have had imo.
     
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  16. Chief

    Chief Northern Simpleton
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    Now, that's the bit I disagree with.

    Call me sentimental if you like but I think Ferguson skilfully and deliberately managed the takeover as best he could to protect Manchester United.

    If he'd have told them to stick it and ****ed off we would be ****ed right now. Bottom half.
     
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  17. Christiansmith

    Christiansmith Well-Known Member

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    United maintained their relative success DESPITE the GGs rather than because of them. Once the big man had retired, it was time to take on the money clubs on their own terms: i.e buying/spending big.
     
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    Last edited: May 11, 2015
  18. UnitedinRed

    UnitedinRed Well-Known Member

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    Bottom half <laugh>
     
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  19. UnitedinRed

    UnitedinRed Well-Known Member

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    They clearly hampered us early on. They seem willing to part with cash without question now though. Theyve spent more than everyone but Chelsea in the past two years so whatever has happened, they realise they cant do it on a budget.

    They are not the worst owners around nor the best. Tge major plus is they let the club get on with it.
     
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  20. Chief

    Chief Northern Simpleton
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    Yeah. You know the sum of **** all about the club son. Making random things up doesn't mean they are true.

    If Ferguson would have left when the Glazers took over lumping £850 million of debt on us we'd still be ****ed right now. The reason we stayed afloat was because he managed the club and take over correctly.
     
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