Calacus Monthly Hit & Miss – Sir Jim Ratcliffe & Manchester Utd

Every month we look at the best and worst communicators in the sports world from the last few weeks.

SIR JIM RATCLIFFE & MANCHESTER UNITED

There was a time when Manchester United set the standards by which other clubs were compared.

The era of Sir Alex Ferguson saw the club win 38 titles including 13 Premier Leagues, five FA Cups and two Champions Leagues. Off the field, the club capitalised on the Red Devils’ global profile to accumulate a raft of commercial partnerships which ensured the club remained competitive.

But when Sir Alex retired in 2013, the club encountered an inevitable decline, failing to win the Premier League or the Champions League again and, at last count, giving eight different coaches control of the first team.

United’s demise has coincided with the club’s sale to the Glazer family in 2005, the American family enjoying a honeymoon period purely down to Sir Alex’s brilliance.

Patriarch Malcom Glazer, an American billionaire and owner of the NFL’s Tampa Bay Buccaneers, acquired an initial 2.9% stake in the club in 2003 which he later increased to 15%, before increasing his stake in the club to 75% and ending its status as a publicly listed company, before taking full control in June of 2005.

Takeovers in football undeniably garner huge attention from fans whose primary concerns relate to the wellbeing and competitiveness of their clubs. Glazer was quick to isolate himself from United’s fanbase when it became clear that the deal was primarily funded through loans secured against United’s assets – landing the club in the red by hundreds of millions.

Understandably the Glazers’ tumultuous relationship with United’s fanbase has endured, even since Malcom Glazer’s death in 2014, when his six children took control of the club.

A series of public relations issues ensued, further fracturing the relationship between the Glazer family and United’s fanbase. In 2015, it transpired that the Glazer children were receiving shareholder dividends that would pay them £15million a year. Fans suggested this was an unjustifiably large sum considering their lack of day-to-day engagement with the club.

Sean Bones, Manchester United Supporter Trust’s (MUST) vice-chairman, told Sky Sports: “We feel it would have been more justified to take a chunk of the debt rather than to extract money from the club.

“They have turned United into a cash cow and they are starting to milk it. It is obviously now a mechanism for the profits of United to leave the club and make its way to Florida.”

Perhaps most drastically in 2021 the Glazer family, among other top-flight European clubs, agreed to join the European Super League with six English clubs, before all of them withdrew their support for the breakaway organisation.

Joel Glazer, co-chairman of the club, latterly apologised in an open letter to United fans, writing “You made very clear your opposition to the European Super League, and we have listened. We got it wrong, and we want to show that we can put things right.”

Despite fewer trophies over the past decade, United have secured record breaking sponsorship deals around the globe, with the club propelling its commercial revenue from £44m in 2005 to over £300m in 2023.

According to Deloitte’s Football Money League, they remain among the most commercially viable clubs around, an achievement that largely goes under the radar.

The MUST have described the Glazer’s running of the organisation as “slow and opaque,” and after a prolonged period of negotiation billionaire Sir Jim Ratcliffe acquired a 27.7% minority stake in the club in February this year for £1.25bn through his company Trawlers Limited, an amusing nod to United’s beloved Eric Cantona.

With his business success through the INEOS company, Sir Jim has already shown his passion for sport, backing the former Team Sky cycling team and backing the British America’s Cup bid as well as Ligue 1 club Nice and one-third of the Mercedes Formula 1 team.

At the time of the purchase, Sir Jim stated: “Whilst the commercial success of the Club has ensured there have always been available funds to win trophies at the highest level, this potential has not been fully unlocked in recent times.

“We will bring the global knowledge, expertise and talent from the wider INEOS Sport group to help drive further improvement at the Club, while also providing funds intended to enable future investment into Old Trafford.

“We are here for the long term and recognise that a lot of challenges and hard work lie ahead, which we will approach with rigour, professionalism and passion.”

During a BBC interview with Dan Roan, he further set out his aspirations for the club: “We have to walk to the right solution not run to the wrong one. Short term issue is we want to get into the Champions League for FFP. Real challenge is it’s a two-to-three season challenge to get the organisation and environment right to get the performances on the field right and winning football matches.

“It will be intense from time to time but equally it needs to be friendly, supportive, you need to create a combination of the organisation, right people, right environment, and then my belief is the results follow.”

Regardless of his minority stake, Sir Jim’s influence is clearly extensive, and it’s hardly a surprise that he wants to change so many aspects of the club to make it competitive for the top prizes again.

A quick win was to announce among his initial reforms that he would instigate a three-year freeze on dividend payments, bucking the controversial trend set by the Glazers.

A central part of this journey, says Sir Jim, is investing in the right people to ensure success can flourish, leading to changes in the club’s leadership team including the inclusion of Dave Brailsford, the director of sport at INEOS.

Brailsford is a veteran in the world of competitive sports, having supercharged British Cycling to unprecedented heights during his role as director of performance. Team GB cyclists won eight Olympic golds at the London 2012 games under his guardianship, with his scrupulous attention to detail yielding his ‘marginal gains’ philosophy tremendous success.

Brailsford went on to achieve similar accolades in the world of road cycling with Team Sky, rebranded INEOS Grenadiers in 2019, winning the Tour de France in the team’s third year under their new name.

There can be no doubt that Brailsford’s appointment is emblematic of Sir Jim’s impressive ambition for United and demonstrates the Glazers’ willingness to cede operational control of the club, a move most welcomed by the fans.

Former Manchester City Commercial Director and Chief Football Operations Officer Omar Berrada was appointed as the new Chief Executive of the club in January as a precursor to Sir Jim’s official arrival the following month, a post he will most likely assume this summer after his gardening leave.

Berrada has an extensive background in football, particularly when it comes to player contracts and transfers, which will be crucial for United in the coming months and years.

Having bolstered City’s revenue to £712m in 22/23, overtaking United, Berrada is keen to stress that successful commerciality is underpinned by success on the pitch.

Berrada will seek to reinvigorate United’s commercial footprint in tandem with improved playing performances and stated: “The commercial growth of the clubs is predicted or underpinned by success on the pitch. If you have a really good business strategy alongside it, then it just turbocharges the growth off the pitch.”

Some cynics have argued that Berrada’s exit from City shows he’s not indispensable, but his track record is certainly impressive.

Under his predecessor, Ed Woodward, United accumulated a net spend of more than £1.13bn since Ferguson’s retirement in 2013, the highest in the League, with fans having had little to cheer about.

The proposed appointment of Dan Ashworth and United’s poaching of Technical Director Jason Wilcox from Southampton, further underlines Sir Jim’s intention to transform the club.

The pursuit of Ashworth has been controversial, especially after details of his covert email negotiations with Berrada were discovered, highlighting the fact that Ashworth was being tapped up, breaching Premier League guidelines and confidentiality agreements.

Equally, an audit of United staff and the club’s facilities has led to some clumsy communications that further underline the need for expert PR support.

In late April, Sir Jim made the decision to cut staff perks as part of his money-saving measures ahead of the men’s FA Cup final. A company-wide email outlined that while staff would be given a free ticket to the final, employees would have to pay for their own travel to and from the stadium.

Other perks such as the pre-match party, hotel accommodation and the ability for employees to bring friends and family to the match were also scrapped.

This email, as revealed by The Times, said: “In recognition of your ongoing support this season, we will organise a colleague trip to Wembley for the final on 25 May.

“This year, the trip will be a little different. We will still provide you with a complimentary ticket to the game. However, we’ll ask you to contribute towards coach travel, and lunch will not be provided.

“While we appreciate this is a change from previous trips, you will be aware of the need for us to spend the club’s money effectively, with a focus on performance and outcomes.”

The i Columnist Kevin Garside wrote: “Almost six months since his Christmas Eve declaration of purchase, Ratcliffe’s motive is revealed for what it always was, a business opportunity aimed at deriving value from a fading asset even more than the hated Glazer regime he diluted.” It’s hard to disagree.

This was just one of many announcements Ratcliffe made to staff, detailing his cost-cutting programme and general displeasure at the way the club was being run

In early May, after a tour of the Trafford Training Centre, Sir Jim sent another email to staff condemning the state of the training ground: “I had a good tour around some of the facilities. I am afraid I was struck in many places by a high degree of untidiness. In particular the IT department which frankly was a disgrace and the dressing rooms of the U18 and U21 were not much better. These standards would not come close to what we would expect at INEOS and we are a chemical company.”

Sir Jim also cited email traffic statistics to Manchester United staff as the basis for a ban on working from home and told them to seek ­“alternative employment” if they are not willing to come to club premises.

Sir Jim made his edict despite United’s lack of sufficient office space and some consultants on contracts whose terms do not require them to be in the club’s Manchester or London business complexes.

He later offered early administrative employees an annual bonus if they resigned by June 5 in a further attempt to trim the workforce.

According to the Sun, these communiques have turned the atmosphere at the Carrington training centre ‘toxic,’ although it is understandable that Sir Jim wants to get the basics right and fix United’s organisational challenges.

Shortly after these disciplinary measures, Sir Jim attended United’s Premier League clash against Arsenal instead of the women’s FA Cup final at Wembley, when United’s women’s team won 4-0 against Tottenham to earn their first major trophy.

Many disgruntled fans took to social media voicing their concerns over this alleged favouritism, presenting Ratcliffe with a further communications set-back, this time with the fans, despite INEOS representation at Wembley.  

On X, @TheUnitedWayyyy posted: “Zero excuses for INEOS, Ratcliffe & his representatives not attending the Women’s FA cup final at Wembley.

“The game against Arsenal is not going to decide anything for us. The men’s team’s fate has been decided & is done for. Think it reeks of biased priorities. Not a good sign.”

Sir Jim was keen to right this wrong, sending a message of congratulations to the women’s team later that day calling it a “wonderful achievement” and a “historic moment” for the club.

For many, this was compared to the Glazers’ reign of operational disinterest, but Marc Skinner, Manchester United’s women’s head coach, was quick to jump to Sir Jim’s defence, insisting that words of encouragement were repeatedly passed on to the players before the final.

But when it was later revealed that the women’s end-of-season awards dinner was to be cancelled, it gave further credibility to concerns that the women’s team is not an INEOS priority.

Once again, Skinner defended his paymaster, saying in a news conference: “I sit in a position of celebration rather than worrying about what has and hasn’t happened. I understand the decision, I respect it and our girls will be presented at the appropriate time with the successes that a club will celebrate.”

Sir Jim may argue that he had to be at Old Trafford for the Arsenal game, given that Labour leader and Arsenal fan, Sir Keir Starmer, and Lord Sebastian Coe, chair of the Old Trafford Regeneration Task Force, were also in attendance.

The regeneration of Old Trafford is a pressing issue with its leaky roof again attracting attention towards the end of United’s 1-0 defeat to the Gunners, that saw 41mm of water cascade through the roof, later dubbed the ‘Old Trafford waterfall.’

Sir Jim has made his plans for Old Trafford clear from the start, with a vision to create the ‘Wembley of the North’ and provide a stadium that the club can be proud of.

Along with the £237m he has pledged to boosting the club’s infrastructure, Sir Jim’s close ties with the Labour leader suggests government levelling up funds may account for the difference. Although this remains an obscure longshot, it may explain why Sir Jim attended Old Trafford in favour of Wembley that day. Whether or not this decision was borne out of political necessity, it seems a poor lapse of judgement.

Using public funds to modernise a dilapidated club stadium which former Sports Minister Tracey Crouch pointed out was purely down to the lack of investment by the Glazers, from Sir Jim who has officially moved to Monaco to avoid paying UK tax, was brazen and lacking self-awareness.

Given that United finished eighth in the Premier League in the 2023-24 season, their worst finish since 1990, and with a goal difference of minus one, the future of manager Erik ten Hag has also been under scrutiny.

Ahead of the FA Cup final, there were reports that the Dutchman was almost certain to be fired, regardless of the result.

The shock 2-1 win over Manchester City prompted a delay in that potential development, with fan groups writing an open letter to INEOS urging them to have patience with ten Hag’s project.

Either way, the timing of the story, replicating what happened to Louis van Gaal when he was sacked straight after winning the FA Cup in 2016, was embarrassing and avoidable.

But it is not just on the field that United have struggled, since Sir Jim finalised his investment.

United’s FA Cup win this season has left them with another problem. Nice, the team that INEOS owns who play in France, are also set to play in the Europa League next season, with UEFA rules prohibiting two clubs from competing who have the same ownership.

Sir Jim has certainly made an impact during his early leadership, with executive appointments, cost-cutting measures and his overall strategy for Manchester United’s governance.

A club of United’s size will always receive significant media attention, so every mis-step has been pored over with results as indifferent to some of Sir Jim’s early initiatives.

These drastic measures demonstrate an unwavering commitment to getting Manchester United back on track in the long-term, and any attempt to instil a degree of vigour should be welcomed with open arms.

But it’s also a reminder that senior leaders, however successful they have been in their professional lives, would do well to work closely with their communications teams. Unlike his stated ambition, communication has not been consistently friendly and supportive.

So often we see that the best intentions, clumsily delivered, can do more harm than good that undermines credibility, trust and the support of those key audiences that leaders seek to engage.