Sir Jim Ratcliffe and his INEOS colleagues are just a few weeks away from being fully ratified as part owners of Man United with full responsibility for football operations.
There’s a big task ahead for everyone involved with the club as they seek to become best-in-class once again, both on and off the pitch.
Clearly, there are no overnight solutions available for this storied institution to take advantage of, but some serious and diligent planning now could save a lot of time later on.
One area that appears to have been overlooked to date is the power that Old Trafford has for the club.
The ‘Theatre of Dreams,’ though decaying, is still one of the grandest football stadiums in the country but it seems that United aren’t taking full advantage of all that it has to offer.
In the Deloitte Football Money League 2024, United find themselves in fifth place behind Real Madrid, Man City, Paris Saint-Germain and Barcelona.
A healthy €745.8m in revenue could easily be added to if the club came up with something a little different for the area surrounding the ground, set as it is well away from the city centre and any shopping destinations.
“What is so impressive (about United) is that resilience, that ability to continue to generate significant commercial return in the market, to find new (commercial) partners. They have this way to engage with commercial partners in a way that few other clubs can,” Tim Bridge, the Lead Partner in Deloitte’s Sports Business Group, said to the PA News Agency (h/t Manchester Evening News).
“But you could also flip it around and also talk about what is the scale of the opportunity if they got it right. There have been a lot of reports around the current conditions at Old Trafford, there has been a lot of comparison to other football stadiums and the overall offering.
“I genuinely believe that if they had a genuine matchday offering that kept the fans in and around the stadium in the way that you have at somewhere like Tottenham, the results from a revenue perspective could be revolutionary and really outplay the rest of the competition.
“Because they still generate £100million-plus from Old Trafford and yet in experience terms, compared to what is also available on the market, or what may be available on the market from a Real Madrid or a Barcelona in the future, then the two are probably not comparable. So the strength of their brand, the strength of their fanbase, the loyalty is absolutely incredible and is extremely resilient and impressive.”