Glazers refinance the debt - again

Originally Posted by Cream

Yes they have played a blinder for themselves.

Could also have gone terribly wrong and they would have just walked away, leaving us £#%&!ed.

Hard to see how we could avoid the huge sponsorship deals and TV money given the status of the club and how things have gone.

It was a risk free (for them) investment (or lack of) that has paid off and to paint them as oracles of the market (there is no such thing) seems a bit silly. But do go ahead.

I don't paint them as oracles of anything, because what they've done is exactly what I thought they obviously would do - as you say, it was, well, obvious.

which makes it even more baffling - either clueless or a spiteful deceit, as you prefer - that so many so-called experts reckoned they would basically ruin the club financially and destroy the club's status.

in fact the only part I don't agree with your appraisal is that it could have gone horribly wrong and they'd have just walked away. I don't believe there was a danger of the former (even if technically people can still argue that there was ) and I do think that in the latter scenario they would have been finished - market confidence is key in their game, of course.

I've always seen them as merely a front for the finance industry anyway, hence why i thought United would be just fine in the long run. although whether they'll still be fine if this throwing money at everything that moves continues to produce shit on a stick football should be a concern to everyone imo.

incidentally, just because it was, in your view (and mine), obvious that there was huge potential in marketing and media, it's still the case that just a few short years ago the critics were protesting publicly to anyone who'd listen that United wasn't even worth a billion and calling the owners out for not selling. again, were the critics lying to the support, or were they just wrong?

Originally Posted by jem

yes. underinvestment. money leaking out. they make out like bandits. we fail to compete in the transfer market. the football is shit. we look like arses in two cl finals, but a couple of titles paper over that we're not cleaning up in the shittest league (after all, how can we match chelsea and city?). dumbass.

exactly.

Originally Posted by Sparky***

Absolute mental amount of money gone out of the club in the last 10 years on servicing that.

The glazers were lucky fergie coincidently decided there was no value in the transfer market at the time, and considered Valencia, obertan and owen as fine replacements for Ronaldo.

I suppose it's an unpopular view, but Ferguson was right when he said the time to protest with any hope of success was when the club first went public. Post floatation, an LBO was always a possiblility and certainly not illegal, so anyone not wishing to see the club in the hands of the Glazers or their ilk should have been screaming before, not after, the takeover. I also think our support was wildly misled by their success in thwarting Murdoch. That was achieved not by the power of popular protest, but by the illegality of the takeover itself. Ultimately it was merely a postponement of the inevitable.

No fan of the gimps at all with the ronaldo money being banked along with trying to do things on the cheap (Owen,Valencia etc.)untill they realised it cost them sponsors buying average players hence we are now throwing money at the problem.

But I'd take them over Mike Ashley any day

the revisionism on here when it comes to the Glaziers is pretty remarkable,

Originally Posted by believe

the revisionism on here when it comes to the Glaziers is pretty unremarkable,

Originally Posted by believe

the revisionism on here when it comes to the Glaziers is pretty remarkable,

you're not wrong

Originally Posted by believe

the revisionism on here when it comes to the Glaziers is pretty remarkable,

Pot calling kettle .

Originally Posted by Sparky***

The lesson i've learned is that if you grossly neglect to seriously invest the first team for 5 years and then employ david moyes as your manager, you'll finish 7th.

Originally Posted by jem

yes. underinvestment. money leaking out. they make out like bandits. we fail to compete in the transfer market. the football is shit. we look like arses in two cl finals, but a couple of titles paper over that we're not cleaning up in the shittest league (after all, how can we match chelsea and city?). dumbass.

Exactly ffs. People still trying to claim that they have inspired positive change at the club

Ferguson is the only reason their little gamble - and it was a gamble, throb - paid off. Everyone agrees that post Ronaldo the squad was less than inspired due to complete lack of proficient and proper investment, yet the genius of Ferguson papered that over.


Just because we didn't end up in yet more debt doesn't mean they have been a good thing. How odd that anyone could think that. Unless maybe you work in the marketing division.

Originally Posted by Sparky***

The lesson i've learned is that if you grossly neglect to seriously invest the first team for 5 years and then employ david moyes as your manager, you'll finish 7th.

I just don't quite buy the idea that the most successful manager in British history stood by and watched his team suffer because of lack of investment. The deterioration in the squad was down to fergie rather than the glazers.

I still maintain that we would be a lot better off without the glazers but there's no denying the sheer scale of bullshit that was spouted by imusa and the now fc hierarchy pre takeover - some of that evangelical shit at the Methodist hall - none of which has really come to pass. I didn't buy into most of it albeit I was firmly anti glazers and under what appears to be the unique impression that fc was created as a response to the glazers only now to be informed that it was nothing of the sort.

Basically throb's general point is right imv. Stories of my death are greatly exaggerated etc.

Originally Posted by My Name is Keith

I just don't quite buy the idea that the most successful manager in British history stood by and watched his team suffer because of lack of investment. The deterioration in the squad was down to fergie rather than the glazers.

I still maintain that we would be a lot better off without the glazers but there's no denying the sheer scale of bullshit that was spouted by imusa and the now fc hierarchy pre takeover - some of that evangelical shit at the Methodist hall - none of which has really come to pass. I didn't buy into most of it albeit I was firmly anti glazers and under what appears to be the unique impression that fc was created as a response to the glazers only now to be informed that it was nothing of the sort.

Basically throb's general point is right imv. Stories of my death are greatly exaggerated etc.

Really? That's what I thought as well

Originally Posted by Jammy Dodger

The glazers were lucky fergie coincidently decided there was no value in the transfer market at the time, and considered Valencia, obertan and owen as fine replacements for Ronaldo.

i doubt that's quite how he saw it, and still believe he was probably keeping his powder dry because he couldn't get the player(s) he wanted. and Valencia has proved a very good signing, emphasised by the fact he is almost a 1st pick even for LVG, a far more technical manager, half a decade later.

people forget that ferguson's transfer dealings were always pretty consistent. even the signing of ronaldo was for 50% less than the player he was replacing, for example. the notion that signing obertan, owen and whoever else it was was due to constraints is fanciful if you consider his previous record, like signing silvestre off the back of the treble, or signing klebersen, djemba and smith, or bringing those 5 players in in 96 when really he was after alan £#%&!ing shearer...

the lack of investment spiel is the exact same argument - failing completely to account for, or understand even, the way ferguson built his squads - that made andersred look such a clueless @#%&! for so long

Originally Posted by jaffo

Really? That's what I thought as well

4 legs good, 2 legs better

Originally Posted by jem

yes. underinvestment. money leaking out. they make out like bandits. we fail to compete in the transfer market. the football is shit. we look like arses in two cl finals, but a couple of titles paper over that we're not cleaning up in the shittest league (after all, how can we match chelsea and city?). dumbass.

tbf it's only glory-hunters who might need to paper over the fact united reached 3 CL finals in 4 years. united aren't the 1st side to keep falling just short of winning it and they won't be the last. those 2 runs to the barcelona finals were almost flawlessly executed (porto at home aside), as befitted united's then status as the best team in europe until dethroned in rome and probably still the 2nd best until beaten at wembley.

again it goes to transfer policy rather than restraints anyway; signing berbatov should have given us a brain but actually just confused things and instead by the end of the season ferguson was losing ronaldo, had pissed off berbatov and was having to rely on a disaffected tevez.

ferguson eventually freed giggs to become the team's brain in a brief late-career hurrah, but maybe he had that option even going back to rome, he just hadn't really seen it yet, or maybe he didn't want to. the scattergun transfer habit grew partly from the reaffirming that reputation and price tag did not necessarily equate to being a success at united - where the team is far far more important than the individuals, even though there needs to be great individuals within any successful united team. we've seen this yet again this season, of course.

i have no truck at all with anyone who wants to argue that we should be competing on the transfer stage with the oil money. the fact we threw £60m at Di Maria last summer is a crying shame for traditionalists, and talk now of throwing confetti money at the likes of Bale and Pogba is deeply concerning. the jump to £37m for mata was ok, but to then jump from there to £60m? wow, wtf? still, just cus I want united to find success on a relative shoestring and somehow reverse the current trend in football doesn't mean it'll ever happen. especially now the club has given up and thinks it's all about money - ironically perhaps now sharing the same obsession as some of its biggest critics over the last 10 years

Wow. Revisionism at its best.

Not an FC fan but they set their club up not just as a reaction to the Glazers but the whole monetisation of football and the fact normal working class supporters had been priced out and marginalised by the Premier League clubs.

As for the £#%&!ing Glazers - they played a super high risk red or black gamble with the club. And it paid off for them . Fergie toed the line as did a previously reluctant Gill and all the players, including Neville and Ole who made some encouraging noises at the start but soon agreed to shut it.

Originally Posted by My Name is Keith

I just don't quite buy the idea that the most successful manager in British history stood by and watched his team suffer because of lack of investment.

Why? He'd totally painted himself into a corner by virtue of his conduct over Rock Of Gibraltar. Magnier & McM@&%! were putting big time pressure on him, what with the Kroll dossier etc.

He clearly didn't want to walk away from management (one would think adding at least a couple more CLs to his CV was high on his agenda), and then the Glazers come along, pay off M&M, and essentially leave him alone to run the team, albeit within the new financial constraints imposed by the crippling amount of debt.

If you consider it just through the prism of Ferguson's own selfish goals, it's not difficult to see both why the Glazers' arrival was a dream come true for him (or at least the end of a nightmare of his own creation) and why he was willing to peddle their propaganda about no value in the market etc. over his remaining years in charge.

Originally Posted by lztom

Why? He'd totally painted himself into a corner by virtue of his conduct over Rock Of Gibraltar. Magnier & McM@&%! were putting big time pressure on him, what with the Kroll dossier etc.

He clearly didn't want to walk away from management (one would think adding at least a couple more CLs to his CV was high on his agenda), and then the Glazers come along, pay off M&M, and essentially leave him alone to run the team, albeit within the new financial constraints imposed by the crippling amount of debt.

If you consider it just through the prism of Ferguson's own selfish goals, it's not difficult to see both why the Glazers' arrival was a dream come true for him (or at least the end of a nightmare of his own creation) and why he was willing to peddle their propaganda about no value in the market etc. over his remaining years in charge.

always makes me chuckle that even critics of ferguson such as yourself cannot or will not see his comments on 'value' as anything other than peddling glazer propaganda.

would have thought they'd see at least a hint of ferguson trying to protect and defend his own reputation over his transfer market dealings.

whatevs anyhoo, glad I've always been able to see the good and the bad in all concerned - the only truly objective and rational position to be in

Originally Posted by Semantic Lisp

talk now of throwing confetti money at the likes of Bale and Pogba is deeply concerning.

Deeply concerning, indeed. I'm losing sleep with worry, tbf.

The glorious days of signing high-quality value like Obertan, Bebe and Michael Owen could well and truly be over.

Originally Posted by Semantic Lisp

i doubt that's quite how he saw it, and still believe he was probably keeping his powder dry because he couldn't get the player(s) he wanted. and Valencia has proved a very good signing, emphasised by the fact he is almost a 1st pick even for LVG, a far more technical manager, half a decade later.

people forget that ferguson's transfer dealings were always pretty consistent. even the signing of ronaldo was for 50% less than the player he was replacing, for example. the notion that signing obertan, owen and whoever else it was was due to constraints is fanciful if you consider his previous record, like signing silvestre off the back of the treble, or signing klebersen, djemba and smith, or bringing those 5 players in in 96 when really he was after alan £#%&!ing shearer...

the lack of investment spiel is the exact same argument - failing completely to account for, or understand even, the way ferguson built his squads - that made andersred look such a clueless @#%&! for so long



4 legs good, 2 legs better



tbf it's only glory-hunters who might need to paper over the fact united reached 3 CL finals in 4 years. united aren't the 1st side to keep falling just short of winning it and they won't be the last. those 2 runs to the barcelona finals were almost flawlessly executed (porto at home aside), as befitted united's then status as the best team in europe until dethroned in rome and probably still the 2nd best until beaten at wembley.

again it goes to transfer policy rather than restraints anyway; signing berbatov should have given us a brain but actually just confused things and instead by the end of the season ferguson was losing ronaldo, had pissed off berbatov and was having to rely on a disaffected tevez.

ferguson eventually freed giggs to become the team's brain in a brief late-career hurrah, but maybe he had that option even going back to rome, he just hadn't really seen it yet, or maybe he didn't want to. the scattergun transfer habit grew partly from the reaffirming that reputation and price tag did not necessarily equate to being a success at united - where the team is far far more important than the individuals, even though there needs to be great individuals within any successful united team. we've seen this yet again this season, of course.

i have no truck at all with anyone who wants to argue that we should be competing on the transfer stage with the oil money. the fact we threw £60m at Di Maria last summer is a crying shame for traditionalists, and talk now of throwing confetti money at the likes of Bale and Pogba is deeply concerning. the jump to £37m for mata was ok, but to then jump from there to £60m? wow, wtf? still, just cus I want united to find success on a relative shoestring and somehow reverse the current trend in football doesn't mean it'll ever happen. especially now the club has given up and thinks it's all about money - ironically perhaps now sharing the same obsession as some of its biggest critics over the last 10 years

£#%&! off throb.

Originally Posted by Neo

Deeply concerning, indeed. I'm losing sleep with worry, tbf.

tbf I may have overstated it, but still struggling to really care if everyone or anyone agrees tbh

although obviously United are still looking at making the odd strange-looking signing, and looking at stop-gaps too, as well as throwing £60m at the likes of Di Maria

Originally Posted by Semantic Lisp

tbf I may have overstated it, but still struggling to really care if everyone or anyone agrees tbh

although obviously United are still looking at making the odd strange-looking signing, and looking at stop-gaps too, as well as throwing £60m at the likes of Di Maria

Di Maria does look pretty strange.