June 15 – Manchester United co-chairman Joel Glazer has admitted that the owners’ silence “gave the impression we don’t care”, but was told by fans that the club has become “a laughing stock”.
Earlier this month, Glazer met United supporters for the first time at a fans’ forum, the minutes of that meeting have now been released. The forum was arranged after the club’s involvement in the European Super League project which prompted outrage in all corners of the industry and sparked a new protests against the Glazer family.
The American family, not helped by its aloofness, has often been accused of using United as being purely a cash cow for the family ownership. In the post-Ferguson era, the club has seen its on-field performance decline (in terms of titles won) with a last trophy coming under Jose Mourinho in 2017 when Manchester won the Europa League. At the fans’ forum Glazer acknowledged that his family, owners since 2005, should have been more proactive in their communication.
“We always took the approach that we should stay in the background [and] let the manager, the players, the people at Old Trafford, be the ones out in front, communicating and talking,” said Glazer. “In retrospect, that was not the right approach and there’s a middle ground.”
“Our silence wrongly created the impression that we don’t care, that we aren’t football fans, that we only care about our commercial interests and money. I can assure you nothing could be further from the truth.”
However, it was not enough to allay anger among the United fans. Secretary of the Manchester United Disabled Supporters’ Association Chas Banks, a fan since 1957, said: “We used to be the club that others measured themselves by – on the field and off the field. And the problem is now, people are laughing at us, Joel. We’ve become a laughing stock. There are memes on the internet all the time. And there’s nothing worse. People say bad things about you, but there’s nothing worse than being laughed at.”
He went on to say that the Glazers didn’t invest enough in the club, both in terms of playing personnel and infrastructure.
Glazer however set out plans to create a new fan advisory board. Discussions with the Manchester United Supporters’ Trust over a proposed fan share ownership scheme will be accelerated. Liverpool, Tottenham and Chelsea are clubs who have introduced similar measures following the European Super League debacle.
“With these two initiatives, which would just be the beginning, we feel we can reset the relationship with our supporters, strengthen the club as a whole and do bigger and better things,” explained Glazer.
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