01 Sep 2026 09:25:05
Today, last day of the window, we should remember all the staff who have suffered under Ratcliffe and the Glazers. The parasites enabled Ratcliffe so he introduced cost cutting, people lost their jobs so the club could make more money, so we could make profit. We thought it was so we could afford top players. Just a pack of lies.
Today I ask what was it for?
Unless there are several transfer shocks today were all these cost cuts to enable the club to compete? Or actually just to make more profit for dividends or even make us more attractive for a full sale next year? You should be able to see it. It doesn't look like they care at all about competing for the title or CL. It could change today, they could do something and get in a LB and a striker of real quality. The midfield bar Baleba looks a fudge but at least they did something, almost like just enough.
Here is what they did, sold to us as getting the club in order to compete, to be able to buy top players.
First wave (summer 2024): Around 250 jobs cut across departments. This was expected to deliver annualised savings of roughly £40–45m
• Second wave (announced February 2025): Further 150–200 redundancies as part of a "transformation plan." Combined with the first round, total cuts reached up to ~400–450 roles. Headcount fell substantially (from averages around 1, 100–1, 140 non-playing staff toward ~700). 
• Overall restructuring and redundancy-related exceptional costs have been reported in the tens of millions (figures cited in the £22–36m+ range across periods, including associated exits). These have reduced the wage bill notably (e.g., employee benefits and overall wages down significantly in subsequent accounts). 
Commercial and scouting teams were among areas affected; the club also reduced its London office presence and considered streamlining overseas operations.
Other Notable Cost Cuts and Changes
• High-profile ambassadorial and related roles: Sir Alex Ferguson's paid ambassador role (reported ~£2m per year) ended. Other ambassador salary reductions (e.g., involving figures like Bryan Robson, Andy Cole, Denis Irwin) were reported. 
• Staff benefits and perks: Free/staff lunches and canteen provisions ended or heavily restricted at Old Trafford (and changes planned/made at Carrington for non-players), with estimated savings around £1m annually in some reports. Christmas parties cancelled; FA Cup final travel support for staff withdrawn or reduced. Company credit cards and some bonuses tightened or eliminated. 
• Charitable and foundation contributions: Reduced funding to the Manchester United Foundation (reported ~£1m impact in some coverage); smaller payments (e.g., to certain supporter groups) adjusted or ceased in places.
• Ticket pricing: Introduction of a flat £66 match ticket rate (with removal or reduction of some senior/child concessions in the process).
• Broader operational tightening: Return-to-office mandate (ending flexible remote work); tighter spending approvals and expense controls; commercial department headcount reductions; and general "right-sizing" of non-football operations.
01 Sep 2026 10:38:40
For those interested, our Net Spend has been £88.34M.
Signed
Carlos Baleba - £65m + £5m
Andrey Santos - £48m + £2m
Youri Tielemans - £35m
Tynan Thompson - £4m + £4m
Cristian Orozco - £0.74m
Kit Margetson - Compensation
Karl Darlow - Free
Total spent: £163.74m + undisclosed fees.
Sold / Loaned / Released
Rasmus Hojlund - £38m
Radek Vitek - £6m + £8m
Toby Collyer - £3m + £4.6m
Andre Onana - Loan (£1.3m fee)
Altay Bayindir - Loan (£3.5m buy option)
Mason Greenwood - £11m (sell-on fee)
Total received: £75.4m* + undisclosed fees.
Net Spend: £88.34m* + undisclosed fees.
01 Sep 2026 10:40:34
I think you're letting emotion drive the conclusion here.
There are definitely decisions that deserve criticism. The ticket pricing changes, reductions in staff benefits, and some of the optics around the cuts have been poor, and have understandably upset supporters and staff.
That said, you're attributing motives and making claims that simply haven't been made. At no point did Ratcliffe say redundancies or cost-cutting measures were being implemented specifically to "buy top players". His argument has consistently been that United's cost base was too high, the club's finances needed fixing, and that the business needed to become sustainable.
Personally, I don't agree with every decision, but I also don't think it's unreasonable to cut costs in a business that has been posting significant losses. I work for a highly profitable financial services company, and we don't receive half the perks that some United staff had. Free meals, extensive travel perks, flexible arrangements, and other benefits are nice to have, but they're not an entitlement.
Likewise, remote working was largely introduced as a response to COVID. Somewhere along the way, a lot of people started treating it as an absolute right rather than a benefit granted by an employer.
Whether that's right or wrong, businesses are perfectly entitled to review those arrangements.
On the ambassador point, I have even less sympathy. Club legends deserve respect, but I don't think Manchester United should be indefinitely paying multimillion-pound ambassador contracts simply because someone was a great servant to the club. If the club is looking at every area of expenditure, those arrangements should be scrutinised like anything else.
The biggest issue with your argument is that you've created a test that Ratcliffe never set for himself. You've decided the cuts were made solely to fund blockbuster signings, and because that hasn't happened you're calling it a lie. But that's not actually what was promised.
Criticise the decisions, absolutely. Criticise the impact on morale, the fan experience, or whether the restructuring has been handled well. Those are fair debates. But claiming the entire exercise was fraudulent because United haven't gone on a transfer spending spree is arguing against a narrative you've invented rather than one Ratcliffe has publicly presented.
01 Sep 2026 10:54:34
Kurtis,
I never suggested anything was fraudulent, so let’s be clear.
I also understand the business decisions and rationale to cut costs.
However, let’s also be clear that, unless something changes in the coming hours, we are very right to ask why the cost cutting was done if it is not to improve the team.
Surely, as a football club, the No1 priority must be to make the team successful; that means buying the players to do it. We have not done that.
So what is the No1 priority at the club in your opinion?
01 Sep 2026 11:02:19
Net spend over last 3 seasons is over 400M. Arsenal, Liverpool, and Spurs are the only teams to spend more. Spurs, mainly due to this summer, are most at around 500M.
Over 10 years we're at 1.3B net, which is the highest, with Arsenal at 1.2B and Chelsea at 1.1B.
The numbers do not back you up, Red Man. You keep pushing this, but there are other sticks to beat the club with if that's your agenda.
01 Sep 2026 11:26:36
Don,
Yet we only have one 31 year old left back and one striker who has had injury issues. Is that agenda not sufficient?
01 Sep 2026 11:35:02
Apologies, and just to clarify, I wasn't suggesting you were accusing anyone of literal fraud.
My point was that you're measuring the outcome against a narrative that Ratcliffe never actually presented. I don't recall him ever saying the staff cuts, redundancies, or other savings were being made specifically to fund "top players" or a transfer spree.
As for your question, I think the No.1 priority is restoring financial stability and putting the right football structure in place. Under PSR, owners can't simply keep writing cheques to cover inefficiency, so the club needs a sustainable cost base and better decision-making before anything else.
That's why I don't see improving the team and cost-cutting as mutually exclusive. The cuts are justified if they help create a financially stable club that can invest more effectively in the squad over the long term. The mistake, in my view, is assuming that team improvement can only be measured by how many players arrive in a single transfer window.
I'd also point out that many of these cuts were already underway before last summer, when United still spent heavily on the squad. I don't remember people repeatedly raising these arguments then. It seems they're only being brought up now because this window hasn't met expectations.
01 Sep 2026 11:45:17
Kurtis
Per a simple search, I think that's pretty clear.
"Savings were intended to create headroom for investment in the playing squad and facilities, while helping meet Profitability and Sustainability Rules (PSR) / financial fair play constraints.
Club statements described a "transformation plan" / cost-saving programme to put the club on a "stable financial footing," stop non-essential activities, maximise resources for football and infrastructure, and enable long-term competitiveness."
01 Sep 2026 12:08:36
The priority is to build a stadium to line their pockets further, with the illusion it's for us fans.
01 Sep 2026 12:13:41
Over the last 5 years, the club has lost £375m and no dividends have been paid. Without making profits, no dividends will be paid, but not only that, the debt will not be reduced and the ability to purchase top players will continue to be restricted. Any normal business with debts of £1.3bn, revenues 1/2 of that, making losses would be on the verge of calling in the receivers. You have no idea whether dividends will be paid in the near future if we start to make profits again. Maybe the Board wants to hold onto cash to help fund the stadium. Maybe the bankers put conditions on the new fixed term loan. But generally, if a business is making money, the owners are perfectly entitled to reward themselves. That's the way the world works. It's not just Man Utd. Investors are ultimately in it to make money.
There's no one on this site who doesn't resent the Glazers for saddling the club with so much debt while making out like banshees. Personally, I think LBOs should be banned and not just in football. But, to me, their biggest sin was appointing and retaining Woodard to run the club. Even with the remaining debt after the company went public, the amount of money we've spent net on transfers since SAF retired has been enough to have kept us consistently in the top 4.
Meanwhile, everything else about the club was left to rot, non-playing staff numbers and costs rose to be the highest by far in the EPL. Things had to change. They should never have been allowed to continue for so long. In steps Ratcliffe. There have been costly missteps, but there has been some improvement, given last year's finish. We still carry players we can't get rid of because we paid too much for them and pay them too much. We haven't had many players we can afford to lose, from whom we could make a profit, with the result that over the last 10 years we have had the highest net spend in the whole of football. This appalling level of past incompetence cannot be fixed overnight. It's going to take time. I wish the Glazers would sell out and someone would buy the club and invest some cash to wipe out the debt, but it's not going to happen.
Redman, we all agree, we need to fix the defence. We're disappointed we haven't spent more this summer, but chill out. Please stop using pejorative terms like parasites. All of us here, bar a few trolls, love the club, but in the end it's just football.
01 Sep 2026 13:08:04
You said it yourself, Redman, long term. If you believe that 10 years of bad decisions, overpaying for average (bad) players, and a debt of about 1,3 billion will all be solved in 1-2 years, and we'll be able to overspend everyone again, I don't know what to say.
01 Sep 2026 14:56:32
Newname
Parasite "An organism that lives on or in a host organism and gets its food or other resources from or at the expense of its host. The parasite typically benefits while the host is harmed (to varying degrees)."
It's an accurate description.