Ratcliffe cost-cutting ‘absolutely necessary’
A football finance expert reckons Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s cost-slashing at Manchester United is “absolutely necessary”.
The Red Devils’ minority owner has launched controversial staff cuts – and now wants a £2billion new stadium.
Dr Rob Wilson told JeffBet: “It’s such a difficult situation.. You’ve got poor sporting performance and you have had poor decisions that are still costing a significant amount of money.
“United had probably 30% more workers than any other Premier League team, but they’re not 30% better. So you’ve got to look at two things. One is the structure right? Probably not. Two, are the personnel right? Possibly not.
“All of the things happening off the field, the staff redundancies, closing the canteen, the free fruit instead of free lunch, is not great for those involved in it, but is probably the right decision for the long-term interest of Manchester United as a commodity.”
But Dr Wilson added: “What makes it really difficult to stomach is how poor the sporting performance is.
“So I think you end up scoring a bit of an own goal with your own staff morale. Ruben Amorim has mentioned it two or three times in his press conferences.
“Having said that, how many organizations do you know that provide free staff lunch – there aren’t many. Most of the executives I speak to are all on subsidized lunches.
“You can’t keep giving stuff away when your organization has lost over 300million quid in the last three or four years irrespective of whether some of that is a consequence of one field activity or not.”
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