Fact and fiction
By Tom Fordyce
If it is possible to be both ashen-faced and puce with rage at the same time,
Sir Alex Ferguson pulled it off on Wednesday night. Defeat to Benfica left
even Ferguson admitting that his Manchester United side had reached a new low.
But what does United's Champions League exit really mean for the club, the
Glazers and Ferguson himself? THE DECLINE
Can a team which lies second in the Premiership and has recently beaten the
league leaders really be said to be in decline? The brutal message from the
statistics is an unequivocal 'yes'.
From being beaten semi-finalists in the Champions League four years ago
United have since slipped further and further away with each progressive
season. Beaten in the quarter-finals in 2003, they failed to get beyond the
first knock-out round in 2004 and 2005. This year they finished bottom of
arguably the weakest of the eight qualifying groups. Yes, one goal in the
Stadium of Light on Wednesday would have been enough to see them through. But
in six games against underwhelming opposition - Benfica and Villarreal lie
sixth in their domestic leagues, while Lille are seventh - they managed just
three goals, and went scoreless in four. In the same period, Barcelona scored
16 and Lyon 13. The story is no better in the Premiership. Having won three
titles on the bounce between 1999 and 2001, and five out of six from 1996-2001,
they have now won only one of the last four. Last season they finished
without a trophy of any description. With the best will in the world, you
can't massage those facts to spell anything else than decline. THE FINANCES
Talk of the Champions League exit costing United £15m is slightly
disingenuous. To make that amount, they would have needed to have gone all
the way through to the final. The board had also only initially budgeted for
United to reach the last 16, meaning the shortfall from the early exit is
closer to £5m. The failure to qualify for the Uefa Cup - where United could
have negotiated their own television deals - makes the situation more parlous,
adding an estimated £3m to the tally lost. Glazers play down
defeat
A spokesman for the Glazer family also said on Thursday that there was enough
"slack" in the investment to deal with the problem. But the Glazers bought
United with the expectation of making profits, and with a burden of heavy debt.
Giving the club financial 'slack' was never part of the plan. United also
need a new shirt sponsor after Vodafone announced last month that it was to end
its £9m-a-year deal two years early. And marketing consultant Oliver Butler
says United's defeat on Wednesday may hinder their efforts to find a suitable
replacement. "There has been growth in revenue for shirt sponsorship among
the top clubs, and the prime reason behind that growth is the opportunity to
appear in the Champions League, which has a global audience for brands to
communicate to. "If you're a club that isn't able to get into the second half
of the competition, then that has implications." THE OWNERS
The same Glazer spokesman insisted that Wednesday's defeat would have no
bearing on the family's long-term ownership of United. But United were not
bought as an Abramovich-style play-thing. Malcolm Glazer expected to make
profits - and the unavoidable decline in the club's success on the pitch has a
direct impact on that. United were the first club in Britain to identify and
then truly exploit the lucrative marketing possibilities of a successful
football brand. The word to emphasise there is 'successful'. United's
financial domination of the 1990s and first part of the next decade was built
on a bedrock of championships and trophies. Take away those footballing
triumphs and the amount of money coming in from marketing, sponsorship and
television revenues drops accordingly - not the sort of news which the
hard-nosed Glazers envisaged or welcome. That means that savings have to be
made elsewhere - like in the kitty available to the manager to spend on
transfers and
player wages. THE MANAGER
Ferguson's face post-match told its own story. This is the biggest crisis
of his 20 years at Old Trafford. And this time a 1990-style FA Cup run will not
be enough to assuage the critics. There are three key areas where Ferguson is
particularly vulnerable: his recent record in the transfer market, his ability
to get the best from his team and his chances of turning things around. On
the first of these, the evidence is damning. Forget even the Klebersons and
Djemba-Djembas - what about the £30m spent on Rio Ferdinand? On the second,
when a team containing such attacking stars as Rooney, Van Nistelrooy, Ronaldo,
Scholes and Giggs scores just three times in six games, you know there are
serious problems. Stunned Ferguson vows to rebuild
And on the third - well, the decline has been going on, even if slowly, since
the dominant days of 1999. And no amount of effort exerted or money spent by
Ferguson appears to have arrested it. Ferguson, remember, is only on a
12-month rolling contract that comes up for renewal at the end of the season.
Should the Glazers decide to act, there is no need for dramatic sackings or
expensive pay-offs. The bookmakers aren't in much doubt. William Hill has
Ferguson as the fourth most likely Premiership manager to be sacked, after the
perilously-placed Souness, O'Leary and McCarthy. Ferguson is also at 11-10 to
leave United by the start of next season. It is not a scenario befitting one
of the great managers in British football history. But, sadly for Ferguson
and United fans, that does not make it any less real.
Liverpool FC, King of Europe
The greatest football club in the world
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