Glazers must keep splashing the cash
WELCOME to modern football, the Glazer family. Welcome to the game everyone else plays — are you ready for what lies ahead?
Manchester United’s owners have had it easy since they arrived here in 2005. They relied upon the genius of Alex Ferguson to keep producing teams who enabled them to stay at the top.
Their ownership has resulted in five Premier League titles, three League Cups and a Champions League but those trophies had nothing to do with bold statements in the transfer market. They were down to the inspiration of Ferguson.
Now, with United f acing a huge fight to get into the top four, they need a new approach. They need eed to show they are prerepared to spend. The he clubs who stay at t the head of the game invest in the future from positions of strength, which is why the signing of Juan n Mata is intriguing.
Is this a pointer to the future or simply ply a break from the norm? rm?
Do not think for one ne moment the £37million paid for Mata will cure all United’s ills. To get back to where they were under Ferguson, dominating domestically and constantly posing a threat in Europe, they need another three or four of those transfers.
United have never been afraid of spending but since the last time they broke their transfer record — for Dimitar Berbatov (£30.75m) in 2008, four months after they won the Champions League in Moscow — their rivals have been bold.
The Glazers, by contrast, have been complacent a nd t he evidence across Europe stacks up against them — none of the clubs they want to compete with have hesitated when it comes to paying massive fees.
Real Madrid have gone beyond £ 80m twice since 2009; l ast summer Barcelona paid £51m for Neymar; Paris Saint- Germain went higher to get Edinson Cavani, as did Monaco when they landed Radamel Falcao.
Quality does not come cheaply and Karl- Heinz Rummenigge explained to me in December the moment Bayern Munich realised they would be fighting an uphill battle if they didn’t follow the lead of others and spend big.
It revolved around the Spain midfielder Javi Martinez. Bayern were debating spending €40m, but ultimately the question came down to, ‘Would he make a difference?’ The answer was ‘Yes’ and Martinez ended up playing a key role in Bayern winning the Treble.
Other than Robin van Persie, how many players capable of making a difference have United bought since Cristiano Ronaldo left in 2 2009? In that time, their n net spend has been £68m £68m, dwarfed by the lik likes of Real Madrid (£ ( £307m), Chelsea ( (£306m) and M Manchester City (£367). Even Stoke (£72.5m) have spent more. Mata will make a d difference to United. If he produces the nu numbers he did for Chel Chelsea — he has been directly involved in 45 goals (scored 18, assisted 27) since 2011 — then they have a chance of pegging back Liverpool, Tottenham and Everton in the race for the top four.
His arrival will also lift a squad who are on their knees following the latest setback against Sunderland; nothing beats seeing a quality addition walk into the dressing room and David Moyes will hope Mata can do for his squad what Eric Cantona did for Ferguson in 1992 — add quality and galvanise those around him.
But the men who hold the key to United’s future are the Glazers. Are they going to stand up to the challenges of modern football, or are they going to coast along without any real spending? If they choose the latter option, this season is unlikely to prove a one-off.
Let me know what you think. I’ll try to answer your questions each week. Leave your comments at www.mailonline. ie/sport