Manchester United’s new home strip was on show for the first time last night as Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s reserve team beat Curzon Ashton 4-0 in a pre-season friendly. Ahead of the official, considerably more glitzy, launch in the US, Solskjaer’s side donned the new retro kit. Somebody, somewhere isn’t going to be popular with the Old Trafford hierarchy!
The question is will you buy the official £49.99 strip or seek alternatives?
With both profits from shirt sales (although minimal due to the nature of the deal with Nike) and exposure for United’s principal sponsor Aon on the cards, many anti-Glazer fans have decided to boycott the new kit.
After all, there are choices, with the Manchester United Supporters’ Trust (MUST) launching its own black, green and gold kit recently and the grey market offering cheaper ‘official looking’ kits.
[poll id=”44″]
yep I’ll be buying one, don’t buy into this “don’t line the Glazers pockets” malarky. If we don’t support the club we definitely won’t be buying players.
This is the problem… People like you… ffs
If Glazer have the club 5 more years there wont be much left of MUFC.
We need a mass boycott that shows Glazer he is losing. He will then be forced to sell. We will still be in big debt. BUT ALL the money will now go in to the club. NOT to the americans.
And we can start to rebuild.
It will take time. But we will survive… So start growing some bales, and start fighting.
Congratulations Bealsy on being shortsighted and a glory hunitng clueless ‘supporter’! if you were actually bothered about the future prospects of our club you wouldnt buy the shirt and you would boycott the megastore because whether you stick your head in the sand or not, the glazers are using and abusing our club and running it into financial ruin FACT
ed, i would like to lt u know that i dont believe must intentions is to ruin us, but i feel the methods such as snubbing merchandise and this stupid crapin boycotts wil have anegative affect as glazers will still take cash and less income would mean less cash to the club. must might be manutd fans but they seem ok with the idea of damagingg our cash flow. like to hear your opinion.
Sorry aj but you completely misunderstand the economics of the club. The Glazers are allowed to take a fixed percentage of all United’s income in addition to interest payments, management fees and consultancy fees they ‘charge’ the club. A boycott will have an effect on the Glazers’ ability to take money out of the club, pay down the PIK debt and therefore continue running the club. Misguided loyalty to the Glazers simply because “things could be worse if we don’t help prop them up” is one of the saddest things to come out of their ownership.
There’s no way I’ll be buying the official one. The less money for them leeches, the sooner they’ll be out of our club. No, I bought the One Love shirt. And I won’t be spending a penny on any official merchandise.
manchester united are on the verge of being left behind, in the last few years we havent signed the players needed to strengthen the squad with sir alex saying there is no value in the market, but i dont agree!!
we must stop the glazers taking everything away from this club before its to late!!
there will never be good value in the market whille the yanks are in charge, not whille they have the dept’s they have!!
i watched the tv doccumentry on the glazers and they have lost so much already through there buisnesess going belly up, do you want this to happen to united?
DONT PUT MONEY INTO THERE POCKETS!!
ed, i think you misunderstand as i understand all of tha but yu missed my point, you see they have certain cash they can take and even with less income they will do so and with less income after tbey help theselves to the cash we will have less aldo we have lots anyway but that is not the point. i support manutd not the glazers and wuld love to have new owners and be debt free again but i dont believe affecting our income is the way to go about ousting those glazers.
I understands what your point is aj but the main point is money!!, if we continue to pile money into united the glazers will continue to take it out!!
If we stop putting money into united yes the team will suffer but are we not suffering already?
I would rather united win nothing and not get into europe next season and force the glazers hand into selling, get new owners, be dept free and become manchester united again!!
I love united so much and my view is simple,
If the glazers have no money coming and they cant continue to pay there depts they would have to sell!!
dave, i cud go next yr witbout a trophy, but no europe? i know we wll still land cbampions league football not wanting europe is to far. all manutd fans should still want champions league football and possible title challenge even if we lose out. glazers need to go and that i agree with as the debt needs to go. i think we could possiibly look into ways of paying the debt ourselves.
i am a true blood supporter as only care about manchester united and wsnt us to always succeed.
aj – I just think it’s really sad that you want to pay the debt! The Glazers loaded the club with debt via a leveraged takeover. It’s not like we’ve been unlucky, or fans should rally round with buckets. This is of the owners own making and they’re happy with it because their personal exposure – the amount of money they put into the buying the club – is almost zero.
I am sure going too buy because may be this is last season of my giggs i wanna to remember him always how bad jersey is? where is money going? i dont care it as long as i got giggs on pitch and i wearing his his jersey forever now i am decided i buy two for feture too
It’s completely up to the individual but, I won’t spend one bent penny on United as long as the Glazers own it.
I’m aware that my meager contribution, or lack of it, won’t have any real impact on their plans, and I’m not sure that a mass, organised boycott would help either… as it may just force the Glazers into more drastic measures to raise the money they need to pay their bills… and let’s face it, as bad as things are… the Glazers could make things much, much worse.
But as much as I love United, I’m getting more and more disillusioned with football in general. The footballing authorities themselves are no longer concerned with the sport as “the beautiful game”… only how it generates money.
The proposes 39th game is a perfect example… a ridiculous notion that most oppose and yet the money men are still determined to make happen.
For me… the Glazers represent everything that’s wrong with football, and most sport for that matter… and I wouldn’t piss on them if they were on fire…
I don’t just want them out of Manchester United FC… I want them sent packing, broke and miserable.
Parasites…
whats wrong with wanting to pay off the debt, you been saying stuff along the lines of getting rid of debt. i dont mean stuff like bucket crap and collections, more like a business style well planned set up to solve the problem instead of waiting for others. i already know they have gave us no money of their own since the takeover and put us into debt blah blah blah, try tinking outside the box and stop saing the same lines. the idea of us coming up with ideas isnt sad. whats wrong with us paying off debt?
Paying it off by owning the club? Well that’s one thing and an avenue the Red Knights explored and failed to achieve. Getting United fans to ‘invest’ alone is impossible – both financially and logistically. At IPO barely any fans bought shares.
But paying the debt off just for the sake of it with no return?? No that’s utter madness because there would be nothing to stop the owners or new owners just taking out another bond secured against the assets. That’s not thinking out the box, that’s bonkers. But I’m sure the Glazer family would gladly take your donations. Their phone number is 1-800-suckers.
AJ, are you Glazers lovechild? Pay their debt off ourselves???
wtf?
Not a chance. Won’t buy a kit or any official merchandise mainly because I don’t want to see anything from the Glazer regime in my home.
I live in Chicago and tonight is the AON kit release party at the pub I go to watch United matches. Aon basically took the whole capacity of the pub for their own employees or stuffy suited business men to attend. Gave the bar owners almost no room for themselves or any of the United supporters that go there for matches.
AON is shit.
am i a glazer love child? oh grow up. i dont think paying off the debt ourselves is such a bad idea or are you just a bunch of talkers who would rather wait for someone else to do the work whiles you bore with anti-glazer talk. i dont give a damn about their 500m american debts or 200m pik, i am talking about the £500m debt they put on our books and hasnt got the decency to pay off, why are you against it, are you scared of the throught of us paying the debt off ourselves?
What’s your business plan AJ? Because 500m is nearly 10k for each season ticket holder. What are investors getting back…
well ED i only really throught of it today and not put to much into it so would feally need tome, but way i figure it is we have over 330m fans worldwide and around 50-75m maybe more would have somewhat in the region of what is known as substantial amount of cash to put in with out worry incluing season ticket holders and protesters, must members and the red knights. so say they come together as one to target the debt and not glazers and put in aywhere between £5k and afew million……….
The Red Knight plan, which didn’t work, was to buy out the club and then do a rights issue for anything up to £200m in which the fans could buy shares. The problem is that its almost impossible to monetise fans in this way. 330m fans – well maybe but they’re fickle brand followers not people who’ll buy United products let alone put their hand in their pocket to invest. The last time United fans were asked to do this at IPO in 1991 about 35,000 small shareholders did buy but it raised a tiny fraction of what would be needed today.
then iam sure it wll not be a problem. all do we coould use thag idea aswell in a takeover bid to get the club back. bit of a bastardas only just throught of it so some gaps need putting together and issues sorted out. after all one way we could pay of debt wit enough cash but glazers still incharge and other way to many people would want a say in the club. either way i believe we should put together certain people to take it forward. like i said just throught of it bu thats a rough look at it.
some work needed for total idea, but i believe with time a goo plan wuld work out well, if must succeed and i doubt it things would be easier as could simply look into instant debt paying but with glazers there it wold be a bastard to pull off. but a simply business plan focused on the debt should be looked into instead of so much timme trying to force a sale of united. enough fans, enougb cash and the right plan and people i believe it would come together.
as forwhat investors get out of it i hasnt yet filled that piece as a debt payment plan the fans should simply be happy being debt free and a takeover some would simply care purely about gettin tbeir money back whiles otbers would like say in the cub siince since the managers side that includes team stuff, tactics and transfers wll be his only, that leaves departments like ticket prices which would return to a lower price, aswell as other area that can be looked into if it comes together. worth thinking of
https://www.nqatpod.com/poll-new-kit-launched-but-will-you-buy-one/
granted if you wanted to put together aplan to pay of debt, the best idea is to use as little amount of people involved as possible, that way the conflicts if any are limited and easy to solve. i say the highest number i would want to involve in a possible set up to rid our debt as no takeovers are coming is 50000 and obviously they will be manutd supporters and even ticket holders, obviously right now peeps are hoping for a takeover to oust the glazers and thats fair but lets not purely focus on them.
that isjust a rough idea of how to sort out debt. anyone gt something better i’m lisstening all do i all so think that maybe and this is a lot shot but instead of protesting to try and help. the knights, maybe must and the protesters could approach united with the possiblity of paying off the debt in return for like a small say in the club and then everyone could pt together a way in brining the cash in as there is apprently 160 thousand protestors.
AJ – I think what you’re fundamentally failing to understand is that debt repayment cannot come without equity – its utter insanity otherwise, will never happen and nobody would sign up to it. Pretty much like setting your money on fire.
grow up??? ok, where shall i donate my 30k towards the debt aj?
ffs
Guys DON’T Buy MUTV. It’s Expensive And Helps The Glazers. Watch All The Pre-Season Online At http://WatchMUFC.com Or Something.
WE MUST GET RID OF THE EVIL GLAZER FAMILY, OFFICIAL MERCH COMRPISES THE VAST MAJORITY OF MANCHESTER UNITED PLC’S INCOME OUTSIDE OF THE 40% GENERATED ON MATCH DAYS, IF WE EACH DO OUR BIT AND BOYCOTT OFFICIAL MERCHANDISE, THE GLAZERS WILL DEFINITELY BE FORCED TO SELL MANCHESTER UNITED!
We have proposed the idea of a chain message, which can be sent around the world, to the global Manchester United family. The purpose of the message is to raise awareness of the importance of a boycott of official merchandise, which accounts for a vast percentage of the revenue Manchester United PLC makes aside from the 40% generated on matchday’s, if we work together and make a co-ordinated effort we can get rid of the Glazers. I have created an e-mail/facebook(or indeed any means of online communication) template and, an SMS template. Get online and join our capaign to boycott official merchandise, I started the campaign today and have sice contacted the majority of Manchester United SC’s around the world! Don’t give in to the Glazers! Do not feed the vermin! Merchandise sales account for the vast majority of United’s profit outside the 40% of total revenue generated on match day’s, if we can cut out the Glazer’s life blood then there is no question, they will be forced to sell.
To see the templates check out this info section of the campaign’s facebook, and dont forget to add us as a friend!
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001359667924
For fucks sake lads, I mean seriously, 108 of you are going to buy it, that’s £4860 youre forking over into Glazer’s grubby paw! And youre only a miniscule drop in the vast ocean of customers who’ll buy the shirt! DO NOT GIVE HIM YOUR MONEY! THE ANTI-MERCHANIDSE ATTITUDE CAN PROLIFERATE IF YOU SEND THE CHAIN MESSAGES AROUND, WE CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE, THE FUTURE DEPENDS ON WHAT WE DO IN THE PRESENT!!!!
Join the campaign http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001359667924
aj, for heavens sake mate, pay off this debt, the glazers will then re borrow and use the money to prop up their ailing property business. these people are about screwing every last penny out of the club, we didnt ask them to come in and load us with hundreds of million in debt, let them fail in the usa and in britain, united will bounce back.
Short term pain is acceptable in my mind for long term stability and success of the club.
mutv is just £6 amonth, not expensive at all and i’m keeping it. protesters need to stop thinking they can tell everyone what to do, if we want to do what you are doing we will join, if we dont and we want to buy tickets and merchandise, watch games and have mutv we will and we have the right to do so and its not this your backing the glazers or lining their pockets stuff, its supporting mancheser united, the club we love. not everyone haves to protest, there are 160,000 and thats fair but i am not one.
Contributing to the Glazers business plans by buying their products makes you part of the problem not the solution. You can’t say you want the club debt free if you help enable that business model. Starving the Glazers of cash accelerates their departure, of this there is no doubt. Funding their business model extends the slow and inevitable decline of the club in which will see more summers like the past two with cheap investments and player sales.
i am not totally against the protest. i want us debt free and new owners who truly care for united, but the glazers will only move for their price and there is the problem as they listen to cold hard cash not protest and emotions, draining manutd of cash wont work as they will still use our cash even if we have less. we need a concrete cash offer they will listen to, not this stupid idea of dont give the club cash as that could cause trouble with the debt and endanger manchester united and that i dont want
to be honest Ed i am starting to wonder if you even understand football of know anyting about manchester united. there has only been normal activity on our part as fergie has bearly ever spent big in the market and these player sales hs been normal your united time is over transfers and nothing to do with the debt, and this no value line is not new either as fergie never has an never will be took for a ride by other clubs, i hear you and understand your view but all you do is negatively spin everything.
With respect AJ. Go fuck yourself, you haven’t earned the right to question my fandom.
ronaldo left for 80m because he wanted to play for real madrid, nothing to do with debt. flopster and tosic was sold for 5m and 8m as they just wasnt good enough not becaue of debt. we signed owen, 2m diouf, 3m obertan, 15m valencia, 10m smalling and 8m hernandez because fergie wanted them, not because of lack of funds. we tried for benzema at 30m a yr ago remember and will probably try to land one big money signing this year.fergie goes for who he thinks will help the club and not just for the hell of it
oh poor little Ed loses the plot and tells me to go fuck myself then removes his comments, why? is it because i have exposed youas a crybaby having a rant because we aint spending big and put you in yourplace concerning our transfer activty of past times and how we bearly ever spend big. sorry Ed i already saw your breakdown and you know i have worked you out, go on keep playing your little games of acting like you have any knowledge about united and i will enjoy fact i exposed you as a crybaby.
What the hell are you talking about AJ. Did your mummy let you on the kompoooter again? I’m with the plot, mate, you just haven’t earned the right to question what kind of fan I am. It’s not the first time either, its offensive and pathetic. You’re a Glazer loving lackey. We get it. And that’s fine, there’s lots of other people with different views on here and the debate is good. But you just don’t understand the fundamental economics so it’s pointless endlessly debating this over and over with you while you post the same thing over and over.
I’ve been to more matches home & abroad than you’ve had hot dinners so I’m not going to accept you questioning “what kind of fan I am” simply because you’ve got nothing to offer. So I’ll repeat, fuck you AJ and goodbye.
lets look at the facts. dont understand the economics, dont understand the debt, glazer lover, glazer lackey, indicating that i am a child, telling me to fuck myself and fuck off. Ed, not once did i question your loyalty and knowledge until youu made yourself clear that you think we are fucked annd cant spend money because of the debt when that simply isnt the case and even with debt we will succeed. fact is you have been the offensive one and i have only defended manutd and myself. i loathe the glazers.
Let’s see – do you understand the economics of debt? No. Haven’t you proven yourself a Glazer lover? Yes. Are you a child? – Well I think you’re wrong about the debt and have offered book loads of evidence on this site. You can disagree but your reaction is that I neither “understood football nor am I a real supporter of United.” You don’t get that right, its not for you to decide who is a supporter. So yes, it’s pretty childish really and I’m really tired of it.
AJ has been eliminated. He’s now messaging me threatening to come round to my house and sort me out. Jeeeze. So if I disappear you’ll know what’s happened!
LOL, he’s shown up on RoM preaching the same stuff.
Oh dear. If he wants to love the Glazers so be it but I’m not going to accept threats of violence just because I don’t agree with him. Get enough of that at Old Traffford – come to think of it, perhaps he’s one of the stewards?!
Ed seriously your an idiot. You claim that people who buy the kit become part of the problem BUT get your head out of the sand ffs. I know you hate the Glazers but first and foremost the well being of the club has to come first and any boycot isn’t doing that.
Boycotts just weaken the brand, weaken the shortterm ability to make money and also the long term ability. If anything anyone who boycotts things make themselves as much a part of the problem as they claim the Glazers are.
The total personal cost to the Glazers takeover is pushing 500mill (The share purchases to get to the takeover stage plus the PIK and personal investments to fund the takeover) so when you factor in inflation the RK’s bid was insulting and would have seen them struggle to break even. Especially when you then factor in the rolled up interest on the PIK’s which may be able to be serviced via other means but of they are selling they would expect these to be covered too.
So lowering the value isn’t going to make them think “Oh lets accept the RK’s offer” that so many fans seem to think is perfect situation. They will either hold on to the bitter end hoping the boycot ends before it does any lasting damage (They are protected from the Club failing on most counts) or they will sell it to whoever bids the most who is most likely to end up turning us into ‘City’
And if it gets to the point where it all goes wrong then the club at best is going to end up in the hands of speculators as we saw with pompey. Each who think they can make a quick profit and have little intention of sticking around more than a year..
At the end of the day even if you don’t like the Glazers atleast they are long term owners and their profits rely on long term success.
And we need to get over the ‘Bleeding the club dry’ myth. MUST like to bring up the “75p in ever £1 spent by fans on matchday is spent on the Glazers” and also “The Glazers plan to withdraw vast amounts of money” but we need to start looking at this claims critically.
Yes the figure can be made to be 75p of every £1 but only if
– We put all the so called Glazer costs into the Matchday accounts only. This isn’t right as they need spread across the whole operation
– We include in these costs NON-CASH accounting deductions at the HOLDING COMPANY level
– We include Management Fees and Director Loans which were present in the PLC but that fact is now convinently forgotten
– We ignore the costs that were unique to the PLC structure
At the end of the day the extra cost that the match day side of the club is responcable to service has seen a rise but its not a massive rise and with to other areas of the clubs revenues rising quicker than match day so these areas become are taking a greater resporesponsibilit for costs.
On the Bleeding the club dry, in the first year MUST atleast had some basis for this claim. However they keep claiming it every year and they have yet to get it right. The Glazers have been allowed to take a profit based dividend from the clubs profits (The club does make a profit, its the holding company that doesn’t) but have passed on it every year. They can take more now but again there is no evidence of this happening or about to happen yet. All they have taken are smallish Management fees and some Director loans so do we seriously keep buying into the bleeding us dry myth when the evidence to back up that up doesn’t exist.
And the end of the day a Boycott hits the club first and foremost. Even if the Glazers start to take their dividends its in the clubs interest and ours for the club to make as much money as possible as thats more money available for the club to spend. We don’t want the club to end up like Barca where the money generated isn’t sufficient to keep it running without taking loans out to pay the players wages.
Certainly if United get into financial issues and there is evidence that any kind of boycott has played into this I for one will be holding these boycotters to blame as much as if not more than the Glazers (Atleast the Glazers had a business plan that could service the debt and at the same time increased the revenue in other areas. The boycotters have done nothing but remove revenue from the club)
@ Wakey
What is it with Glazer apologists like you – almost none of you can make a point without attaching an insult first. It cheapens your position and is, factually wrong. I don’t need to get into a pissing contest but lets be clear I’m far from an idiot on any scale you wish to choose.
But unlike you I’m happy to have a debate that doesn’t include any insults even though I despair of United fans who think propping up the Glazer regime is akin to supporting the team. It isn’t.
First and foremost though, you’re just plain wrong and either ill-informed or deliberately misleading. For somebody who has at least basic financial knowledge I’m guessing the latter. I’m happy to say that without throwing around any personal insults.
First lets get the utter rubbish out the way that the total cost to the Glazers of acquiring the club is now pushing £500 million. Their initial stake – £272 million – was entirely funded through debt. Deutsche Bank for the senior loan, probably leveraged against US property, and a bunch of NYC hedge fund debt. Much of it dumped on the club directly and the rest in PIKs. Fortunately they have the United cash cow to pay down the PIK debt and the bond interest. The true cost to the Glazers is/has/will be almost zero.
Now on to revenue side. The financial structure of the club means that cash flow is totally and utterly king. United’s group operating profit before player trading showed a substantial loss in the past year. Financial restructuring means that long-term at least half United’s EBITDA will be reduced by interest payments. Management, consultancy fees – and yes dividends required to pay down the PIK, as there’s no other source – will further reduce United’s free cash flow. By my estimate to far less than £20 million per annum. Short term pain from commercial and ticket revenue reduction absolutely pushes the Glazers finances further towards a distressed state.
Not sure where you think the comparison with Barca is going – their financial problems are based on over-spending not lack of revenues, which factually are greater than United’s.
The rest of your post is speculation and hyperbole, not least the utterly ridiculous final statement that anybody bar the Glazer family is to blame for the problems at the club. Divide and rule has been United’s strategy for a while now and you’ve fallen for it hook line and sinker.