Manchester United owners the Glazer family are set to hold a board meeting within ‘days’ to discuss fresh proposals from Sir Jim Ratcliffe, it has been claimed.
British billionaire Ratcliffe and rival bidder Sheikh Jassim bin Hamad al Thani have both submitted multiple bids since the Glazers announced in November 2022 that they were potentially open to selling the club. The latest approach from the former, which would see him initially take a minority stake of 25 percent, is understood to have ‘given him the edge ‘ over his rival.
According to Bloomberg, the Glazers are said to prefer the arrangement to the full takeover proposed by Sheikh Jassim. A board meeting, expected to take place in the coming days, will allow the owners to discuss the merits of the latest approach.
Bloomberg’s report indicates there is “no certainty” the Glazers will agree to Ratcliffe’s new proposal. There is also a chance Sheikh Jassim ups his own bid, though the Qatari banker has so far indicated a preference to complete a full takeover rather than taking a smaller stake in the club and a spokesperson for him told Bloomberg such an offer remained on the table.
Earlier interest from Ratcliffe had seen him make efforts to buy the Glazers’ 69 percent holding. The current owners have been in place since 2005, and during the process there have been reports that Joel and Avram Glazer – the two most prominent family members when it comes to the running of United – were not on the same page as their siblings when it came to a sale.
According to reports from Sky in early October, the Glazers have been keen for any investment to value the club at £6billion. It has been suggested that Ratcliffe’s approach for a 25 percent stake would see him take control of shares held by the Glazers and by some minority investors.
INEOS billionaire Ratcliffe has already made multiple forays into football in the past. He bought Swiss club Lausanne-Sport in 2017, with the takeover of French outfit Nice arriving two years later.
Nice have finished in the top half of Ligue 1 in each of the Ratcliffe seasons but are still waiting on a first Champions League campaign under the current owners, though they currently sit second in the table. Lausanne, meanwhile, won promotion back to the Swiss top tier last season after being relegated the previous year.
“The Manchester United bid would have been unthinkable two or three years ago if we hadn’t had some of experiences — some quite difficult experiences with Lausanne and Nice,” Ratcliffe said in September. “You can’t really contemplate acquiring a brand like Manchester United and failing because the failure is just far too public and excruciating in a deal like that.”
