Author – Amrit Santlani
Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag believes the club should learn a lesson from Chelsea, who went through a tumultuous campaign after their takeover, as Manchester are also in the middle of a sale.
Chelsea were bought by Todd Boehly last summer and since then they have spent more than 600 million pounds on transfers, but with a lack of vision they are currently in 12th place.
The same could be a lesson for Manchester United’s next owners, said Ten Hag, whose team faced Chelsea on Thursday.
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United’s current owners, the Glazers, are keen to sell the club, with Qatari banker Sheikh Jassim bin Hamad Al Thani and Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s Ineos Group the two interested parties in the race for the Old Trafford outfit.
Speaking ahead of the game against Chelsea, Ten Hag said:“You can have money, but you need to spend it intelligently and you need to have a strategy behind it – otherwise the money doesn’t work.”
“At the moment, the centralization of good players, the best coaches and also the money is all here in the UK. This creates great competition, but also tough and difficult competition. I think there are a lot more teams in the Premier League that are really strong” added the Dutchman.
According to the club’s own figures published in March, United need to fork out £969.6 million, which is a combination of their gross debt, bank loans and outstanding transfer fees for players.
According to Transfermarkt, Manchester United have a net spend of £352.24 million over the last three seasons combined, which shows that the new owners will have a big task ahead of them.
Many players signed by United in the last three years have struggled to make an impact, such as Donny van de Beek and Jason Sancho, and Ten Hag reminded the club to spend wisely in the future and avoid the mistakes made by Chelsea.