Manchester United Glazer fans protest at the heart of modern football

Within minutes, the #GlazersOut hashtag has become a trend. From all corners of the world, Manchester United fans posted the same open letter on social media, detailing concerns about "clubs in decline."

The essence of this problem is the five key questions that the Glazer family supporters want to answer, who now have a club for 14 years.

To summarize, they are: What are the plans to eliminate debt in a realistic and appropriate time frame? On what basis was Ed Woodward given a salary increase? What are the plans to reduce payments to pay off debts? How much money is floating on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) that has returned to the club? Are there advances in the search for the director of football?

"Manchester United fans deserve to know the answers to these questions," the letter said. "Every fan has the right to know the character and behavior of his owner and every fan has the right to challenge his owner if they believe it is the best for their football club."

"Your protest against property has come and gone, but now it is enough. We will not leave at this time. We will not sit in the dark anymore while you pretend there is none."

The extraordinary finances involved in modern football clubs the size of United make fans become accountants, explore books, and try to find out how their clubs are managed.

The silence of the Glazer family only arouses suspicion. When they finish a big acquisition, fans promise it won't be like that.

In an interview with MUTV, Joel Glazer was asked how important communication was with the followers.

"This is very important. Again, I continue to go back there, fans are the blood of the club's life," he said.

"People want to know what is happening, people want to know where they are going, but we will communicate."

That never happened. A small explanation will help, maybe starting with the answers to those questions.

But this form of 'protest' is manifested, and the way the owner runs the club, attacks the heart of the modern football club and its modern support base.

Open letters have the attraction and publicity that must be done. Fans may feel frustrated because they were cut off from MUTV for trying to raise their concerns, but the club will never let the stage be played. The decision to end the call helps with publication, and those questions are not for people like Lou Macari and Ben Thornley. They are addressed to the owner.

This is not the first time there have been protests against ownership of the club by the Glazer family. The Green and Gold campaign increased in 2010, but because it was lost and recaptured, it would not be easy. These problems are 14 years old.

A big disappointment with the owner reappeared this summer, for some supporters, because success had dried up, and that was part of the problem for the protesters. While many questions are asked and problems related to the club's finances will benefit from the discussion, protests will be more severe if done at the time of victory. It is an unavoidable fact that many protested again when the club fell to sixth place after another difficult season, but did not fully depend on property.

People who are close to United will show that investment has continued to emerge since the acquisition in 2005. Only City and Chelsea have spent more transfer fees than United since then, while there has been a considerable increase in academy spending.

It has produced some results in preseason, while United will suggest that this is truly a positive summer. In Australia and Asia there is a feeling that there is now a shared vision once again, that everyone, from the owner to the manager, etc., is committed to the "philosophy" of the Kingdom, to win when playing attack, attacking football. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has a significant influence on that.

The club will also show ticket prices for the frozen season for nine of the last 10 years.

As the club has shown in the past, commercial success is used to finance investments in the field, which is a priority, but the money generated by Woodward's business acumen in those markets is too futile. Debt problems are a different problem with bad decisions in soccer recruitment that have been made in recent years.

The nature of this protest is part of the era of social networking. For many people, even though it's important not to show everything, this is a way of exploring frustration at a club that threatens to get lost in the field. The success of Sir Alex Ferguson's era is a distant memory.

Of course, when United still won the league title, there were many supporters who had problems with the Glazer ownership model. They are still doing it now, many of them published the letter yesterday, but they joined a lot of people on social networks whose anger will disappear when success returns. We have seen that it happened once during the past one and a half decades.


The danger for fans who want to extend this protest is that the problem of success and the way the club is run is long. They are separate problems. Those who are really worried about debt around the club and the ownership model will be nervous if United win the league or finish sixth.

This summer always tends to explore the line of error between clubs and fans. While supporters have seen enough and wanted revolution in the field, Solskjaer preached about evolution. There was frustration at the inactivity in the transfer market and United were not where he wanted to be in 10 days until the window was closed, but the reason for not having a half dozen new faces at Old Trafford was because that was not what Solskjaer wanted. . This is a patient who is rebuilt when patience is never more than virtue.

Now it remains to be seen whether this initial protest was followed by further action. A planned rally outside Old Trafford last month, driven by social media posts, ended with only a few dozen fans present, which showed how difficult it was to build momentum.

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