Sir Jim Ratcliffe would sell Manchester United to Qataris on one condition | OneFootball

Manchester United co-owner Sir Jim Ractiffle reveals the only scenario which would see him sell his shares at the club, albeit it’s unlikely to occur anytime soon.

In December 2023, the British billionaire acquired a 25% stake from the Glazers who remain the club’s majority owners. However, the 72-year-old and his group, INEOS, took over the club’s day-to-day operations.

But after taking over a club that is seemingly heading into a financial disaster, the 72-year-old found himself forced to take a series of drastic cost-cutting measures, including massive redundancies. Unfortunately for Ratcliffe, this marked him as one of the most unpopular men in Manchester at the moment, something he’s struggling to deal with.

“Change requires some unpopular decisions,” said Ratcliffe during his interview with Gary Neville on The Overlap. “And I have to accept I’m going to be unpopular.

“I don’t know how long I’ll be unpopular; maybe I’ll be unpopular for a long period of time, but I think it’s worth being unpopular to fight our way through the changes that are necessary to get Manchester United back to where it should be, and hopefully, the attitudes will change a bit if we come out the other side with a successful outcome.”

“I think, ultimately, we’ll come out of this difficult period, and we’ll find ourselves in a much sunnier place, I do. I mean, otherwise, I couldn’t deal with what I’m having to deal with at the moment because it’s not very nice when you go home to Manchester, and you’ve got people saying some quite unpleasant things; that’s not very nice; I don’t need that, really, to be honest, at my age.”

Sir Jim Ratcliffe would sell Man Utd if he loses faith in the project

Hence, Ratcliffe insisted he’s only in it for the love he bears for the Red Devils. Nevertheless, he admits he’ll consider selling the club to Arab investors in case he ends up losing belief in the cause.

“[I’m doing this] because I really like Manchester, you know, Manchester United’s been my boyhood club, and I believe that we can sort it out; if I didn’t believe it, I wouldn’t do it, would I? I’d sell it to the Qataris or something… [but] I think we’ll get there with Manchester United.”

This is obviously a reference to Sheikh Jassim, the chairman of Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB), who launched a bid to buy the club from the Glazer family in 2023 but to no avail.