Man Utd co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe and other members of the Old Trafford hierarchy were talked down from a potential ’20 per cent rise’ in season ticket prices.
The British billionaire completed a deal to buy 27.7 per cent of Man Utd a year ago as the Glazer family sold part of the club.
It has already been a rocky road for Ratcliffe and his INEOS team with many of their decisions criticised during their first year in charge.
Ratcliffe has announced hundreds of redundancies, cut lunches for staff, cut the ambassadorial wages of three club icons and terminated Sir Alex Ferguson’s £2 million annual salary as a global ambassador.
The Man Utd co-owner also chose to keep on Erik ten Hag in the summer before making a change early on this season, replacing him with Ruben Amorim.
But Ratcliffe and the rest of the Man Utd board could have avoided yet further pain by announcing a five per cent rise in adult season ticket prices, as opposed to the 20 per cent one which was originally discussed.
The Athletic have revealed that ‘substantial lobbying’ from the Fans’ Advisory Board led to Man Utd coming down from 20 per cent.
The report said:
‘The Athletic has been told the club were initially aiming for a 20 per cent rise, but substantial lobbying and extensive consultation by the club’s Fans’ Advisory Board (FAB) — a small number of unpaid supporters who give up their time to argue in the interests of supporters — contributed to the club searching for different solutions which better protected season-ticket holders. This accounts for around 50,000 seats within Old Trafford’s 74,000-capacity stadium.
‘FAB was established in the aftermath of United’s secret and doomed plan to join a European Super League in 2021 and this exercise appears to have shown the significance of dialogue and engagement, even in a world where some sections of United’s support appear to favour a protest-first approach to their complaints. During this process, United’s fan representatives made their case directly to Ratcliffe, chief executive Omar Berrada and chief financial officer Roger Bell.
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‘Yet direct action may not be without its impact. Ratcliffe, for example, appeared visibly stunned when he attended a game at Fulham’s Craven Cottage earlier this season to hear his name sung in disparaging and abusive terms by the club’s travelling support. Then, when he wound down the window to speak to a fan outside the stadium, Ratcliffe appeared to presume the supporter wanted a photograph, when in fact he was about to be admonished for a rise in ticket prices.
‘United first angered fans in November when they took the unusual step of altering their ticket strategy in the middle of the season. They also abandoned concessions, meaning ticket prices for unsold or returned tickets would then be £66 for the remainder of the campaign.
‘United’s leadership were shaken by the reaction and they have responded by reintroducing concessions to ticket sales for non-season-ticket holders, although these tickets will be subject to the match categorisation model. In all likelihood, many factors, including a record season of underperformance in the Premier League, have likely contributed to the overall prices not being quite as bad as some feared they might be.’
