“Retooling;” that’s the word Woodward used to describe recent transfer spending, which has had pretty poor results. Despite the massive cash investments made into the players last summer and the summer prior, United will miss out on Champions League for the second time in three years unless they both beat Bournemouth and Man City loses to Swansea on Sunday.
In September of 2015, a computation within a study found that Man United had spent the third most money of any club in Europe in order to construct their roster. Here’s a link to the entire chart.
That’s very poor return on investment as United look set to miss out on the Champions League and of course the revenue that the European Cup brings. Via ESPN FC: When asked about the impact of not qualifying for the Champions League, Woodward forecast an overall impact of “high single digits.”
United’s revenue for the first three months of 2016 was £123.4m, up around 30 percent year on year. Their commercial revenues of £65.8m were up 37.7 percent for the quarter.
Perhaps most importantly, Ed Woodward reassured investors on the call that the club will reach half a billion in annual revenue for the first time ever. Woodward is just a phenomenal businessman. He’s not a good football man though. It’s no coincidence that the team has gotten so much worse since David Gill and Sir Alex Ferguson were replaced.
Woodward, and the club, would be best served if he sticks to the business side of things, where he is indeed a tremendous talent, and lets someone else handle the player roster decisions. Most importantly, he needs to find a real long term solution at manager who can make it all come together.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. and News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, currently contributes regularly to the Chicago Tribune’s RedEye publication and Bold Global.
He also consistently appears on numerous talk shows all across the country. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram