Richard Arnold, one of the top lieutenants to the Glazer family, will soon no longer be the Manchester United Football Club Chief Executive Officer. He’ll be replaced by Patrick Stewart, one of the club’s top legal counsel, on an interim basis.
This will take effect once Arnold departs at the end of the calendar year. Although it is worth noting that we have known for some time that Arnold was not long for this role at the club.
As The Athletic reported, Arnold “was expected to depart if Sir Jim Ratcliffe succeeded in his bid to buy a 25 per cent stake in the club.” While the club itself has yet to confirm the investment from Ratcliffe at this point, the departure of Arnold is yet another strong signal that it is indeed going to happen.
Richard Arnold, who replaced the deeply unpopular Ed Woodward in February of 2022, wasn’t exactly extremely popular with fans himself.
He was considered by many to be just be another yes man for the Glazers, and his egregious mishandling of the Mason Greenwood situation only further diminished his reputation.
While the Greenwood situation was rather delicate and difficult for any club executive to deal with, Arnold truly made it all much worse, and it’s not even completely resolved yet, despite the player’s legal issues first beginning in January of 2022.
So who is Stewart, other than the club’s top lawyer? Well, he’s also a member of the club’s board, and an arbitrator at the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
He also has the same name as a very popular actor, who was the lead on an extremely popular television series, so the jokes inspired by that have already started (see the graphic from Paddy Power below)
Stewart will only serve in the role on a caretaker basis, with the club looking to eventually appoint someone new to the CEO role. According to The Athletic, former Juventus CEO Jean-Claude Blanc is considered to be among the candidates.
Paul M. Banks is the owner/manager of The Sports Bank. He’s also the author of “Transatlantic Passage: How the English Premier League Redefined Soccer in America,” and “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry.”
He’s written for numerous publications, including the New York Daily News, Sports Illustrated and the Chicago Tribune. He regularly appears on NTD News and WGN News Now, while writing for the International Baseball Writers Association of America. You can follow the website on Twitter.