Storm clouds gather over Old Trafford

Wayne Rooney’s surprising agreement to a new five-year contract with Manchester United, considering the amount of press coverage his apparent fallout with manager Sir Alex Ferguson generated in the space of days, is only a respite from the club’s current problems.

Granted, Ferguson once again showed his managerial skill in keeping Rooney for another five years when all seemed lost, but the fact that the confrontation between player and manager came about at all shows a club that while seemingly stable is an institution going through change.

This change can be divided into three separate eras, with the duration between them constantly shrinking. First there was the pre-Abramovich era. United, from their commanding fortress of Old Trafford, conquered the English game for most of the 1990s and early 2000s. The only exception was Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal, including the “Unbeatables”, who with Thierry Henry at the peak of his powers, showed an alternative to that of their north-eastern rivals. Perhaps that is why Wenger and Ferguson, while from different sides of the soccer track, are driven by their passion for the game and perhaps at a more personal level, their passion for being pushed on by each other. Ferguson and Wenger built their respective sides from scratch and though Ferguson had the head start with United’s economic dominance, Wenger’s achievements, regardless of what he might still achieve, stand up to the foulest scrutiny.

Liverpool more recently painted themselves in this light, but from United’s point of view, Rafael Benitez was just another victim in Ferguson’s long and weather-tested career of going toe-to-toe with his opposite number and winning. The old Scot has left a platoon’s worth of challengers on the side of the road as his team went about their business in claiming title after title and Benitez, partly because of himself and on the other hand events beyond his control, didn’t last in their war of attrition.

The sea change then began with the arrival of the Abramovich era. His buyout of Chelsea in 2003 represented the beginning of the Premier League’s “Big Men” era, reminiscent of Africa’s colonial history. His acquisition was the watershed moment in Premier League economics: rich owners bankrolling the clubs they buy. He attracted a manager with a personality that rivalled Ferguson’s in Jose Mourinho, who is a likely bet to take over at Old Trafford once Ferguson departs the scene. Liverpool, Aston Villa, Newcastle, Birmingham, West Ham along with United themselves all eventually went the same way. Bought by foreign owners, the landscape of the Premier League developed and now is firmly international in flavour. For United, this meant being bought by the Glazers, who in doing so, plunged one of England’s most successful clubs into debt. What the Glazers brought to the table was their marketing experience from the US, still a relatively untapped source of revenue for English soccer at the stage of their acquisition. United’s signing of a shared marketing agreement with the New York Yankees, the US’s most successful baseball team, was in part driven by the Glazer revolution to gain an early foothold in the US. The BBC’s coverage of “The Business of Sport” is something you should have a squizz at if economics of sport in today’s global economy interests you.

Now, the third era is under way. What began this sinister new epoch? The purchase of Manchester City by the Abu Dhabi government, or more accurately a member of the ruling family. Sheikh Mansour’s wealth is so vast that it makes Roman Abramovich’s fortune, currently about $1 billion, look like a kiddie pool in comparison to the Sheikh’s Olympic-size bathtub. Even for a league now used to owner buyouts, the amount of money Manchester City have spent in their quest to change the status quo of the English game is quite astonishing. Ninety percent of their revenue is used to cover wages, while they have spent approximately half a billion pounds in acquiring new talent. Manchester City pose the biggest threat to the rest of the league via their Fantasy Team approach, buying who they want, regardless of the name. Their antics have destabilised the international transfer market because City are now the biggest fish in the pond. Everyone else has to be weary because City’s involvement in any potential transfer will push up the price of a deal because everyone knows, and I mean everyone, that the price for the blue half of Manchester is irrelevant.

United in the meantime haven’t strengthened their squad to nearly the same degree, relying upon a team structure where Paul Scholes is very important (especially with Michael Carrick’s fall from grace last season). Scholes, apart from being one of the Premier League’s top passers, is verging on the end of his career, and United don’t have a replacement that can match him. When rumours surfaced that Wesley Sneijder might be heading to Old Trafford before the season began, there was general optimism that another creative force in the midfield was just what United needed. However, that ship has now sailed and though we still have a while to see if Javier Hernandez can cut the mustard, the lack of star power in United’s line-up, in comparison to Chelsea and City especially, is something that tells its own story.

This isn’t to say that United won’t be able to compete. Of course they will since Ferguson has got excellent value from the likes of Luis Nani, Park Ji-Sung, Darren Fletcher (United’s version of Claude Makalele), Antonio Valencia and finally Dimitar Berbatov (who always had it). Man for man the United side is no longer the best in the league, and if you drop a step further, their bench in comparison to their rivals is shorn of quality and perhaps more importantly experience.

Manchester United is still the world’s richest football club, but there is no doubt that it is no longer the force in the English Premier League. That became very apparent at the beginning of the Big Men era, but now with cracks such as Rooney’s displeasure with a squad lacking the same type of depth (though Ferguson might disagree) in comparison to his rivals, something which Wenger coincidentally knows a lot about it, things are not all well at Old Trafford. Include the debt that looms large over any conversation about the Red Devils, the next couple of seasons will prove to be very important to the future of Manchester United Football Club. Liverpool are an example of what can go wrong, so United be warned.