Paul Lewis: Beware double Glazer salesmen

Until the smoke clears from the fire-fight over Malcolm Glazer's financial assault upon - and conquering of - Fortress Manchester United, we will probably not know if the United fans will swing their baleful gaze on manager Sir Alex Ferguson.

Ferguson it was who introduced the two Irish magnates, J. P. McManus and John Magnier, to the club and Ferguson it was who provoked them to buy up a significant number of United shares.

This occurred because of the much-publicised argument over the ownership of stud rights to the champion racehorse Rock of Gibraltar. The two Irishmen then increased their shareholding to put pressure on Ferguson, calling for inquiries into the club's and Ferguson's dealings until Ferguson relinquished the claim to the horse's reproductive capacities.

It is not too long a bow to draw to suggest that Ferguson was the catalyst that saw the two Irishmen perform the act (of selling to Glazer) that some see as treachery and some see as a petty revenge on Ferguson.

The real reason is likely to be more prosaic: money. The Irish duo, already wealthy men, played a brinkmanship game with the hungry Glazer. When the price and conditions were right, they bit his hand off and walked away with a 90m profit (NZ$250m).

If you are detecting a common thread here, it is a thing called greed. Greed by Ferguson - he co-owned the racehorse with Magnier's wife after paying 120,000 ($310,000) for an animal which came to be worth 60m. But that did not stop the argument over the ownership of stud fees. Greed by Magnier and McManus - 90m is a nice little earner, thank you very much. See you later, United. Greed by the shareholders who sold out to Glazer's fat offer. Greed by Glazer himself. Greed by players, with their enormous salaries and transfer fees, and by those who earn commission off same - agents and others.

However, three points have to be made: (1) there is nothing illegal or even underhand about what has happened at Manchester United. It is standard stock-exchange procedure; (2) there's nothing illegal about earning big money, even if the morality seems questionable; (3) a sport that plays with the devil's dollars can hardly complain when the devil buys them out.

And yet even now it appears that Glazer might not quite be the devil he is painted.

Last week, we ran the story that United may have to find 46m in interest alone to keep afloat - a sum more than double United's profit last year. It now transpires that Glazer may only need 16m - because much of the money he is borrowing is on a basis where the interest is compounded up and paid when the loans are redeemed, probably in five years. Of that 16m, Glazer will recoup 10m when he delists the company and does not have to pay dividends to shareholders.

The implication is clear. Glazer has five years (or whenever the loans come due) to turn United into an even richer club so that he can either repay the loans or sell it on. Again, this is hardly the stuff of a piratical raider. As a businessman, Glazer will be aiming to profit. There is no profit in him running the club down.

The fans fear that player purchases and their ability to challenge Chelsea and Roman Abramovic's billions (although he paid a lot less for Chelsea than Glazer has for United) will be compromised by a club so heavily burdened with debt that the need for prudence will restrain the club's buying and selling.

But the first act under the new Glazer regime was that Ryan Giggs and reserve goalkeeper Tim Howard both had their contracts renewed. This was a surprise because Giggs was to have been let go under the old United regime because of the club's policy on over-30s. Howard, in spite of his talent, had a wretched year peppered with embarrassingly public errors and could easily have been shifted on for a good fee. Doesn't sound like the act of a money-hungry regime snapping shut the purse, does it?

Those sports which have not yet scaled the global heights of football can learn a lesson: Don't let dollars drive you into a whirlpool of greed and personality and a global takeover triggered by something as ludicrous as a racehorse's sperm count. Neither Ferguson, nor the Irishmen, nor Glazer need more money. Who knows what drives them?

Rugby, for example, has nothing like football's global appeal. But one of the reasons the New Zealand Rugby Union originally named the Super 12 franchises the way they did (the Blues, Chiefs, Crusaders, etc, instead of regional or geographic names) was to prepare for the (far-off) day when they could be sold to private interests.

Maybe that day will come. Until then, watch carefully the epic tale of greed unfolding at Manchester United and let's ensure we find a way where sport stays above money, instead of money using sport as a, well, football.

If such a thing is possible.

- HERALD ON SUNDAY