Manchester United are considering selling Old Trafford naming rights

Manchester United are considering selling the naming rights to a refurbished Old Trafford or a new-build stadium as co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe tries to raise revenue to finance the project, while the club is also deliberating on substantial ticket price increases.

United has also held exploratory talks with major financial institutions, including Bank of America, as it explores a range of financing options to raise the capital needed to cover the potential multi-billion pound project.

Manchester United declined to comment on all the points raised in this report, but club sources – who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issues – insisted that while discussions had taken place, no decisions had yet been made. Bank of America did not respond to a request for comment.

It is not clear at this stage whether the club or INEOS, the company owned by Ratcliffe, would bear the burden of fresh debt if money is borrowed to finance the infrastructure project. United’s financial results, published for the second quarter of the financial year in March, showed the club still had debts totaling £653.3m, excluding money owed from transfer fees, mostly as property inheritance the Glazer family’s sole control of the club before selling. a stake to Ratcliffe and handed over operational control of the club to the British businessman.

Those financial results also revealed that £120m of Ratcliffe’s £238m cash injection into the club – which had been pledged to go towards infrastructure – was used to pay the money on United’s revolving credit facility. United’s logic might have been that reducing debt on the high-interest loan would later allow them to borrow money through a different mechanism at a lower interest rate and use it for infrastructure investment.

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United’s 114-year-old stadium has always been known as Old Trafford and the club has never sold the naming rights to the stadium. While stadiums in Europe and the United States have long been associated with major brands, it has been a more contentious issue in England, where supporters value the history of a stadium’s name.

More recently built stadiums such as Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium or Manchester City’s Etihad Stadium have secured lucrative naming rights deals. In each case, the airlines acquired the rights not only to the stadium name but also to the jersey sponsorship.

A number of clubs have entered into naming rights deals for stadiums (Justin Setterfield/Getty Images)

In the event of a redevelopment, one option may be for United to retain the Old Trafford name but look to have an associated partner. The English national arena, for example, is called Wembley Stadium, connected by EE, for which the network provider pays £10 million a year. A similar approach has seen teams retain traditional names for stadiums by attaching a sponsor – such as Spotify’s Camp Nou in Barcelona or cricket grounds including Manchester’s Emirates Old Trafford and London’s Kia Oval.

However, in the event of a new build, United are open to selling the name outright, which they hope would fetch tens of millions of pounds.

United have yet to reveal how they plan to fund either a refurbishment or a new build, but the Glazers have never shown any inclination to self-fund United’s ambitions, while Ratcliffe’s INEOS is likely to seek a mix of public funding and private partners or debts in to carry out the work.

It then opens up long-term questions about how the revenue will enable the club to recoup costs. Naming rights are one way, while ticket price increases were mooted as a way for the club to boost revenue when the Glazer family pitched potential investors during the strategic review process that culminated in Ratcliffe becoming a co-owner at the start this year.

United will already increase the price of season tickets by five per cent for the 2024-25 season. It is the second increase they have introduced to season tickets after 11 consecutive seasons of price freezes, having also introduced a five per cent rise for their 2022-23 season tickets. However, in the case of a substantial stadium project, United are now considering additional ticket price increases to help manage project costs and keep revenue high enough for the team to be competitive on the field.

United’s stadium plans came under fire in May after the club’s long-running problem with a leaking roof was further exposed when Old Trafford looked washed out towards the end of the Premier League defeat to Arsenal.

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Speaking to British and international journalists in February, Ratcliffe said the stadium was second only to the team’s performance on the pitch as the most talked about issues at United. Ratcliffe himself described United’s stadium as a “waterfall” in an interview this month. He stressed that in a world of tightened financial fair play, where club losses are more closely monitored by both the Premier League and UEFA, optimizing revenue from best-in-class stadiums is essential.

He estimated that a refurbishment of Old Trafford could cost around £1billion – a scenario in which United would take the capacity to between 80,000 and 90,000. He said a newly built stadium, which he explained was his personal preference but not necessarily feasible, would cost £2bn.

Ratcliffe has spoken of his desire to create a “Wembley of the North” and enlisted Sebastian Coe, who chaired the London 2012 Olympics organizing committee, to lead a task force to explore the regeneration of Old Trafford. Former United captain Gary Neville is also a member, while Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham and Trafford Council CEO Sara Todd are also involved.

The working group will explore how to finance the project. A variety of potential sources of private funding will be explored, the cost of building a new stadium and/or a wider regeneration scheme which may require additional financial partners. In May, Ratcliffe met soon-to-be Prime Minister Labor leader Sir Keir Starmer to discuss proposals for the stadium to be the centerpiece of a potential sports, leisure and business campus.

Ratcliffe oversees big changes at Old Trafford (Stu Forster/Getty Images)

Ratcliffe’s previous appeal for public funding assistance is for the regeneration of the wider area, rather than United’s stadium, and this has been encouraged by Burnham, the mayor of Greater Manchester, but the wider public may need some convincing, given that Ratcliffe is domiciled in Monaco. and United’s controlling shareholders, the Glazers, have extracted more than £166m in dividends from the club during their ownership, while they recently received $1.3bn from Ratcliffe for 27% of the club.

Talking to The Athletic in 2022, legendary United striker Eric Cantona said he would “quit football forever” if United sold their naming rights. Cantona remains involved in marketing campaigns with United, most recently helping to launch their shirt with new front sponsor Snapdragon.

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Cantona said: “Now all the stadiums are called Emirates or Allianz. These stadiums have lost the soul and history of the club, like Arsenal and West Ham. We played in those old stadiums like Highbury and Upton Park. I spoke to a few Arsenal fans and they hate these (new) stadiums. These fans have lost the soul of their clubs.

“Thankfully Old Trafford is still Old Trafford. Anfield is still Anfield.

“But can you imagine Old Trafford becoming a brand new stadium? If one day they do that, I’m sorry but I’m not a United fan anymore. And I gave up football forever!

“But please don’t call this stadium Nestle, or Amazon, please. Old Trafford is Old Trafford.”

(Top photo: Peter Byrne/PA Images via Getty Images)