Beware Manchester United fans, the Glazers are happy to pass the buck

By Oliver Holt

Published 23:00 27/10/09

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If I was a Manchester United fan, the alarm bells ringing in my head would be keeping me awake at night.

Not because of what happened at Anfield at the weekend. Although the defeat to Liverpool is part of the bigger picture.

Not because Dimitar Berbatov is still not the force United need him to be.

Or because Rio Ferdinand is still clearly struggling with injury and lack of confidence.

Or because United's midfield misses Darren Fletcher more than it should do when he is not available.

No, I'd be more worried about what happened at Wembley on Sunday evening than I would be about what happened at Anfield on Sunday afternoon.

I'd be looking at what United's owners, the Glazer family, have done to their other sporting property, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, and thinking that what happens in America usually happens in England soon afterwards.

On Sunday evening at Wembley, the Glazers' Buccaneers were hammered 35-7 by the New England Patriots in the NFL's annual excursion to these shores.

Tampa Bay hardly provide a ringing endorsement of the Glazers' ownership qualities or their ability to provide the team with enough money to compete with the rest of the league.

The defeat to the Patriots means they have now lost all seven of their matches this season, a distinction they share only with the St Louis Rams among the 32 NFL teams.

A big reason for that is that the Glazers have spent less on players than any other owners in the NFL this season. They are a whopping £19million under the league's salary cap, a record low for the NFL, and £14million less than the average spend.

Accounts also show that the Bucs are the league's lowest total spenders over the last four seasons since the Glazers began paying off interest on the huge loans they took out to buy United in 2005.

The Glazers are now disliked in Florida almost as much as they are in Manchester. They have been accused of neglecting the Buccaneers in their efforts to meet the crippling repayments on the massive debt they took on to buy United.

I've never been fans of theirs anyway. My solitary collision with the people skills of the Glazer boys was less than heart-warming.

I caught up with Bryan Glazer in Tampa earlier this year before the Super Bowl but when I got close enough to ask him a tame question, a neanderthal in sunglasses and a suit strong-armed me out of the way while Glazer fled on a golf cart.

I wouldn't have minded but it wasn't as if he was being pursued by a mob of angry United supporters. He had just spoken at an NFL Kids Day.

He'd been trying to come over all folksy for the children but the jokes were lame and it was obvious we were deep in charisma-bypass territory.

One brother's lack of personal charm is largely irrelevant, I know, and apart from regularly hiking up the price of season tickets at Old Trafford, it has been hard to criticise the Glazers much until now.

They have not interfered with Sir Alex Ferguson's movements in the transfer market. Indeed, they have backed him wholeheartedly, sanctioning big money moves for Michael Carrick, Owen Hargreaves and Berbatov.

They have also studiously avoided any criticism of Ferguson and kept a low profile in a way that has made them infinitely preferable to Tom Hicks and George Gillett at Liverpool.

But now it is beginning to seem as though many of the concerns that were voiced when the Glazers loaded the club with debt may finally be being realised.

It is the elephant in the corner at United, the thing that no-one really wants to talk about, but the team is missing Cristiano Ronaldo badly.

Real Madrid paid £80m for him in the summer but Ferguson, for whatever reason, spent only £17m of that money. That was on Antonio Valencia from Wigan Athletic and, let's be honest, he is a poor man's replacement.

So why has Ferguson not spent the rest of the money? Is it because, as he said, he thought players like Karim Benzema and Franck Ribery were overpriced?

Or is it because the debt repayments have caught up with the Glazers and the money they received for Ronaldo is a windfall they cannot release? Is it because, basically, United are skint?

The evidence provided by the parlous state of the Buccaneers is hardly reassuring. The team is in freefall. It's the worst in the league.

That will never happen to United in the Premier League but it is beyond argument that they have gone backwards since last season.

They might still win the title this season but only because Liverpool and Arsenal have gone backwards, too, and Chelsea may suffer because of their transfer embargo.

Without January reinforcements, though, this United team won't win the Champions League. No way.

A side that loses players as important as Ronaldo and Carlos Tevez needs to make a statement that says they have not suddenly becoming a selling club.

The Glazers and United have not made that statement yet. If they don't make it soon, those alarm bells are going to start ringing even louder.