Pundits: Steven Howard - Fans ‘Sold Down The River’
Sun: MANCHESTER UNITED fans have been sold down the river.
Even worse, they are having to pay through the nose for the privilege. All round, the 2-0 home Carling Cup defeat by Coventry — and the score could have been far worse — stunk the place out.
First, we have the price that the fans have to pay to watch a shambles like this. Thanks to the Glazer effect, many United supporters claim to have been blackmailed into attending cup matches if they want a season ticket.
In the old days, season-ticket holders were provided with the option of purchasing a seat for the Champions League, FA Cup and Carling Cup.
Now it is compulsory to buy one — even if you are ill, on holiday or working. Which most of the ‘official’ 74,000 wished they had been on Wednesday night.
So more money is squeezed out of United’s huge army of supporters to service the £650million debt the Glazers lumbered the club with to buy into Old Trafford.
Now the word is the Americans want to refinance — and are looking to raise another £300m. And we all know who will eventually fund that — and how.
No wonder United fans are growing increasingly disenchanted. Then we come to the match itself. Despite the evidence provided by last season’s embarrassing 1-0 defeat at Southend of the perils of sending out a seriously-weakened team, boss Alex Ferguson persisted with this policy against Coventry.
It is either arrogance or contempt for the Carling Cup itself. The latter, though, would be surprising — seeing United’s success in winning the tournament in 2005-06 saved Fergie from even more criticism after two seasons of failing to land any other silverware.
It certainly can’t be complacency. The Southend result — plus goalless FA Cup draws at Burton and at home to Exeter — was concrete evidence that United don’t have either the fringe players or youngsters to take risks.
Yet in his programme notes for the Coventry game, Fergie maintained: “The boys I put out are good enough to win the Carling Cup. I would have no qualms playing any of them in our first team.”
The horror-show they then produced made a mockery of that. Their performance was so poor, Ferguson can be accused of taking his fans for a ride.
Not only were they having to pay extra to get in, they were also being asked to watch the equivalent of the reserves.
United will counter there was a 25 per cent discount, though this still left supporters forking out between £19 and £33.
Fans will further counter they should be refunded their money after sitting through this grotesque masquerade.
Twenty-four hours earlier, Arsenal had pulled in 60,000 for the visit of Newcastle. Of those, 51,000 paid £20 for adults and £10 for children. And look at the performance they got.
Because of the huge depth of talent at the Emirates, based on an exceptional scouting system assembled painstakingly by boss Arsene Wenger, Arsenal CAN afford to play what looks like a second-string team.
While Ferguson brags of putting out ‘boys good enough to win the Carling Cup’, Arsenal almost did it — stopped only by Chelsea in the final last year. Then there’s Chelsea. One of former chief Jose Mourinho’s best qualities was his bravery in attempting to win every trophy — and that meant fielding near full-strength teams the whole time.
This policy was continued at Hull on Wednesday. Even Liverpool fielded a side at Reading on Tuesday with Jamie Carragher, Fernando Torres, Steve Finnan, Momo Sissoko, Peter Crouch and Yossi Benayoun.
There is certainly no complacency or arrogance here. United, though, chose to start with only one player who knew what British cup football is about — John O’Shea.
Yes, there were recognisable names in Nani and Anderson but neither of these players — who cost an astonishing £39m between them — had any idea of what they were being let in for. As their performances proved.
Since the golden generation of the early 90s, there have been remarkably few success stories from an academy on which United have lavished millions.
Incredibly, United are playing second fiddle to neighbours City who, in recent years, have produced Micah Richards, Shaun Wright-Phillips, Joey Barton, Michael Johnson, Stephen Ireland and Nedum Onuoha.
On Wednesday’s evidence, the better option might be for United to keep spending huge sums in the transfer market. But how much longer can that continue with the current credit squeeze damaging the Glazers’ attempts to refinance?
As it is, their repayment schedule on interest alone is estimated in some quarters at a staggering £62m a year.
And how much longer can they rely on the goodwill and support of the cash cow that is their vast fanbase?
Not long ago, United had a waiting list for season tickets of between 12,000-18,000. That has now dwindled to zero.
If the club continue to take their fans for granted — and fail to beef up their youth system — it ain’t going to get any better.
