Joel Glazer Last Attended Old Trafford in 2019 as United Crisis Deepens

• Manchester United lost 3-0 at home to Bournemouth and sit two points off the bottom of the Premier League, with Michael Carrick’s future under review.
• Joel Glazer last attended a game at Old Trafford in April 2019, while the Glazer family still holds nearly 72% of the club.
• Supporters sang against the Glazers, Sir Jim Ratcliffe and director of football Jason Wilcox, and unfurled a “Standards” banner.

Silence From the Owners as Fans Turn on Everyone

Joel Glazer has not watched Manchester United at Old Trafford in more than seven years. The co-chairman last attended a game there in April 2019, when United hosted Barcelona. Now the team sits two points off the bottom of the Premier League, its manager is waiting to learn his fate, and the Glazer family has said nothing at all.

United lost 3-0 at home to Bournemouth on Sunday, their eighth game without a win in all competitions. Carrick’s bosses are in serious talks about his future, and the head coach could not say whether he will be in charge for Saturday’s trip to Chelsea. The people who own nearly 72% of the club are, in the words of ESPN’s Mark Ogden, “silent and invisible”.

The Owners Who Hold the Switch

The Glazers handed control of football operations to Sir Jim Ratcliffe in February 2024 in exchange for a £1.5bn deal for a 28% stake. They kept their majority, and they kept control of any sale. A drag-along clause in their agreement, live from August 2025, lets them force Ratcliffe out of his stake if they sell the club to a third party.

The clock is running on that arrangement. Until February 2027, Ratcliffe is entitled to $33 a share, the price he paid, if the Glazers sell. That floor expires in four months. United stock closed at $20.61 on the New York Stock Exchange last Friday. Sources say there is no market right now for buyers of a Premier League club, least of all one with United’s problems, and Manchester City’s appeal against a guilty verdict on 114 of 115 charges is keeping potential investors on the sidelines.

One source said the Glazers are waiting for the right moment to cash in. Two other triggers were named: construction of a new stadium, which would lift the club’s value, and the prospect of City being thrown out of the Premier League, which would remove a powerful rival. For now United stay in limbo.

Ratcliffe Takes the Blame From the Directors’ Box

Ratcliffe promised to revive the club when he arrived. In the time he has run football operations, he has hired and fired senior executives, overseen a run of failed managerial appointments, cut transfer and salary budgets and presided over almost 500 job cuts at Old Trafford. One source said the handling of those job cuts did not sit well with Joel and Avram Glazer, and jarred with Joel’s “sense of decency and old-fashioned values.”

A source who watched the Bournemouth defeat from the directors’ box offered a blunt assessment. “The fans were all singing about the Glazers, but I’m not sure they realize how bad Jim is,” the source said. “He couldn’t have masterminded a worse situation.” The source added: “He’s downgraded in all departments. It’s basically the opposite of what he said his strategy is.”

Old Trafford Delivers Its Verdict

Supporters did not wait long to air their grievances. Anti-Glazer and anti-Ratcliffe songs rang out inside the first minute on Sunday. Fans sang Carrick’s name as he walked around the pitch, then turned on the players the moment he left, booing until Diogo Dalot was the last to leave. A “Standards” banner on the Stretford End showed Bryan Robson, Eric Cantona and Roy Keane.

Wilcox heard obscenities sung about him in the game and was booed as he climbed into the vehicle taking him away, nearly two hours after the final whistle. He had sat next to chief executive Omar Berrada, who also worked with Wilcox at Manchester City, and United’s fans sang about that link too.

The anger runs wider than results. All of United’s major fan groups condemned a ticket touting investigation launched in the summer, which supporters read as an attempt to push regular match-goers out in favour of corporate sales. The club says that is not the case. Plans for a new 100,000-capacity stadium costing more than £2bn, with £63.5m already spent on land, drew a message from the Stretford End that it had no interest. The debt the Glazers loaded onto the club has grown to more than £1.15bn according to the latest accounts, and the interest bill has reached £852m, according to finance blogger Swiss Ramble.

A Hands-On Owner Turned Absentee

Joel Glazer was once so involved that, according to multiple sources, he signed off a paint order for the maintenance team and spoke to Ed Woodward several times a day. He also vetoed plans to furlough staff in the pandemic, keeping employees on full pay. Now he and Avram are watching from the United States.

Carrick told reporters: “The responsibility is mine.” BBC Sport’s Simon Stone wrote that the reaction from the stands showed a change of head coach will not settle the unrest at the club.