Sir Jim Ratcliffe insists he has improved Manchester United despite a series of ‘unpopular’ decisions

Sir Jim Ratcliffe has defended some of the decisions he has made at Manchester United since taking over the club’s football operations two years ago.

Sir Jim Ratcliffe has claimed he has become “hugely unpopular” at Manchester United by making the “right” decisions.

Ratcliffe, 73, has attracted a lot of attention at Old Trafford since acquiring a 27.7% stake in United in December 2023 and taking full control of football operations in February the following year.

Some of the changes Mr Ratcliffe has made include making more than 250 jobs redundant to save an estimated £40m, scrapping the tradition of giving paid ambassadorships to former players and ordering all staff back into offices.

The club’s management team has also undergone a major shake-up, with Omar Berrada appointed as CEO and Jason Wilcox appointed as Technical Director. Dan Ashworth was hired as athletic director but left the position after less than five months.

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United have spent more than £400m on transfers since Ratcliffe arrived. This has not led to much success on the pitch so far, but the Reds won the FA Cup in 2024 and reached the Europa League final in 2025.

After winning the FA Cup, they initially retained Erik ten Hag, but later sacked him and paid the club around £21.4 million in compensation. The Reds then appointed Ruben Amorim, but sacked him last month and replaced him until the end of the season with Michael Carrick.

Ratcliffe faced some criticism from United fans and others during his first two years at United, but the INEOS boss has now defended the “difficult” but “right” decision he made.

In an interview with Sky Sports, Ratcliffe said: “We’ve seen quite a bit of this (people making unpopular decisions) at football clubs. If you do something difficult, which we felt we had to do at Manchester United… we felt it was the right thing to do, but it’s going to be very unpopular for a while.”

Ratcliffe continued: “Well, I was very unpopular at Manchester United because we’ve made a lot of changes at Manchester United. But from my perspective, things are going in a good direction and I think we’re starting to see evidence within the football club that that’s starting to pay off.”

Before mentioning United, Mr Ratcliffe had argued that Britain was being “colonized” by immigrants, who were sucking resources from the country. The Reds co-owner has told why he believes Britain faces serious political, social and economic challenges.

In his warning to the UK, Mr Ratcliffe said: “An economy with nine million people on benefits and a huge influx of immigrants is not viable. In other words, Britain has been colonized. It costs too much money. Britain has been colonized by immigrants, isn’t it?”

Ratcliffe’s United missed out on a chance for a fifth successive win after drawing 1-1 with West Ham on Tuesday. However, after giving the Hammers the lead, the Reds were heading for defeat until Benjamin Sesco scored an equalizer in stoppage time.

The points move United into fourth place in the Premier League this season with 44 points from 26 games. They have one point, two points behind third-placed Aston Villa, and will face Brighton on Wednesday.

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