Buying Manchester United
I can't help but comment on the latest attempts in the long-running saga of Tampa Bay Buccaneers owner (and Rochester-born) Malcolm Glazer's attempt to buy Manchester United Football Club. The latest news shows just how bitter the saga has become - especially following Glazer's previous failed attempt late last year. This time he looks set to succeed: he already now "owns 74.81% of the club - just short of the 75% he needs to take it private." What's going on? Maybe Glazer sees an opportunity to run Manchester United like an NFL club.
I should say that I feel strangely conflicted by this development. I don't want to see this corporate raider take over Man. U, any more than I wanted to see Rupert Murdoch buy the club a few years ago . . . and I'm definitely not a Man. U supporter, I'm not a die-hard soccer/football supporter, and I'm not even English (I have my own private hell of following Scotland's national team from one national embarrassment after another). But in my gut, I still see something about football culture that represents a challenge to a sense of U.S.-instigated global hegemony. Maybe I just feel deep down that "the Yanks" (including ex-Aussie Yanks) should just stay the hell away from European football (just as Europeans should flee from "American Football"). It's like worlds colliding! Now why is that?
Back to last December: At the time of Glazer's last effort I pointed to a fascinating piece by Slate's Daniel Gross. Now there were many compelling points made in this piece, but the most compelling, I think, was not about Glazer himself, or Man. U, or the English Premier League itself, but rather the comparison it makes between NFL and the English game. This point's been made before, but it bears repeating:
In some ways this might sound fatuous, but I think it retains the essence of truth. It's also a characterization that might be about to be swept away. Until recently, as Gross points out, "Man U. fans have had a fun time painting Glazer as the owner of a mediocre team in a grotesque sport that has the gall to call itself 'football'. And owning an NFL team is seen as nothing like owning a Premier League club." All true. But that could be about to change. And I don't think Man. U fans are having quite as much fun at Glazer's expense anymore. Up to now, owning or part-owning a major European club has still been as much about prestige, class, "nobility," and Love of the Game as about money (note that much the same used to be true about owning a Fleet Street daily, before Murdoch came along - I'll explain why I bring this up below). For Glazer, you can be sure that it's all about the money! And in the American system, you make it almost impossible not to make loads of money. Thus, the point about the American game in the quote above is telling.
Anyway: The story of a U.S. corporate raider sweeping in with a huge leveraged buyout to take over a highly regarded English business, further leverage the exploitation of its brand identity, and reconstitute it as a vastly more profitable entity - an entity that is truly global in its orientation - normally wouldn't make big news anymore. But this story is big news, and has resonated far beyond the business pages. But think about this: To do what he wants to do Glazer has to sweep aside those die-hard organic elements of the club - mostly the fans, but maybe also the traditionalists in the Football Association - who feel that the club "belongs" first and formeost to them, and not to the bean counters and the forces of global capitalism. I know it sounds odd, but this does have echoes of Rupert Murdoch's monumental 1985 battle with the print unions over moving his print empire to Wapping. Then the unions saw Murdoch as a foreign global buccaneer intent on destroying their culture and "way of life" so he could build a global media empire. Of course 500 Man U fans demonstrating outside Old Trafford are a lot less of an obstacle to global corporate capitalism than the Fleet Street print unions were. And all Glazer has to do is to get that 75%, and that will probably be that (where would the next round of resistance come from?). But there is a sense of another - quieter - sea change going on here - this time in the realm of sports rather than media. The English football league system is, in spite of the millions spent on it, still something of a local-national cottage industry compared to Major League American sports. Glazer may well see a UK, European, and global football future with single-owner superclubs and super-league cartels - "socialism for billionaires," if you like. Of course there are many, many people who would like to stop him. But you could have said the same about Murdoch.
Yes, there's lots of differences between Wapping in 1985 and Old Trafford in 2005. But if you think about this in terms of die-hard tradition and organic local culture pitched against buccaneering globalizing capitalism run amok, I think you can see some clear parallels. Sport - and especially football/soccer - is one of the few redoubts of world and national culture that has resisted the worst excesses of late modern, U.S.-inspired global capitalism. The walls of this redoubt have been crumbling for a long time - due in part to the greed of soccer's own ancien regime; they may be about to finally collapse. Just don't be surprised if, ten or twenty years from now, an English Premier League club - sorry, "franchise" - can be moved to another city - or even another country - as easily as an NFL franchise can today be moved across the U.S. at the whim of the owner.
Addendum (5.16.05, 12:15 p.m.): The BBC reports that Glazer has succeeded in securing 75% of the club, and will take it private (i.e., delist it from the stock exchange). Now we'll see if (or rather when) he tries to set Man. U on a new course - first by trying to re-negotiate Man U's Premier League television collective bargaining arrangement. We'll see what sort of resistance the other clubs put up.
I should say that I feel strangely conflicted by this development. I don't want to see this corporate raider take over Man. U, any more than I wanted to see Rupert Murdoch buy the club a few years ago . . . and I'm definitely not a Man. U supporter, I'm not a die-hard soccer/football supporter, and I'm not even English (I have my own private hell of following Scotland's national team from one national embarrassment after another). But in my gut, I still see something about football culture that represents a challenge to a sense of U.S.-instigated global hegemony. Maybe I just feel deep down that "the Yanks" (including ex-Aussie Yanks) should just stay the hell away from European football (just as Europeans should flee from "American Football"). It's like worlds colliding! Now why is that?
Back to last December: At the time of Glazer's last effort I pointed to a fascinating piece by Slate's Daniel Gross. Now there were many compelling points made in this piece, but the most compelling, I think, was not about Glazer himself, or Man. U, or the English Premier League itself, but rather the comparison it makes between NFL and the English game. This point's been made before, but it bears repeating:
The NFL is socialism for billionaires, with revenue splitting and a salary cap. The enforced parity ensures that a few teams don't dominate the league year after year. By comparison, [English] soccer is a class-based system. The clubs are sorted into different divisions. There is no salary cap. And the wealthiest and biggest clubs—Manchester United, Chelsea, Arsenal, and Liverpool—constitute a sort of permanent nobility.
In some ways this might sound fatuous, but I think it retains the essence of truth. It's also a characterization that might be about to be swept away. Until recently, as Gross points out, "Man U. fans have had a fun time painting Glazer as the owner of a mediocre team in a grotesque sport that has the gall to call itself 'football'. And owning an NFL team is seen as nothing like owning a Premier League club." All true. But that could be about to change. And I don't think Man. U fans are having quite as much fun at Glazer's expense anymore. Up to now, owning or part-owning a major European club has still been as much about prestige, class, "nobility," and Love of the Game as about money (note that much the same used to be true about owning a Fleet Street daily, before Murdoch came along - I'll explain why I bring this up below). For Glazer, you can be sure that it's all about the money! And in the American system, you make it almost impossible not to make loads of money. Thus, the point about the American game in the quote above is telling.
Anyway: The story of a U.S. corporate raider sweeping in with a huge leveraged buyout to take over a highly regarded English business, further leverage the exploitation of its brand identity, and reconstitute it as a vastly more profitable entity - an entity that is truly global in its orientation - normally wouldn't make big news anymore. But this story is big news, and has resonated far beyond the business pages. But think about this: To do what he wants to do Glazer has to sweep aside those die-hard organic elements of the club - mostly the fans, but maybe also the traditionalists in the Football Association - who feel that the club "belongs" first and formeost to them, and not to the bean counters and the forces of global capitalism. I know it sounds odd, but this does have echoes of Rupert Murdoch's monumental 1985 battle with the print unions over moving his print empire to Wapping. Then the unions saw Murdoch as a foreign global buccaneer intent on destroying their culture and "way of life" so he could build a global media empire. Of course 500 Man U fans demonstrating outside Old Trafford are a lot less of an obstacle to global corporate capitalism than the Fleet Street print unions were. And all Glazer has to do is to get that 75%, and that will probably be that (where would the next round of resistance come from?). But there is a sense of another - quieter - sea change going on here - this time in the realm of sports rather than media. The English football league system is, in spite of the millions spent on it, still something of a local-national cottage industry compared to Major League American sports. Glazer may well see a UK, European, and global football future with single-owner superclubs and super-league cartels - "socialism for billionaires," if you like. Of course there are many, many people who would like to stop him. But you could have said the same about Murdoch.
Yes, there's lots of differences between Wapping in 1985 and Old Trafford in 2005. But if you think about this in terms of die-hard tradition and organic local culture pitched against buccaneering globalizing capitalism run amok, I think you can see some clear parallels. Sport - and especially football/soccer - is one of the few redoubts of world and national culture that has resisted the worst excesses of late modern, U.S.-inspired global capitalism. The walls of this redoubt have been crumbling for a long time - due in part to the greed of soccer's own ancien regime; they may be about to finally collapse. Just don't be surprised if, ten or twenty years from now, an English Premier League club - sorry, "franchise" - can be moved to another city - or even another country - as easily as an NFL franchise can today be moved across the U.S. at the whim of the owner.
Addendum (5.16.05, 12:15 p.m.): The BBC reports that Glazer has succeeded in securing 75% of the club, and will take it private (i.e., delist it from the stock exchange). Now we'll see if (or rather when) he tries to set Man. U on a new course - first by trying to re-negotiate Man U's Premier League television collective bargaining arrangement. We'll see what sort of resistance the other clubs put up.
posted by hdougie at 9:14 PM
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