Manchester United have voted against the possible introduction of a new Premier League spending cap, and will have no regrets about doing so.
The only others among the 20 member teams to vote against it on Monday at a shareholders’ meeting in London were Manchester City and Aston Villa, with Chelsea choosing to abstain. However, only 14 clubs need to vote the same way for a proposal to pass, meaning the consensus for it to go to the next stage was overwhelmingly in favour.
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The expectation is the new spending cap will be formally put to clubs at this year’s annual general meeting in June.
The new rules, based on the concept of “anchoring”, are due to be introduced for the 2025-26 season and would limit the amount of money any one club can invest by linking the figure to a multiple of what the lowest earners among the 20 sides get from the league’s centralised broadcast deals.
If the new spending cap rules are to have any chance of being voted through in June, the league knows it must also be approved by the Professional Football Negotiating and Consultative Committee. That is the body that brings the Professional Footballers’ Association (PFA — the players’ trade union), the FA, English Football League (EFL) and Premier League together to discuss matters relating to the employment of players.
“We will obviously wait to see further details of these specific proposals, but we have always been clear that we would oppose any measure that would place a ‘hard’ cap on player wages,” a PFA spokesperson said. “There is an established process in place to ensure that proposals like this, which would directly impact our members, must be properly consulted on.”
GO DEEPER
Premier League clubs to vote on introducing new spending cap
When the concept was initially floated last year, the top-to-bottom multiple being bandied around between clubs was four and a half, but the Premier League, facing criticism from several teams, raised the possibility of increasing it to five.
The idea is that the cap will become a backstop to the squad-cost rule, which limits the amount clubs can spend to their own revenues. Suggesting a possible increase from four and a half to five was done to placate its most vocal critics and, given only three voted against its introduction, it worked.
But even though the informal vote was expected to pass, United wanted to make a stand.
INEOS, which is the club’s new minority shareholder but has the overall say on football operations, was the driving force behind United’s decision to vote against the Premier League.
There is a belief it would slow down INEOS’ attempt to turn the tide quickly at Old Trafford, while also undermining the ability of United — and other English clubs — to compete at the highest level in the European tournaments.
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The Glazer family, still United’s majority owners, are consulted on big governance issues and that was no different with Monday’s vote, which was attended by Patrick Stewart, the club’s interim chief executive.
Sir Dave Brailsford, INEOS’ director of sport, has told people he does not like the proposal, and United think its introduction would punish them for their success in being able to generate significant revenues year after year.
These revenues, they feel, have been built over decades of sporting achievement and their historical standing in football. This, for example, is why Adidas, their kit supplier, agreed in July to a record 10-year-long deal worth £900million ($1.1bn) to carry on making the club’s football shirts.
Given the vast sums being brought into the club, United wonder why they should be prevented from flexing their financial muscle.
INEOS knows fixing United at pace is going to cost a lot of money and the proposed spending cap rule would slow that process down, so its opposition to the plan is a reflection of their current reality and runs counter to their longer-term interests.
United, like all the game’s other established aristocrats, have always enthusiastically backed financial fair play rules connected to club revenues, as they bolster those sides who have already made it and slow down arriviste disruptors such as Manchester City, Paris Saint-Germain and Newcastle United.
There is an argument to make that, if their team were in better shape on the pitch in terms of results, United would not be that bothered by this hard cap, either, as it is pretty loose and they should not really be breaching it. Not if they want to stop losing money, anyway — and neither INEOS nor the Glazers want to keep losing money.
United’s commercial department is often viewed as industry-leading, and although the concept of tethering the top to the bottom has the ultimate aim of balancing out the Premier League, they feel it reduces their chances of winning at European level. In turn, United believe English clubs failing in the UEFA competitions would lead to an erosion of the Premier League’s standing on the global stage.
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But Kieran Maguire, a football finance expert and lecturer at the University of Liverpool, believes the new spending cap rules would not damage United’s chances of flexing their muscles domestically or in Europe.
“If you use a 4.5 multiplier, then Chelsea and Manchester City are impacted,” Maguire tells The Athletic. “If it’s a multiple of five, then it’s only Chelsea impacted, so there isn’t a huge issue.
“In terms of their competitiveness in Europe, I don’t really think that argument holds much water. There are cost-control rules in operation in Spain’s La Liga, which effectively say how much money you have next year minus your loan repayments and running costs and that is your wage limit.
“There is a wage limit in Spain, German clubs under the 50+1 rule really are not a threat to English clubs — Bayern Munich operate on a different financial plane. Italy? Again, it’s not an issue because they don’t generate a lot of money from their TV deal, which is half of that in the UK.
“They (United) don’t like the direction of travel of the clubs they see as potential threats chipping away at them. United’s new kit deal is worth £900million over the next 10 years, but that increase is completely disregarded under the tethering rules. United will say they have historically sold kits and will question why they shouldn’t be rewarded in terms of what they can spend on wages.”
The alternative view to United feeling hard done by is that, by introducing the concept of anchoring, you are putting the clubs on a more even keel.
Having a hard cap linked to central broadcast income, which clubs cannot manipulate with generous commercial agreements signed with related parties, cleverly links their ability to spend to something that cannot be inflated.
Under the squad-cost rules, it would be easier for a team such as United to go out and find a new commercial deal worth millions, which in turn increases what they spend. A Premier League club of Brentford’s lesser stature, for example, will not have that luxury.
If you do not add anchoring as a backstop, the gulf between the Premier League’s top sides and those operating outside the elite will only widen.
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“The reason why Manchester United don’t like that is because they have been successful commercially and believe that should be taken into overall consideration in terms of what they can spend,” Maguire adds. “It is taken into account under the 70 per cent rules, but it is ignored if you use tethering, because that is just based on broadcast income.”
There is a feeling at United that, following 2021’s European Super League fiasco, a concept they signed up to and are still contracted to, they had to roll over and lose their voice at Premier League level.
Monday’s vote, however, is a sign they have had enough of sitting on the sidelines and want to start throwing their weight around again.
Despite losing the lobbying battle on the new spending cap rules, it is perhaps a window into what an INEOS-led United are going to look like.
(Top photo: Bradley Collyer/PA Images via Getty Images)