Less than a fortnight since news of the first meeting of the Red Knights around a table in Fleet Street leaked, the battle lines have been drawn. On one side a group of up to 70 wealthy investors are prepared to pool their finances to fund a bid for the club, backed by a well marshalled supporters' movement that has signed up more than 131,000 fans in the wake of Wednesday night's timely boost from David Beckham. On the other are the incumbent American owners who continue to insist they are going nowhere and will remain in place for years to come.
It is a battle being fought through a combination of old-fashioned protest and the latest digital campaigning techniques. The advice of Blue State Digital, the online firm behind Barack Obama's presidential campaign, has been crucial in co-ordinating efforts to maintain momentum. The next stage will be to try to recruit Manchester United legends to the cause, including Beckham and Eric Cantona. They must reconcile an essentially socialist protest movement with a market-driven takeover bid from some of the most rapacious names in corporate hedge funds and investment banking.
The common ground is that all are convinced the Glazers' model is unsustainable. "These are people who want the Glazers out of their club. If they were looking for a profit there are plenty of other places they could put their money," said one source close to the Knights. The Glazers continue to claim it is "business as usual" but seem caught between trying to ignore the protests – not easy when the majority of a capacity crowd is displaying its anger – and trying to suppress them with counterproductive and sometimes heavy-handed measures.
Both sides are at a crossroads and both made announcements yesterday. The Red Knights confirmed the appointment of the Japanese investment bank Nomura, which will begin the process of turning an aspiration into a workable plan. The Glazers unveiled Telekom Malaysia as the first in a string of global sponsorship deals they believe demonstrates there is plenty of growth to come. They will claim they can continue to draw money out (potentially up to £127m this year) to reduce their high interest loans while re-investing in success on the pitch. "The situation remains the same, the club is not for sale," said a spokesman for the Glazers yesterday.
On Wednesday, as all around him tens ofthousands sang "We want the Glazers out" and hung banners from the Stretford End, Avram Glazer looked on and laughed. For all the continuing rumours emanating from Tampa about the financial health of the Glazers' other business interests, they cite their successful Manchester United commercial operations in Florida and London, a new £1.2bn overseas TV rights deal negotiated by the Premier League and their comfort with their level of leveraged debt as reasons they will not be selling.
Their spokesman added: "The owners remain committed for the long term and would point to success on the pitch, where the team are through to the quarter-finals of the Champions League and top of the Premier League, and off it, where the club has shown strong revenue growth and has a pipeline of further commercial deals."
The unexpected boost from Beckham of a picture that spoke a thousand words capped a night that could hardly have gone better for the Manchester United Supporters' Trust. They managed to quell ill-conceived talk of what may have been a divisive plan to stay away from Old Trafford for the first 10 minutes of the match and instead, with the game won, unleashed wave after wave of protest that will have been heard loud and clear by the global TV audience.
The phoney war is coming to a close and the rest of the season will be pivotal to the club's future. It is understood Nomura's Guy Dawson and Andrew McNaught will spend the next few weeks contacting potential investors and trying to devise a workable model. It will include an element of debt financing and allow for a transfer of ownership to a wider supporter base over time. As with other leading lights among the Knights, including the Goldman Sachs chief economist, Jim O'Neill, and Freshfields partner Mark Rawlinson, for Dawson and McNaught this is personal. Both were involved in advising United during the protracted negotiations that led to the £790m Glazer takeover in 2005.
Dawson and McNaught are aware they are entering uncharted territory in their attempt to put together a bid in public using an untested model. "We have one shot at this," said a source. By the end of the season, when Manchester United could be appearing in their third consecutive Champions League final against a backdrop of green and gold, their chances of success should be clear.
