Gary Neville backs Ratcliffe to become the new Man United president
Earlier, life-long Man United fan and Britain's richest man announced negotiations over purchasing Manchester United from the Glazer family. The former United defender believes the Englishman backs Ratcliffe to take over the club.
In November, the Glazer family announced they were exploring "strategic alternatives", among which was a potential sale of the club.
Sir Jim Ratcliffe, the CEO of the Ineos Group Ltd and widely known as Britain’s richest man and as a lifelong fan of
Manchester United, announced he is aiming to enter the race for the Red Devils.
pundit and former Man United right-back,
Gary Nevillebelieves Ratcliffe is the ideal candidate to take the stewardship.
"The main thing is the Glazers leave as quickly as possible, but the second thing is if whoever takes over, if they could hand it over to people who have feelings for the club, that would be great,
" he told Sky Sports.
"Jim Ratcliffe, he was born in Manchester, he knows the area. If he wins it, I think there would be a lot of very happy Manchester United fans as he would want to do the right thing by the club. I'm sure he would.
"I don't think that United can afford to be with another investment fund that would expect a return on the money, that's what worries me about private equity coming into football because, ultimately, they want a return on their investment.
"It might be that United aren't like this club here [Manchester City] or Newcastle or other clubs who have benefactors, who are willing to let them live debt free, not leverage the club, and United need a debt-free football club with someone who is willing to put money into it."
Neville believes performances on the field and improving the club infrastructure should be the most crucial elements for the new owner.
"The priority for the new owner has to be winning, a winning Manchester United club is difficult to stop, we've seen that in the past. At that point, United become a very dangerous football club,"
he added.
"The priority has to always be football performance. Then you're talking about fan experience, which means the stadium has to be world class, and it's not at this moment in time, it falls behind many stadiums that you come to.
"There needs to be investment in the team to get them winning and investment in the facilities, the fan experience. For me, they would be the two priorities."
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