The Manchester United Muslim Supporters Club (MUMSC) has called for Sir Jim Ratcliffe to leave his role as Manchester United co-owner and for the Glazer family to follow, after the billionaire again spoke out against immigration levels and said the UK was “on the slide”.
Ratcliffe, founder of petrochemical giant Ineos, made the comments in an interview with the BBC on Saturday. He said the UK was in decline because of a combination of high taxes and high immigration. It is not the first time his language has drawn criticism: he previously apologised for “offending some people” after saying the UK had been “colonised by immigrants”. In February, United responded by saying the club “prides itself” on being “inclusive”, while BBC Sport cited a source familiar with the Glazer family as understanding the club’s majority shareholders were “horrified” by the initial remarks and saw them as showing “disregard for their ownership”.
MUMSC said it had condemned those earlier comments and hoped a lesson had been learned. “Clearly, it has not,” the group said in a statement of no confidence in the club’s ownership issued on Saturday. It said Ratcliffe had again placed immigration and people receiving benefits at the centre of his explanation for Britain’s problems, arguing nobody was “tough enough” to deal with either. “We find these latest comments deeply disappointing and completely unacceptable,” the statement added.
The group stressed the diversity of people connected to United, saying the club’s “players, staff, stewards, security teams and supporters come from different countries, cultures, ethnicities, religions and backgrounds”. It added: “Manchester United would not be Manchester United without them. That diversity isn’t a weakness of Manchester United. It is part of Manchester United.”
MUMSC also called on the Glazer family to go. It said members were among fans who had hoped Ratcliffe’s arrival “would finally signal meaningful change” after the Glazers had “presided over Manchester United’s decline”. But it pointed to “higher ticket prices” and “a stadium allowed to deteriorate”, along with “a football team that continues to fall further behind where Manchester United should be”, as concerns that “now extend beyond the pitch”.
Ratcliffe campaigned for a Leave vote in the 2016 European Union referendum and has been a tax resident in Monaco since 2020. He acquired a 27.7% stake in Manchester United in 2024 and has since restructured the organisation, overseeing 450 redundancies, overhauling senior management and sacking two managers.
On the pitch, United entered the weekend sitting 13th in the Premier League after gaining four points from their first four Premier League games. They were knocked out of the Carabao Cup on Wednesday with a 3-2 home defeat by Brighton.
MUMSC concluded: “After years of decline, broken promises and repeated failure, Manchester United Muslim Supporters’ Club has lost confidence in the current ownership structure of Manchester United Football Club. Enough is enough. It is time for change. The Glazers and Sir Jim Ratcliffe must go.”