MANCHESTER United fans and sponsorship experts reacted with scepticism yesterday to Malcolm Glazer’s plan to raise revenues at Old Trafford as the American billionaire prepared to close his offer to the club’s shareholders. As revealed in The Times yesterday, Glazer intends to raise average ticket prices by 54 per cent over the next five seasons as he aims for a turnover of £245.6 million by 2010, from £161.5 million this year.

A previously unseen business plan, compiled this month and understood to be a reflection of the Glazer camp’s most recent thinking, sets a five-year scenario where commercial revenues can be increased by 76 per cent while the growth of operating costs is kept to 11 per cent. It is the ambitious target for commercial revenues that has caused most industry analysts to raise a questioning eyebrow. United are already the benchmark club in world football in commercial terms, with a 13-year £303 million kit deal with Nike and a £36 million four-year deal with Vodafone, the shirt sponsor.

A key part of the commercial strategy is a collection of four sponsors each paying £4 million a year. This so-called “4 x 4 management plan”, once fully in place, would earn the club £17.6 million a year by 2010. Sports sponsorship experts doubt whether the £4 million target is achievable, although they concede that United are still able to attract the cream of sponsors. The Glazer business plan values the United brand at more than £200 million.

“The business plan of United remains valid. The club is a powerful commercial animal because of the value of the brand,” Tim Crow, a director of Karen Earl Sponsorship, said. “However, I think they will struggle to get four sponsors to pay £4 million a year each, particularly because their assumptions of finishing third in the Premiership each season and of making the quarter-finals of the Champions League every so often are not going to rock potential sponsors’ world.”

Supporters are also unlikely to be impressed with Glazer’s relatively cautious predictions, which presume third place in the Premiership each season and the second-round knockout stage of the European Cup.

Although these assumptions are likely to be for the benefit of Glazer’s bankers, they would represent an underperformance in fans’ eyes. If Glazer takes United back to the top of the table, fans might be more forgiving of the new owner and his three sons, who have joined the board. However, with a net transfer budget of £25 million a year and little room for rolling any excess over from season to season, that looks unlikely to happen while Chelsea have Roman Abramovich’s billions.

The total transfer pot of £150 million, from the start of next season until 2010, comes attached with certain restrictions. One of these is that only £10 million can be spent before January 1, 2006, meaning Sir Alex Ferguson is only likely to have that amount to spend this summer. But it is the ticket-price increases that have caused the most consternation.

“We predicted rises of this order, but they will still come as a great shock to many fans,” Nick Towle, chairman of Shareholders United, a fans’ lobby group with 1.5 per cent of the club’s shares, said. “Year-on-year increases like this carry the risk of driving the ordinary fan away, and it’s also clear that the cost of everything else at Old Trafford will go up. G oing to matches will become a very expensive exercise.”

Shareholders United has proposed a boycott of United products in an effort to derail Glazer’s business plan. “The drive for commercialisation is becoming too much for most fans,” Towle said. “Our campaign to urge fans to not buy the products of the club or the products of the company and the products of the sponsors is going to grow and grow.”

David Gill, the United chief executive, and Nick Humby, the finance director, yesterday sold their remaining shares in the club. As previously reported by The Times, Gill has earned £2.2 million by accepting Glazer’s offer of 300p a share, while Humby has received £1.4 million. Gill is expected to stay on after the offer closes on Monday afternoon.

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