Ratcliffe's rebuke

United players 'not good enough and overpaid'

- Jamie Jackson

Sir Jim Ratcliffe has launched a blistering attack on Manchester United players, stating some are "not good enough" and "overpaid", referencing Casemiro, Antony, Jadon Sancho, Rasmus Højlund and André Onana when doing so.

In a series of interviews, Ratcliffe, the club's co-owner, also said that Ruben Amorim would be the head coach for a "long time", and admitted that not sacking Erik ten Hag last summer was an error.

United are struggling on 34 points with 10 games of the Premier League season left. Ratcliffe is clear that this is the fault of players his football department inherited when taking over last year, the billionaire Ineos owner referencing the transfer fee instalments they will have to pay in the close season.

"If you look at the players we are buying this summer, that we didn't buy, we're buying Antony, we're buying Casemiro, we're buying Onana, we're buying Højlund, we're buying Sancho," Ratcliffe said in an interview with the BBC. "These are all things from the past, whether we like it or not, we've inherited those things and have to sort that out.

"For Sancho, who now plays for Chelsea [on loan] and we pay half his wages, we're paying £17m to buy him in the summer. It takes time for us to move away from the past into a new place in the future."

Antony is also on loan at Real Betis, after his £81m transfer from Ajax in 2022 during the same summer Casemiro arrived for £70m from Real Madrid. Højlund, who cost £72m from Atalanta, and Onana (£47m from Inter), joined the following summer. Ratcliffe was asked if he meant this quintet are not of the requisite quality for United.