Manchester United fans march on Old Trafford to demand Ratcliffe sells the club

Hundreds of Manchester United supporters marched down Sir Matt Busby Way before Sunday’s Manchester derby, staging a vocal protest against the club’s treatment of season-ticket holders and calling on minority owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe to sell the club.

The demonstration was organised by fan group The 1958, who declared that a “line had been crossed” after United’s ticket-touting investigation resulted in 685 supporters being stripped of their season tickets and a further 464 either sanctioned or warned. Police initially estimated around 500 fans at the Bishop Blaize pub, with numbers growing as the march moved toward the ground.

Inside Old Trafford, the Stretford End made its displeasure visible in a different way. Supporters left their flags at home — forgoing the pre-match spectacle they usually create — and hung a single banner above the tunnel that read: “THE WAY YOU TREAT US IS A DISGRACE.”

Ratcliffe was as prominent a target as the Glazer family throughout the protest. The 73-year-old leaned heavily on his Failsworth roots when he acquired a minority stake two years ago, but supporters argued his regime has proved just as disconnected from match-going fans as the absent owners in Tampa, Florida. Banners reading “JIM AIN’T THE ONE” and “You take it all from fans and banning us for nothing. Premium prices all for greed” were unfurled during the march, the latter bearing the Amazon logo — a reference to the record fee the company is paying to film a fly-on-the-wall documentary at the club.

Steve Crompton, spokesperson for The 1958, delivered a direct message to Ratcliffe. “I hope Jim Ratcliffe’s watching this now, because my message to that man is sell this football club,” he told the Manchester Evening News. “You’ve done nothing good for this football club. You never will. It’s a vanity project. It’s nothing to do with what’s important to match-going fans. You prove that by shafting everybody for the last God knows how many months. You have total disregard for match-going fans.”

Crompton also framed the unrest as part of a wider issue in English football. “You keep poking the bear, and the bear’s going to bite back, and this is what’s happening right now. And this is important for the Premier League, because this is happening not just at Old Trafford.”

The protest was peaceful throughout, but the depth of feeling was unmistakable — and United fans are well-practised at this. Anti-Glazer chants have echoed around Old Trafford for years, and the fact that a new regime has simply added fresh targets to the repertoire suggests the club’s relationship with its own supporters remains as fractured as ever.