“As a player, and I have been there, they probably need this like a hole in the head”. Hong Kong coach Ashley Westwood was blunt and to the point when speaking about Manchester United’s post-season tour of Asia.
As a former FA Youth Cup winner with United in 1995 - and someone who worked for the club’s in-house television channel MUTV during a recent pre-season trip to Perth - Westwood has an understanding of the pressures and demands associated with being a player for the 20-time English champions. While publicly United’s players talked up their post-season trip to Asia and privately officials have praised the way they carried out a mountain of commercial demands, Westwood says no-one should be in any doubt about the reality of the situation. “No-one says it on the record because they can’t, but fans and sponsors pay wages and this trip is all about revenues,” he said. At half-time in Hong Kong, as United trailed 1-0 to the national side currently 153rd in Fifa’s rankings, the tour looked to be going from bad to worse.
Two youngsters signed from Arsenal this season, striker Chido Obi and defender Ayden Heaven, scored the second-half goals that brought a below-capacity crowd at a rain-soaked Hong Kong stadium to life - and at least allowed United to head into the summer on a winning note. Whether the trip itself was a success is another matter.A trip focused on commercial partnerships
Manchester United forward Alejandro Garnacho arrives at the Bukit Jalil stadium in Kuala Lumpur in sunglasses [Getty Images] United estimate they will generate around ?10m from their 14,000-mile, six-day expedition. The payment is not connected to ticket sales, so it is guaranteed. At a time when their focus in pre-season - both commercially and from a player preparation perspective - is on the United States, where they will go for the third successive summer in July, United’s presence in the region also allows them to ‘service’ existing big-money sponsorship deals with the likes of banking partner Maybank, airline partner Malaysia Airlines, beer partner Tiger and tyre partner Apollo.
If evidence was needed for the real purpose of United’s trip, it comes from the knowledge that Andre Onana, Harry Maguire and Diogo Dalot had been substituted and were heading for the airport as their team-mates were being booed by a large percentage of a 72.550 crowd following their surprise 1-0 defeat to a South-East Asia select XI on Wednesday. The trio were boarding a private plane to Mumbai, where they would spend Thursday on a packed commercial programme arranged by Apollo, before getting home a day earlier than those who had gone on to Hong Kong for the second game. As Westwood said, United’s players had been given little choice about being on the trip. Departure immediately after the final Premier League game of the season against Aston Villa meant there was no opportunity to back out. Dutch defender Matthijs de Ligt was present, even though he was not fit enough to play. United wanted Christian Eriksen and Victor Lindelof there too but both had personal reasons to decline.
So, Ruben Amorim’s squad opted to make the best of it. Unlike a focused and driven pre-season tour, it is fair to say their approach to this event was ‘relaxed’. The scenes on the flight from Manchester to Kuala Lumpur were said to be like a party, with loud music and drinks. Some players and staff members were seen at a club on the Monday, immediately after their arrival. There was also a chance to wind down after Wednesday’s game. In the wake of their defeat in Kuala Lumpur, there was gallows humour among the squad when it was pointed out somewhat ironically that after the season they just had domestically, they had now managed to get booed by fans 6,600 miles away from home. Dutch striker Joshua Zirkzee nipped out - accompanied by security - to get some late-night food because room service was not to his taste. Amad Diallo, Heaven and Alejandro Garnacho tried to take an e-scooter ride, only to discover they did not have the money to pay for it.
Garnacho does not appear to have been an enthusiastic participant. Told following Amorim’s return from a post-Europa League final summit with Sir Jim Ratcliffe and other club executives in Monaco he could find a new club in the summer, the young Argentina winger remains popular among supporters, as evidenced by the raucous cheers for him in both matches. Yet there is evidence of a lack of engagement. After the ASEAN All-Stars defeat, Garnacho went straight past opposition captain Sergio Aguero, a 31-year-old Argentine-born naturalised Malaysian, despite promising him his shirt from the game. The damage was rectified by a United kitman, who grabbed Garnacho’s shirt from the dressing room and handed it over.
Thursday brought more negativity as pictures emerged on social media of Amad Diallo making a one-fingered gesture to a fan as he was leaving the team hotel. Amad subsequently said he was responding to abuse against his mum. He accepted his reaction was wrong but at the same time did not regret it. If specific behaviours raise an eyebrow or can be excused, from a corporate perspective, some of United’s decisions have also been dubious. The context is clearly different but having ruled out having a parade if they won the Europa League final in Bilbao, to see a group of players, including Zirkzee, embark on a bus parade through Kuala Lumpur was bizarre. Some fans did turn out - and there remains enthusiasm for United in this region.
But it is not on remotely the same levels as their last visit to Malaysia, in 2009, when they were still Premier League champions, had the likes of Ryan Giggs, Michael Owen and Wayne Rooney in their squad. At that time, they struggled to get around their hotel such was the constant presence of fans. Their first game attracted a crowd of 85,000 - and there were 30,000 at a second, arranged at 48 hours’ notice after a terrorist attack in Jakarta, where they were supposed to be going. Nani was on that tour too and the Portuguese winger was part of a three-man team of ’legends’ along with Wes Brown and John O’Shea who have been on this trip to push the club narrative.Amorim learns what being Man Utd boss means For Amorim, it has been another eye-opening crash course in what being a figurehead at United means. “More than a manager” was his assessment in Hong Kong on Thursday night.
He was introduced to the Anwar Ibrahim, the Malaysian prime minister, and a United fan, during his time in Kuala Lumpur. It is the kind of exposure you do not get at most clubs, even the size of his previous team Sporting in Poertugal. Amorim knows, stripped away from the sideshow, he must deliver results. Somehow in Malaysia, after a season in which he described his team as “probably the worst” United have ever had, his side managed to lose against a team made up of players from a region with no history of making an impact on the global stage. United were booed off, Amorim claimed his side were “chokers” and he had to implore supporters to buy tickets for the Hong Kong game. It was a plea that went unheeded judging by the numbers of empty seats.
United arrived in Hong Kong to a huge thunderstorm and a deluge that raised concerns the final match of the trip might not take place. The game went ahead, although it did so amid fresh speculation over the future of skipper Bruno Fernandes, who has been the subject of a huge offer from Saudi club Al-Hilal, who want the Portugal midfielder to be part of their squad at the Club World Cup. Amorim believes Fernandes will stay, but until the 30-year-old or Al Hilal specifically state otherwise, nothing is certain. Eventual victory against Hong Kong was well received by the most of those there to witness it.
But Amorim accepts the trip was missing something pretty important. Between June and August 2011, market research company Kantar conducted a poll of “nearly 54,000 adults in 39 countries” and concluded United had 659 million global “followers”. In this period of brutal cost-cutting, it seems doubtful Sir Jim Ratcliffe will be commissioning an update any time soon. On the evidence here in Hong Kong and Malaysia, it is hard to imagine United have close to that number now. Where once they dominated the Premier League commercially, now they trail Manchester City, who have generated greater prize money over the past decade.
United are not the draw they once were, despite the red shirts on show this week, which, in fairness to Fernandes, Garnacho and others, they spent time signing for fans before leaving for Hong Kong airport and home. It is not known when they will return to the region - but Amorim knows for certain what would make it a better experience than this one. “We want to return but I would like to come back with better results,” he said. “The people are really lovely and respectful and we are grateful for everybody. But it would be so much fun to come here with titles.”
