(Football news) Britain’s richest man Sir Jim Ratcliffe has claimed that the Glazer family have told him that Manchester United is not for sale but remains interested in purchasing a Premier League club. The 69 year old tried to buy Chelsea in the summer and already owns Nice in France and Swiss club Lausanne through his company Ineos group. Lancashire-born Ratcliffe made a £4.25bn bid to buy Chelsea but his late involvement meant that he lost out to Todd Boehly’s consortium.

Speaking to the Financial Times, Ratcliffe said “It is owned by the six children of the father and they don't want to sell. I met Joel and Avram and they are the nicest people. They are proper gentlemen. If it had been for sale in the summer, yes, we would probably have had a go following on from the Chelsea thing. But we can't sit around hoping that one day Manchester United will become available." The Glazer family have owned the club since 2005 and have faced immense opposition from the supporters due to dividend payments and saddling the club with debt. Ratcliffe publicly saying that the Glazers aren’t willing to sell Manchester United will give impetus to the supporters to continue boycotting and staging protests.

Meanwhile, the Manchester United Supporters' Trust (MUST) have publicly said that they will take legal action regarding the away ticket allocation for the match against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, insisting that they be allowed the full allocation of 2,994 travelling supporters instead of 2,370. A spokesperson for MUST said “For a Supporters Trust to engage lawyers is always a last resort, but enough is enough. United fans and football supporters in general have had their fill of being on the receiving end of unfair and irrational decisions by councils and the police, who seem to consider us to be a public order problem rather than ordinary people freely enjoying a day out. Tickets have been sold for this game and fans are being treated like second-class citizens."

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