MANCHESTER UNITED are hosting Arsenal in a huge Premier League clash TODAY.
Ruben Amorim’s men currently sit 14th in the league, and are closer to 17th than they are to the Champions League spots.
ReutersMan Utd fans have a history of protesting against their owners[/caption]
The team have also been knocked out of the FA Cup following last weekend’s penalty shootout loss to Fulham and their European hopes hang in the balance after a 1-1 draw with Real Sociedad in Thursday’s Europa League last-16.
A lot of the internal and external blame for the club’s demise that has seen them go more than a decade without a league title has been laid at the ownership.
Majority owned by The Glazer Family since 2005, with Joel and Avram heading the group, they have since changed the structure with the arrival of Sir Jim Ratcliffe and his INEOS group last year, taking over the football side of things.
Ratcliffe has issued hundreds of job cuts to aid with United’s crippling finances.
Why are Manchester United fans wearing black against Arsenal in the Premier League today?
United supporters are expected to don out black today ahead of the match in their latest installments of protest against the club’s ownership.
Supporter group ‘The 1958’ is planning a demonstration against Glazer family control and part-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe.
They will march to Old Trafford before the game, beginning at 3.15pm GMT from the Tollgate Pub near the stadium. It will go down to United’s Trinity monument and Old Trafford’s Munich Tunnel.
The organisation hopes it “could be one of the largest ever protests” at the club.
“The club is slowly dying before our eyes, on and off the pitch and the blame lies squarely at the current ownership model,” The 1958’s spokesperson Steve Crompton said in a statement on Tuesday.
“The club is facing financial armageddon. Debt is the road to ruin. Sir Matt Busby would be turning in his grave at the current plight of one of the world’s greatest football institutions which is being brought to its knees and in many ways becoming a laughing stock.”
Crompton added: “The club is going backwards and it’s likely to get even worse. We urge fans to rise up, unite and join us at 3pm on Sunday as we march to the ground and protest against the despised Glazers and the club’s deliberate assault on fan culture.”
Amorim has supported the fan demonstrations, in which he said: “For everybody in our club it’s a really tough moment.”
“It’s everything at the same time. The only thing I can do, and our players, is perform well and win.
“People have the right to protest. I think it’s a good thing to do that. It’s part of our club. Everybody has a voice.
“But our job and my job is just to improve the team and give them something in this moment because they deserve it and they are amazing.”
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