Why are Manchester United so willing to degrade themselves for Mason Greenwood?

Manchester United are set to stain their reputation by bringing back Mason Greenwood, and for what? At least their dithering buys them time to regain sight of what’s important…

Manchester United might yet do the right thing over Mason Greenwood. But it seems that would require a screeching U-turn on the very dark road the club’s top brass seem intent to travel down.

Reports suggest United are laying the path for Greenwood to return to the club to be reintegrated with Erik ten Hag’s first-team squad. The Athletic reported on Wednesday that the club’s executive leadership had been told as much at the start of August and United were prompted – spooked, actually – by that story to release a statement of their own in a desperate attempt to regain control of a seedy narrative.

The ‘Update on Mason Greenwood’ was as shabby as the entire process around their internal investigation, now in its seventh month. They say they have now gathered all the facts they need to make a decision, one that is currently the subject of ‘intensive internal deliberation’.

That decision appears to have already been taken but not yet communicated. Which still gives United time to reassess their direction of travel.

If he is waiting for the right time to tell the world that Greenwood will one day soon pull on the famous red shirt again and disgrace the hallowed Old Trafford turf, Richard Arnold needs to realise he is pissing squarely into a gale-force wind. This won’t blow over. The damage to United’s reputation will be no less great, however long the club kicks the can down the road.

Fans will walk away and, more importantly to Arnold and the rest of the boardroom, sponsors likely will too. United can continue to push the line around their ‘responsibilities to Mason as an employee, as a young person who has been with the club since the age of seven, and as a new father with a partner’. But there is a much bigger picture they really ought to be focusing on: that their duty extends way, way beyond the player and his family, but to their legions of female supporters – and players – as well young fans, male and female, who need their club to set the right standards.

“I will walk away from my club [if Mason Greenwood walks onto the field].”

Lifelong Manchester Utd supporter, Em, tells @jonsopel why she is protesting at Old Trafford before the first game of the season.

Listen on @GlobalPlayerhttps://t.co/SdyBDl7qyY pic.twitter.com/30efDXxQWI

— The News Agents (@TheNewsAgents) August 14, 2023

There is no comfort or encouragement to be taken from the manner of their ‘carefully-considered process’. While attempting to give the impression of thoroughness, United somehow made a wretched situation even worse by letting it be known that they would wait to consult with members of their women’s team, some of whom are currently preparing for the World Cup final, and really don’t need this sh*t and the abuse that inevitably followed when dropped squarely in the firing line.

Has United’s process really reached this point, where a decision is already said to have been taken, without those people having had their views at least heard first? More importantly, do Arnold and the male members of the board actually need to consult with members of the opposite sex before they take the view that Greenwood’s alleged actions were abhorrent enough not to be excused?

United have contorted themselves into a position they will now struggle to recover from, however the process plays out from here. And for what? Why are Manchester United, one of the greatest football clubs in the world, so willing to stake their name and reputation on one individual?

Would they be tying themselves in grubby knots if Greenwood wasn’t once a potential £100million star and was instead a reserve-team left-back? We can all draw our own conclusions to that hypothetical question. Either way, it should not matter. But to United, it very obviously does, for a couple of reasons.

United need a forward. They bought one, but they are still woefully short. Reintegrating Greenwood would fill that particular hole in their squad and, according to The Guardian, ‘almost all those who favour the 21-year-old’s return work on the football side of the operation’. Presumably, they feel confident that a player who has been out of the game, not having trained properly since being sidelined by the club in January 2022, can get back up to speed and rediscover the form that once made him one of the game’s brightest talents.

Which, given Greenwood still has almost two years remaining on his contract with United retaining the option to extend those terms for another 12 months, makes him an asset, at least to those concerned more with finances than morals. It seems that balance has tipped too far in the wrong direction at Old Trafford. It probably lurched some time ago.

United evidently do not see the cost of cutting Greenwood loose, inevitably for another club to pick him up, as a price worth paying for being seen to do the right thing. The dawning of that sad reality, even in trying circumstances that the club did not invite, will see plenty follow Rachel Riley’s lead and disassociate themselves from the club they have proudly supported, some for generations.

Greenwood’s return, aside from dominating press conferences – Ten Hag can’t play dumb on that score – and sparking vitriol from opposing supporters, would prompt many in the home stands at Old Trafford to at least consider withdrawing their support. That, though, is unlikely to elicit more than shrugs in the boardroom – further indictment of what United have become.

Arnold, though, has more riding on this than the other suits. ‘Responsibility ultimately rests with the chief executive officer,’ read United’s statement, putting Arnold front and centre. Not the Glazers, not Ten Hag, but him. He will be well aware that this decision, to many a straight choice between right and wrong, could be his legacy at Old Trafford.

It ought to be a simple decision, even if the process could never be straightforward. United can still recover sight of what is really important before torching their reputation for no good reason.