Mason Greenwood could be welcomed back to Manchester United, recent co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe has suggested, after the petrochemicals billionaire finally accomplished his purchase of 1 / 4 of the club.
Greenwood was charged with attempted rape, assault occasioning actual bodily harm and controlling and coercive behavior after social media posts that appeared to disclose the 22-year-old forced himself on the lady before Crown charges dropped those charges in February last 12 months. .
United conducted their very own internal investigation and, by mutual agreement with the player, concluded that his profession should proceed “away from Old Trafford”.
This looked as if it would spell the top of Greenwood’s profession at Old Trafford, who joined United on the age of six and last summer moved on loan to Spanish club Getafe, for whom he played 25 games.
But Ratcliffe, whose stake in United was boosted on Tuesday, didn’t rule out the prospect of Greenwood returning to play for the club, saying the choice needs to be made based on the “values of the club”.
“It’s a fresh decision,” Ratcliffe said of the long run of Greenwood, who has greater than a 12 months left on his United contract. “I can speak about principle. I won’t talk about Mason. I’m familiar with this. The principle is the most important. We will have other problems in the future.
“You are dealing with young people who did not always grow up in the best conditions, have a lot of money and do not always receive the support they should receive.
“When we have problems like this, we need to understand the real impacts, not the hype. Then we have to make a fair decision in the light of the club’s values. This is what we have to do and this is how we will deal with it.”
Reflecting on the finalized purchase of the club, Ratcliffe said: “Becoming co-owner of Manchester United is a great honor and a great responsibility. This marks the completion of the transaction, but only the beginning of our journey to return Manchester United to the top of English, European and world football, with world-class facilities for our fans.
“From today, work to achieve these goals will accelerate.”
Ratcliffe agreed to pay $33 (£26) a share for 1 / 4 of the Class A shares, and in addition pay that price for 25 per cent of the Class B shares held by the Glazer family. Each Class B share carries 10 times more votes than a Class A share.
The deal was announced on Christmas Eve and the agreement to buy a 27.7% stake within the club also includes investing a further $300m (£237m) within the club’s infrastructure, bringing the full investment to £1.25bn.
Credit : www.independent.co.uk