Sir Jim Ratcliffe's Manchester United make massive financial loss

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The Red Devils earned £677.6m in the year ended June 30, up from the previous record of £666.5m the year before.

United’s revenue guidance for next year is £740m to £760m, with the club now back in the Champions League.

Chief executive Omar Berrada said: “We are pleased to have secured record revenues and adjusted EBITDA which demonstrates the underlying strength of our business, particularly in a season without European football.

“This shows the direct impact of the work we have been doing over the past two years. It also proves Manchester United’s enduring popularity and commercial strength.”

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United’s wage bill was £302m, down £11.3m or 3.6 per cent on the previous year.

The club attributed the drop to changes in the men’s first-team squad and the headcount reduction programmes embarked on over the last two years.

The overall loss is seen by United insiders as evidence of the need to continue to work hard on financial discipline.

United did manage to save some money on the exit of former head coach Ruben Amorim in January.

The exit of the Portuguese and his staff was initially recorded as an exceptional item costing £16.7m in the third quarter results published in May, but that is understood to have been the maximum exposure the club faced from his exit.

That has now been significantly reduced because he has since taken on the AC Milan job.

Now, exceptional items for the full year are listed as costing £8.2m, with the exit of Amorim and his staff making up the majority of that cost.