The French football star Eric Cantona, who has slowly but surely built a career as a TV and film star in the years after he quit as a football player, has always spoken straight from the heart.
He is not happy about what has happened to his old club, a small glimmer of hope right after Sir Jim Ratcliffe bought into the club almost two years ago.
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Metro today has the following headline and subsequent revelation: “Man United legend Eric Cantona yells at Jim Ratcliffe and the atmosphere at Old Trafford.”!
Manchester United legend Eric Cantona is critical of the current ownership.
Eric Cantona has attacked Manchester United’s owners and the atmosphere at Old Trafford, saying he would rather support a lower division team. – The Frenchman remains a legend at the club, having won four Premier League titles and two FA Cup titles with the Red Devils.
The 59-year-old is still passionate about Manchester United, but is becoming increasingly frustrated with the club’s direction.
Cantona says he offered to come back to Manchester and help the club with the rebuilding process under minority owner Jim Ratcliffe and manager Ruben Amorim.
The offer was not accepted, and Cantona feels that the current owners have gone further in destroying the legacy of the man he played under, Sir Alex Ferguson.
The iconic striker said during a live show, according to The Telegraph: ‘I have a lot of other passions and projects, but I thought that for two or three years I could maybe put those aside and try to give something back to this club, which has given me everything.
I did what I had to do, so I don’t feel guilty anymore. I did my best. Sir Alex Ferguson created a style of beautiful, attacking football that the new owners should have used. Instead, they destroyed it.’
Jim Ratcliffe has not been universally popular since he invested in the Red Devils.
This is not the first time Cantona has spoken out against the current owners, after criticising the significant number of job cuts at the club since Ratcliffe bought in.
‘I support United because I really love United, but if I was a supporter and had to choose a club, I don’t think I would choose United,’ Cantona said earlier this year. Because I don’t feel close to these types of decisions. They have a different strategy, a different project. Do you feel close to this project? I don’t think so.
For me, it’s very important to respect these people, the way you respect the manager and your teammates. I think since Ratcliffe arrived, it’s been the exact opposite, and this team of directors is trying to ruin everything, and they don’t respect anybody. They even want to change the stadium.’
Cantona feels that the atmosphere at Old Trafford has calmed down.
The former striker has also attacked the fan experience at Old Trafford, saying that the quiet atmosphere is due to ‘people coming from different parts of the world just to go to the fan shop.’
‘The atmosphere in the stadium is different, unfortunately,’ he said. ‘I was at Old Trafford last season during the game against Manchester City and I thought it was quiet. United fans prefer to go to away games, to be with the real supporters, rather than being surrounded by people who come from different parts of the world just to go to the fan shop.
We must be closer to the reality of football, closer to the workers. Football is a working-class sport – it’s important that we don’t lose it. If I lived in England, I would rather support a club in the third or fourth division.
I can’t find the energy we had in the past. It is not the fault of the supporters, it is the fault of those who are responsible for the clubs – the economic system.’
Cantona surprised everyone when he retired in 1997, only 30 years old, but players who come to the club in 2025 still hope to emulate him.
Summer transfer Matheus Cunha told the press about the comparisons to the Frenchman: ‘Wow, what a player. I have to do a lot more to be compared to him. When someone says something like that to me, I try to see the good part of this.
To be someone who has a great passion to play for this club, to play football – and then try to represent everyone on the inside of the pitch.
I feel privileged to be associated with such things and with Cantona as well. He made history. And if I can do a small percentage of what he was already doing, I’ll be very happy and then try to build my own path for people to remember me too.’
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