Manchester
United: Sir Jim Ratcliffe told by Glazers club not for sale
Ratcliffe, 69, was unsuccessful in his bid to
buy Chelsea in May.
The billionaire, whose Ineos group owns Nice
in France and Swiss club Lausanne, met brothers Joel and Avram Glazer.
"It is owned by the six children of the
father and they don't want to sell," Ratcliffe said.
He told told a Financial Times Live
conference: "I met Joel and Avram and they are the nicest people. They are
proper gentlemen.
"If it had been for sale in the summer,
yes, we would probably have had a go following on from the Chelsea thing.
"But we can't sit around hoping that one
day Manchester United will become available."
United have been owned by the Glazer family
since 2005.
Their Premier League home game against
Liverpool in May last year was postponed because of an organised protest by
United fans against the owners.
Thousands of supporters marched to Old Trafford
in protest before the same fixture this season, in August.
Lancashire-born Ratcliffe, the majority
shareholder of chemical group Ineos, made a late bid for Chelsea worth £4.25bn
but lost out to a consortium led by American investor Todd Boehly.
In a BBC Sport interview following that offer,
Ratcliffe said he is originally a United fan has "split loyalties"
between the two clubs.
On still being in the market for a Premier
League club, he said: "The most popular sport in the world is football and
it is the sport closest to us.
"So we should have an asset. Not a
Premiership [club], I think a premier club."
