Manchester United's plans for a new 100,000 seat stadium and wider generation of Old Trafford
A 100,000 capacity Old Trafford would almost certainly make Manchester United the richest club in the world
Nobody could accuse Sir Jim Ratcliffe of not dreaming big since he got his foot in the door at Manchester United. Plenty of the billionaire's decisions have gone down badly with supporters, but Ratcliffe has now put a timeframe on the team winning the league and the club building a new stadium.
In Ratcliffe's dreams, a title-winning United side will be playing in a 100,000-capacity new Old Trafford maybe as soon as the 2030/31 season. It sounds ambitious, but so does winning the title by 2028, and Ratcliffe hasn't got to where he is by showing a lack of ambition.
It has been estimated that a new stadium will cost £2bn to fund, and finding the money for the build will be a challenge. Ratcliffe and architect Lord Norman Foster have spoken of the advantages the Manchester Ship Canal offers in terms of logistics, potentially halving the usual build timetable, but finding the cash to deliver on the plans is a major hurdle.
The unveiling of the grand plan for a new stadium comes a day after Ratcliffe said the club would have run out of cash by Christmas without his cost-cutting interventions over the last 12 months, so this isn't a club likely to find a couple of billion down the back of the sofa.
Funds could be generated through sponsors, and United have already opened the door to naming rights for a stadium if it is a new build. The value of that deal could be astronomical.
Something that supporters - and Ruben Amorim - will be keen to avoid is what happened to Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur during the funding of ambitious new stadiums. Both tightened their belts when it came to spending in the transfer market and opened the Emirates and the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium when the team had been neglected on the pitch.
You could argue neither have really made up that ground yet, but it doesn't mean they took the wrong approach. Tottenham's revenue has been transformed by opening what is currently the most impressive stadium in the country, but they have failed to put that money to good use.
United could find a budget for the transfer market and the stadium, especially if Mission 21 is to be delivered, securing that 21st league title by the time the club celebrates its 150th anniversary in 2028. It's clear Amorim has inherited a squad that isn't up to standard and doesn't suit his style, and significant transformation is required in the playing ranks.
As part of his rounds of interviews on Monday, Ratcliffe predicted that the cost-cutting measures being implemented now would help make United the most profitable football club in the world in three years. Again, this sounded like an ambitious claim, especially given the Glazers' debt, which continues to hold United back.
If he is correct, however, that will free up revenue to build a new stadium and sign new players. Ineos will want this stadium christened by a winning team, not a United side continuing to tread water, as the current crop are doing.
But if the five-year timescale starts to drift due to financial constraints, then cutting back on the transfer budget isn't the worst idea. In the long term, a new stadium will be most transformative for this football club.
That has been the case for Spurs' revenues. They now have the largest matchday revenue in the Premier League on a per-game basis and have seen commercial income rocket as well. The ability to host NFL games and concerts has also been critical.
United might have the biggest stadium in the Premier League, but it is dwarfed in terms of the hospitality available and the kind of income that can be made from concession stands on a matchday. Plans for the new Old Trafford would keep supporters on site a lot longer and boost the VIP packages.
A 100,000-seat Old Trafford would undoubtedly see United rocket to the top of the revenue charts in England and, most probably, Europe. By that stage, they would almost certainly be the most profitable club on the continent.
The new stadium is the real game-changer here for Ratcliffe and United. If it requires some short-term pain to get there, then that might not be the biggest price to pay, especially if the alternative is more debt and more refinancing.