Interim boss Michael Carrick is making no secret of the fact that the club's financial muscle in the upcoming window is directly linked to their final league position. United are currently sitting in the third Champions League qualifying spot with only six games left to play.
Discussing how their eventual ranking dictates the summer budget, Carrick says: "The Champions League just brings so many positive things. It's where we want to be. It has ramifications for so many different things – players staying, players coming in, financially all sorts of different things.
"There's obviously work that's going into planning for the summer, there has to be. If you finish in certain places in the league, financially, it makes a lot of difference. But there's certainly work going on in terms of what can be done in trying to move forward in improving the squad and making the best of what we've got."