It is just as well Qatar’s investment in football isn’t to be measured in anything as tangible as silverware. In the 12 years since it took over Paris Saint-Germain, Qatar Sports Investment has spent a little over £1.5bn on players – or, to put it in terms Nicolas Sarkozy would understand, the equivalent of 16 Dassault Rafale multi-purpose fighter jets. It has inflated football’s transfer market, changed the landscape of the sport, brought the emirate to unprecedented prominence and got past the quarter-finals of the Champions League twice.
You can see why a vocal contingent of Manchester United fans dream of something similar, of a Qatari takeover of their own. Who wouldn’t want this? Which fan, raised in a Salford terrace on stories of Eddie Colman and Paul Scholes, Ian Curtis and Albert Finney, on George Best v Benfica and Bryan Robson v Barcelona, hasn’t yearned in their heart of hearts to become a rabble of egos promoting a petrostate with a questionable human rights record?
