Club are happy with Top 4 and that is unacceptable. They've no interest in how the team plays, Woodward has even said this. And now it seems they're not even bothered if we don't win trophies providing we get top 4.
I think those quotes from Woodward are twisted sometimes he said on an investor call that the the club are fairly resiliant financially to a lack of success used Liverpool as an example saying they've been able to grow their commercial revenues despite no league title in 25 years and no trophy in 10 years.
Top 4 has been the minimum requirement at the club ever since the Glazers come in the CL money was/is crucial to managing the debt and allowing the club to invest each summer in the playing squad and realistically that isn't much difference to how it was under the PLC once the CL expanded.
What we had was a manager who knew how to fine tune the machine and get the absolute maximum out of it at all times and I have no doubt Fergie acted as the Glazer's puppet at times with his whole no value in the market quotes when the truth was Utd didn't have the budget to sign top players when the debts were much bigger.
For the owners, shareholders and therefore the board Utd is and will always be treated like a business I think they know that remain profitable they need to compete but they also know that they don't really need to win every year as fan loyalty can be relied on it's what makes sports teams so attractive to investors. However, brands only want to attach themselves to the best Utd have premium brand deals locked in for long term but say in 5 years when we renegotiate our shirt deals again if we've still not won the league again or CL I don't think Utd will be getting offers that are comparable to what Barca/Madrid etc are getting.
Back to the topic I think trying to buy players this summer has been way harder than ever before for 2 reasons.
1) The market is still trying to adjust itself for the madness of the Neymar deal last summer.
2) The ludicrous decision by the PL to close it's window 3 weeks before the rest of Europe.
A specific problem to Utd is I don't think our scouts and manager have selected realistic targets that we can actually afford it sounds like Jose left the list on Woodward's desk then went on holiday surely that list should be discussed at a meeting with the board, manager, scouts etc all sitting and agreeing a strategy for getting these deals done. From the sound of it the scouts produced a list of who they felt the 10 best defenders in the world were and Utd have spent the summer going down the list trying to sign each one of them which would be a pathetic attempt at a transfer strategy/plan.