Mason Greenwood and Manchester United: How club reacted and what happens next

Editor’s note: Manchester United announced Aug. 21 that Mason Greenwood will not return to the team.

On Wednesday, we published a story that Manchester United’s chief executive, Richard Arnold, had told the club’s executive leadership in the first week of August that United were planning to bring back Mason Greenwood.

Greenwood has not played for the club since he was arrested in January 2022 after graphic images and audio were released on social media. Charges of attempted rape, assault occasioning actual bodily harm, and controlling and coercive behaviour — all related to the same woman, and all of which Greenwood denied — were discontinued in February of this year.

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How did The Athletic article affect the situation? Did it force United’s hand?

Laura Williamson: Yes, it absolutely did. We put some impeccably sourced points to them for comment, as we do with every article, and it was up to the club to respond.

They chose to do that publicly by sending a note to staff and then putting it on the Manchester United Twitter account.

“We have heard from numerous people with direct involvement or knowledge of the case,” they said, “and throughout this process, the welfare and perspective of the alleged victim has been central to the club’s enquiries and we respect her right to lifelong anonymity.”

They talked about the responsibilities to Greenwood as an employee and as a young person who had been with the club so long and as a new father with a partner. And then they said that the fact-finding phase of their investigation was complete and they were in the final stages of making a decision on Greenwood’s future. But that decision had not been made and is currently the subject of intensive internal deliberation, and responsibility ultimately lies with chief executive Richard Arnold.

People are entitled to change their minds. But for whatever reason, that decision had been planned to be communicated and then was then delayed.

Adam Crafton: I think a lot of Man United supporters would have just seen that statement come out and also Man United staff would have seen that statement drop into their inboxes midway through a Wednesday afternoon. The important thing here is actually club staff received a different email on Monday, which was Richard Arnold just sort of setting out the new season, acknowledging that there are a few things still to be resolved, i.e. the takeover and the Mason Greenwood situation, and saying the club would be in touch over the next few weeks with further communication.

So for what was essentially a non-update really from the club on Wednesday afternoon, it wasn’t a communication of a decision.

It was something where they clearly felt that, following stories around the pressure that’s being applied to the women’s team over the past week and then also the story that they knew we were planning to publish, they felt they were losing control of the story, losing control of the narrative that had been very carefully choreographed over a great deal of time and had a great deal of planning.

I think it represented a little bit of a desperate attempt to claw back that control. And, you know, my personal reading of it is that it gave a window really into a club that is unsettled and panicking a little bit at this stage about how to handle what is threatening to become a very, very difficult situation from a PR point of view involving one of their employees.

🧵 Little thread on #mufc and Greenwood after today’s events, which may help people understand what happened. This is a bit industry-y but hopefully people appreciate the transparency

— Adam Crafton (@AdamCrafton_) August 16, 2023

Why is it important to show the process of the story being published?

Adam Crafton: I think sometimes as journalists, we presume that everyone knows how all these things work, right? How something just appears on a website and I think sometimes, within reason, it’s good to explain that process.

We did everything as we should on Wednesday.

We approached the club with the facts as we understood them to be true. We gave the club ample time to respond. We also allowed them an extension to their deadline because they said they were formulating the response for us. And then all of a sudden the club statement appears on the website simultaneously to it being sent to us.

Therefore, it was entirely clear to me that the response that the club provided, I think it’s very fair to conclude, was a result of the reporting that we intended to do.

And I think it’s very important that Manchester United fans who would have just been looking at that thinking: “What’s that statement all about?” have that understanding.

How much consultation will the United women’s team have had on the decision that is made?

Adam Crafton: This has become one of the really dominant topics in terms of this consultation, this proposed consultation with the women’s team.

As this process has gone along, Manchester United have used slightly different wording at slightly different times around what will happen with regards to key stakeholders. At different times it’s been described as consultation or engagement or kind of pre-briefing.

I think the word consultation gives a hint of “we’re really bearing in mind their views when we make a decision”. I think far more what Manchester United were planning to do, certainly at the start of August with the proposed announcement, was “we’re going to sit down with these people, whether that’s sponsors or advisors or fan advisory board or the women’s team, and we’re basically going to tell them the decision, explain our reasons. There’ll be an opportunity for feedback, but, fundamentally, the decision is made, but we don’t want it to be a huge shock that they find out on social media or on the club website when it lands”.

And some people would argue that that is really entirely appropriate because you’re talking about the relationship between an employer, an employee, and arguably an HR issue between those two parties.

People might also say, well, it’s not appropriate to delegate a major decision that the club’s hierarchy ought to make onto the shoulders of, you know, the women’s team, some of which are still playing at the World Cup. So I do see that from both sides.

We’ve had to be careful around how all of that is framed. But what has happened, regardless of what the truth of that intention really is, because there has been this perception that the women’s team will in some way be involved, it has led to social media hounding of some of these women over the past week or so.

To the extent we reported that one agent of a Manchester United women’s player was exploring enlisting cybersecurity support for his client, due to supporters who are supportive of Greenwood saying things like: “We’re watching you, we’ll be coming for you,” and things like that.

So that has become one of the darkest and most troubling aspects of this whole thing. And, unfortunately, it really stems from a vacuum of communication from the very top of the club and the delays during this process.

Laura Williamson: We can only surmise why this decision has been delayed, but when this meeting took place in the first week of August, that is just as England with Mary Earps and Katie Zelem (pictured below) are progressing into the knockout stages of the World Cup. And it it feels like to me somebody suddenly realised, hang on, we can’t put this out while our wonderful female players are playing at the other side of the world and winning.

And so you’ve opening up yourself to this situation where England are now in a World Cup final. They might win it. I hope they win it! But they might get asked after it: “What do you think about Mason Greenwood’s return to Manchester United?” It’s absolutely unpalatable.

It feels like the bigger picture hasn’t been seen here and that’s why it’s been delayed, and it just leaves a sour taste in the mouth.

Adam Crafton: The timing is also fascinating because I think one of the things Manchester United have come to realise is there’s actually never a right time to bring him back, right?

Now because of the delays and because things have started to come out, it looks like they’re kind of on the run a little bit. What they’ve realised is there is no ideal time. There is no ideal time to bring back Mason Greenwood and perhaps that in itself could be quite revealing to them.

What happens now?

Laurie Whitwell: I feel like they have this plan in mind that they want to enact. They obviously have delayed it for the reasons Adam has outlined very articulately. Does the reaction come into it too, in terms of just representing your company, your brand?

We’re not talking about his innocence or guilt. He’s not faced any charges in a court of law. But in terms of actually representing your club, people have deep affection for this club that they go and watch and they have emotion about it.

We’re getting a lot of people that are writing into us that are communicating what they’ve sent to Richard Arnold, for example, which is that they don’t want Mason Greenwood at their club.

Now, does that govern what you then ultimately do as a club if you feel it’s right to bring him back?

It’s the Women’s World Cup final on Sunday. Are they instantly going to start briefing the women’s players after that point? I don’t know. I feel like there should really be a gap. As Adam said, if they go and win this thing, they should just be allowed to celebrate and enjoy it and have a great time afterwards.

Adam Crafton: Ultimately, the level of planning that has gone into this over so many months, they must have priced in that some elements of this may get out into the media. It’s unfathomable that they couldn’t have conceived that.

And also that there would be something like a protest at the first game, as we saw. And also there would be a social media backlash. That’s how social media works. So I don’t think anything’s happened that couldn’t have been foreseen.

To be honest, it’s just a case of, well, if you really, really believe this is the right thing to do, then come out and argue it and stand by it and get on with it. Or are they going to go back to the drawing board off the back of all of this and say: “Oh, maybe we need to think again?”

The sponsors I think are quite interesting because they’ve been pretty quiet so far, haven’t they?

Laura Williamson: Yeah, really quiet. We’ve asked all United’s major sponsors: “Did they agree with Mason Greenwood coming back or not?” and the vast majority were no comment. And Adidas were very keen to say that they don’t have any say in day-to-day matters at the club having just signed that mega long-term deal with Manchester United.

It’s going to be fascinating what happens now. This gives United a chance to see what the feeling is like out there. You know, that classic sort of thing when you’re launching something, you see what the feeling is before you actually launch it and it’s back on them. Now what are they going to do? If the letters that we’re receiving are indicative of the general swell of feeling out there, then this decision has become even harder overnight.

Adam Crafton: You have to remember, with United, we’ve reported over the years how much attention they pay to the fan feeling at different times on different issues. And they’ve wavered over the years on different things based on that. So I do think, clearly, they’ve made a decision, but human beings can change their decision until it’s been announced.

That’s why we were very careful to make clear these are the facts as we know them. But who knows how human beings react with what is a mounting, potentially intolerable pressure that’s being put on them.

(Top photo: Lindsey Parnaby/AFP via Getty Images)