Man Utd reach settlement with Newcastle to appoint Dan Ashworth as sporting director

Manchester United have finally reached a settlement with Newcastle to appoint Dan Ashworth as sporting director.

Ashworth, 53, is expected to start his new role with immediate effect.

His move marks the end of a bitter four-month wrangle with Newcastle when it looked like an arbitration hearing was going to be needed to break the deadlock.

United had first approached Newcastle in February after Ashworth had been placed on gardening leave.

But Sir Jim Ratcliffe and his Ineos team balked at demands for £20 million in compensation.

With neither club backing down in negotiations, it emerged in April that Ashworth was set to take Newcastle to arbitration. The Old Trafford club backed the move and were willing to pay his legal costs.

It is thought a hearing had been due to be held soon but the clubs have now broken the impasse, leaving Ashworth free to start.

Ashworth will complete a new-look hierarchy at United and faces the immediate challenge of taking the lead on the transfer-window policy with Jason Wilcox, who was appointed technical director in April. Omar Berrada is finally due to start as chief executive on July 13 after six months on gardening leave following his exit from Manchester City. John Murtough left as football director in April as part of Ineos’s huge reshuffle.

Ashworth will oversee football operations, with ultimate responsibility for recruitment and performance, and help finalise Erik ten Hag’s impending  contract extension. Wilcox will report to him.

United had originally been unwilling to offer much more than £2 million in compensation for Ashworth. That was similar to the fee Newcastle had paid to take Ashworth from Brighton in 2022.

It is unclear what level of compensation United and Newcastle finally agreed on but the deal comes at the start of what is effectively a new accounting year for clubs.

Ratcliffe had made no secret of his frustration with the Ashcroft process and admitted it had caused headaches for his club.

Speaking in an interview with Bloomberg last month, Ratcliffe said: “One of the biggest issues in football, which I have to say I wasn’t fully prepared for, was the gardening-leave issue, which is not something that I bump into in my business world.

“I see absolutely no point in the gardening-leave thing that they have in football.

“It just makes it difficult to change things with pace because Omar [Berrada] is on six months, Dan Ashworth is on one-and-a-half years.

“Newcastle are just being very difficult and very awkward about Dan. Until you get the people in, it’s quite difficult to drive the change and it’s just frustrating.”

Newcastle released the following statement confirming Ashworth’s departure.

“Newcastle United and Manchester United have reached an agreement for the immediate release of Dan Ashworth from his contractual obligations at Newcastle United. The terms of this agreement will remain confidential between the clubs. Newcastle United thanks Dan for his service and wishes him well for the future.”

United, meanwhile, have signed a new three year shirt deal with Snapdragon worth almost £180 million. The £59 million a year deal – which includes an option to extend by a further two years – is the largest front of shirt partnership in the world and follows the £900 million, 10-year kit deal the club struck with Adidas last year. There will be no drop in the value of the deal should United miss out on Champions League over the period of the partnership. Snapdragon is the consumer facing brand of technology company Qualcomm.

Snapdragon’s chief marketing officer Don McGuire believes it would make “a lot of sense” for the Premier League and European football to explore playing a one-off domestic season game in the US or other foreign markets. United are due to tour the US this summer with games in Los Angeles, San Diego’s Snapdragon Stadium and South Carolina.