Manchester United launch ambitious new plan to catch Liverpool and FSG

When Fenway Sports Group first walked through the door as owners of Liverpool back in October of 2010 there was talk in the background of a potential new stadium being built across Stanley Park.

Liverpool and Anfield had gone hand in glove ever since the club took up tenancy there in 1892. Its charm, lustre and importance was not lost on FSG supremo John Henry, who having committed to keeping his Boston Red Sox in their spiritual home of Fenway Park Stadium some years before, committed to doing the same at Liverpool, preferring to build up the existing stadium, something that was achieved through the major redevelopment of the Main Stand in 2016 and the current expansion work being undertaken at the Anfield Road End.

Like Liverpool, Manchester United and their stadium have a special bond. Old Trafford has been home of the club for 112 years and has undergone facelift after facelift as the decades have passed to become the Premier League's biggest stadium at 76,000.

It has, though, reflected the team that has been on the pitch in recent years, but has been the beneficiary of far less investment to try and make it better. Old Trafford continues to be the Premier League's biggest ground, but it has been some time since it was anywhere near being the most impressive, with new stadiums cropping up the length and breadth of the country and work at places such as Anfield casting Old Trafford in a rather tired light. Like the team on the pitch its glory days seemed to be behind it.

The Glazer family's ownership of Manchester United has been a deeply unpopular one for United fans ever since the leveraged buyout of the club back in 2005, a move that loaded hundreds of millions of pounds worth of debt onto the football club with