Sir Jim Ratcliffe: Full transcript of Dan Roan’s interview with Man Utd co-owner

What did you make of the hardline stance he took with Marcus Rashford. Did that have your support?

Yep.

Why was that stance taken?

Because he wants a dressing room that is full of people who are totally committed to winning football matches. He won’t tolerate people who don’t have 100% of that attitude.

It was about a culture?

Yes. That’s Ruben, and the players have to be in the same box.

Frustrating to see him do well at Aston villa?

No, I am pleased. He’s moved out of Manchester and maybe that’s a good thing for him. I am very pleased he is doing well. It’s good to see because he has got tremendous talent, but for whatever reason it wasn’t working in Manchester for the past couple of seasons. But he is a very talented footballer, Rashford.

United face the prospect of not being in Europe at all… but also could win the Europa League to get back in the Champions League. How important is it that United win the Europa League? Financially?

Thursday [the second leg of United’s Europa League last-16 game against Real Sociedad] is a huge game for us, absolutely. We shouldn’t underestimate them. There’s no guarantees in life but it’s a huge game for Ruben.

A chance to clear a few things up… when it comes to the women’s team it has been suggested you don’t care as much about that team as the men’s team. How would you describe the situation from your perspective?

It’s a bit unfair. What I said at the beginning was my main focus is on the men’s team because that, at the end of the day, is what moves the needle at Manchester United. The women’s team is much smaller than the men’s team. Of our £650m of income, £640m of that comes from the men’s team and £10m comes from the women’s team.

With my business background you tend to focus on the bigger issues before you focus on the smaller issues. But the women’s team wear the Manchester United brand, the Manchester United logo, so in that sense they are every bit as important as the men’s team. And frankly, they are doing better than the men’s team – they are second in the league and won the FA Cup last season. [Head coach] Marc Skinner is doing a great job as the coach and the new captain Maya [le Tissier] is doing a great job.

I saw reports you had to ask Katie Zelem who she was…do you want to clear that up?

No, not really. I did ask Maya if she was related to Matt [le Tissier] but the answer was no.

If the women get to the FA Cup final will you attend, or someone from Ineos, as was suggested?

Certainly someone from Ineos will attend. Whether I’ll be there or not I don’t know because I don’t know what the date is and my diary to be honest.

On Ineos’ general fortunes, what’s the situation…we read about debt several times more than annual earnings, downgrades by credit agencies and then you look at the fact you are withdrawing from some sports in terms of sponsorships. There’s the state of the European energy market, taxation. What is the state of play within Ineos financially? Could any issues impact United?

Ineos is in a good place today but not in as good a place as it was three or four years ago. Europe has become a very difficult place to do business for industrial companies because energy prices now in Europe are five times America, which is where a lot of our competition is. We have huge levels of carbon tax in Europe, and in America they have no carbon tax. The two biggest industries in Europe are the chemical industry and the automotive industry and both are tough industries to be in at the moment.

Ineos is clearly in the middle of the chemical industry and we are probably the largest chemical manufacturer in Europe. We are the only chemical manufacturer in Europe who is building something. We are building a huge facility in Antwerp which costs £4.5bn.

Times are tough and when they are you have to cut your cloth. We’ve not changed any of our sports ownership because we own things in sport like part of the F1 team, the America’s Cup team and what have you. But we have reduced the sponsorship. I know again that’s unpopular and difficult but sometimes you do have to be unpopular when times get tough.

New Zealand Rugby accused Ineos of reneging on a sponsorship deal?

We talked to New Zealand Rugby about the fact that times are tough and we’d like to see if we could find a compromise. Which you would think as a sponsor of the All Blacks they would have listened to, but they didn’t want to listen . So we finished up in a different place.