Sir Alan Sugar has told Sky Sports News that he cannot understand the motives behind Malcolm Glazer's takeover of Manchester United.
With the American tycoon closing in on a 75 percent stake in the Old Trafford outfit, fans of the FA Cup finalists have been protesting vehemently about the developments in the boardroom.
Sugar, the former Tottenham chairman, sympathises with the United supporters as he finds it hard to fathom why Glazer is prepared to unload so much debt on his new purchase.
"I think you said if you can believe what you read," he informed Sky Sports News. "One needs to stand back and count to ten for a moment.
"There's a lot of stories in the press about how he raised the money to buy the shares. Normally, when you buy companies, not particularly football clubs, but any other companies, you can raise money through investment banks then, after the deal is done, the actual debt that you've raised is the debt of the company you've just purchased.
"It's pretty standard procedure. But certainly from what I can understand, this is not a Roman Abramovich-style takeover at Chelsea. It's a completely different thing and I'm struggling to understand what this fellow's motives are and why he wants a football club.
"I don't know how you make money out of a football club," confessed Sugar. "No-one else has managed to do that in the past.
"Abramovich took over a club; for whatever reasons, he wanted to take over a football club and he invested loads and loads of money on players and actually paid off the debt when he bought Chelsea. This fellow seems to be reversing this by pushing the debt for purchasing shares of the club into the company now.
"Under normal circumstances, buying any other business, it's standard procedure. The theory behind it is that the profits made by the company just acquired will end up paying off the debt. That's okay if you're buying a chain of department stores but, in football, we all know it doesn't actually work that way."
Although some pundits have indicated that Glazer will step up commercial activities at Old Trafford and further penetrate Asian and American markets, Sugar thinks this does not ring true.
"I don't quite see what this chap is going to add that the previous regime hasn't already tried," he added.
"Manchester United have, for the past five, six or seven years, even under Peter Kenyon, tried to exploit every single thing that they sell and represent.
"I don't see what this fellow is going to bring to the party. Americans aren't particularly interested in English soccer clubs, as they call them. It's not a new thing as there are a few Americans interested in it, but not a lot. I can't understand what he's got in mind.
"Maybe he's got visions of breaking the cartel, what he may consider to be a cartel, on TV rights. There's been talk in the past that clubs should be allowed to sell their own rights and not collectively. The Premier League have taken the sensible view that they should be sold collectively.
"But people in the European Community are saying that's wrong. Maybe he's an advocate of it but I wish him luck if he feels he can go it alone in trying to sell Manchester United's television rights."
