Former Man City defender turned pundit believes that Omar Berrada’s switch to Manchester United is a “massive blow” for the Premier League champions.
INEOS started their overhaul at United with Saturday evening’s announcement that they have appointed City Football Group’s chief football operations officer, Berrada, as their new chief executive.
After arriving from Barcelona in 2011, Berrada established himself as City’s commercial director in recent years and is well respected within the game. He eventually moved on to chief officer before becoming chief football operations officer.
The news has shocked many in the game, but one can’t blame Berrada for ditching City to take a better role at a bigger football club.
Former City defender Micah Richards has now offered his verdict on the latest episode of The Rest is Football. He claims to know Berrada well and describes him as ‘inspirational’.
“I know him, I know him very well,” said Richards.
“A really nice guy, he is incredibly articulate, he’s got a plan… so how it works at Man City, you’ll have Khaldoon, who is chairman/owner, then you’ll have Ferran, who takes care of not just Man City but all the City Group, so he’s like the front man, CEO, any speeches or any direction. Then you’ll have Txiki, who is the football side. Really great guy, he’s just football operations, so he’s the one who gets the players and Omar worked alongside him and Brian Marwood in terms of negotiating the deals, dealing with the scouts and all that sort of thing.
“I’ve listened to him talk and he’s so inspirational, the way he knows the game, the way he knows the market and Gary Neville says it a lot but ‘best in class’ in terms of getting every department to run the best it possibly can be. It’s not just his voice, he’s happy to take opinions from other people, put them all together and help build all the way from the ground up. To see him go to Man Utd is a massive blow.
“It definitely was a shock but, by all accounts, it was done amicably and they wish him well but it just shows you how far Man City have come in terms of organisation and how they run, how all the big clubs around the world now are trying to poach their staff, so it says a lot about him and a lot about the way Man City are doing things.”
It remains to be seen when Berrada can start work at United, but he should be in position by the summer at the very latest.
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