Manchester United published their Q3 results today, covering the nine months to 31 March 2026. After a Q2 update that read like a club cutting its way out of trouble, this set of numbers tells a more encouraging story. Revenue is growing again, profitability has jumped, and the team has done its bit by finishing in the Champions League places. The debt, however, has not gone anywhere. United are heading in the right direction, but they are still carrying the same weight on their back.
Revenue is finally growing again
The headline figure that stands out is revenue. Last time it was falling. This time it rose 3.5% to £520.1 million across the nine months, driven almost entirely by broadcasting.
| Revenue stream | 9m FY2026 | Share of total | YoY change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Commercial | £245.1m | 47.1% | flat |
| Broadcasting | £157.1m | 30.2% | +17.1% |
| Matchday | £117.9m | 22.7% | -4.1% |
| Total | £520.1m | 100% | +3.5% |
Broadcasting is the engine here, up 17.1% to £157.1 million, and it is worth being precise about why. None of it is European money. United did not play in Europe at all this season, so there is no Champions League or Europa League income anywhere in these figures. The release puts the rise down to two domestic factors: a higher projected Premier League finish than the year before, which brings more live TV picks and a larger slice of merit payments, and the increased value of the Premier League’s latest international broadcast rights cycle. The genuine European windfall, from the Champions League place United have just secured, does not arrive until next season and lands in the FY2027 accounts. For now, this is simply a club being rewarded for a much better league campaign, and a reminder that for a side of United’s size, results on the pitch and income off it are tied together far more tightly than the commercial machine likes to admit.
Commercial income held flat at £245.1 million, which is steadier than the 13.5% sponsorship slide we saw in Q2 but still not the growth you would want from the part of the business that is supposed to be United’s superpower. The training kit slot left empty by Tezos last summer is still a gap waiting to be filled. Matchday slipped 4.1% to £117.9 million, largely a function of the fixture calendar rather than weakening demand.
Profitability has surged
This is where the INEOS project starts to look like it is working. United turned a £3.2 million operating loss a year ago into a £37.7 million operating profit. Adjusted EBITDA, the cleanest measure of how much cash the business generates before debt and player trading, climbed 29% to £187.5 million.
The cost discipline is the throughline. Wages fell to £219.1 million over the nine months, down from £234.1 million, and now represent 42.2% of revenue rather than 46.6% a year ago. When you are earning more and paying out less, the gap widens fast. The headcount reductions and squad trimming that defined the early INEOS period are still feeding through.
“We feel very positive about the club’s progress this season and the continuing positive impact of our business transformation initiatives.”
Omar Berrada, CEO
There is a familiar caveat, though. That £37.7 million operating profit includes £43.0 million of gains from selling players. Strip those out and United’s underlying football operations ran at roughly a £5.3 million loss over the nine months. That is a far smaller hole than the club has lived with in recent years, and the trend is clearly positive, but the point from the last update still holds: United are not yet able to fund themselves from day-to-day football income alone. The player-trading model remains load-bearing.
So why did United still post a loss?
For all the improvement higher up the income statement, United still recorded a net loss of £14.3 million. The culprit is the same one it has always been. Net finance costs of £55.7 million over the nine months more than swallowed the entire operating profit. That is money paid to lenders rather than spent on the squad or the stadium, and it is the direct legacy of the debt loaded onto the club during the Glazer takeover.
The one piece of genuine comfort is that the loss is shrinking. A £14.3 million net loss is a meaningful improvement on the £29.1 million lost in the same period last year. The direction of travel is right, even if the destination is still some way off.
The debt picture itself looks like this:
- Non-current borrowings: £490.1 million, the sterling value of the club’s $650 million dollar bonds
- Current borrowings: £262.5 million, down from the £295.7 million at the end of December as United paid down part of the revolving credit facility
- Cash in the bank: £60.9 million, up from £44.4 million at the half-year mark but still below the £73.2 million held a year ago
Gross debt sits at £752.6 million, leaving net debt of roughly £691.7 million. That is still an enormous number, but it is worth noting it edged down over the quarter rather than up. The January window receipts and the back end of the season’s broadcast and matchday money gave the balance sheet a little breathing room. After years of the debt only ever growing, even a small step in the other direction is worth marking.
A confident outlook
United also nudged expectations upward for the full year. Management is guiding to revenue of £655 million to £665 million and adjusted EBITDA of £200 million to £210 million for FY2026. Crucially, those numbers do not yet capture a full season of Champions League income. The broadcasting and matchday windfall from being back among Europe’s elite lands in next year’s accounts, which gives the revenue line a clear runway into FY2027.
The football is doing its part
The financial recovery has not happened in a vacuum. United finished 3rd in the Premier League and qualified for the Champions League, the single most valuable thing a club of this size can do for its revenue. Michael Carrick, who stepped in as interim head coach after Ruben Amorim’s January exit, has now been confirmed in the role through 2028, ending the uncertainty that hung over the squad for much of the winter. New contracts for Harry Maguire and Kobbie Mainoo point to a club finally planning beyond the next window, and the women’s side reaching the Champions League quarter-finals for the first time adds to the sense of a club moving forward on more than one front.
Carrick’s appointment matters financially as much as it does sportingly. The interim arrangement, as the club itself acknowledged earlier in the season, was no basis for making £100 million decisions. A permanent manager with a clear mandate lets United plan recruitment properly rather than patching the squad window to window.
The bigger picture
The Q2 verdict was a club cutting costs faster than it could grow. This update reads differently. Revenue is up, EBITDA is up sharply, wages are under control, the net loss is narrowing, and the team is back in the Champions League. Berrada’s optimism is, for once, backed by the numbers.
The qualifications remain real, though. United still lean on player sales to flatter their profits, still hand over more than £55 million a year to lenders, and still carry three quarters of a billion pounds in gross debt that the much-discussed 100,000-seat Old Trafford project will only add to. The structural problem inherited from the Glazer years has not been solved. It has merely been made more bearable by a better season.
The bottom line: this is the most encouraging set of results United have produced in a while, and the Champions League money to come should push the trajectory further still. The club is no longer just cutting its way to health. The question now is whether the football can keep delivering the European nights that make the rest of the maths work, because the debt is not going to wait.