After an underwhelming campaign in the Premier League, Jose Mourinho’s first season in charge of Manchester United was saved with victory in the Europa League finals against Ajax in Sweden. Sixth in the league, and no Champions League football next season would have really been catastrophic for Man United. The club’s fall in fortunes on the football field ever since the retirement of Sir Alex Ferguson has not affected the massive commercial machine that Manchester United is off it. However, failure to qualify for the champions league for the second consecutive season would result in the club having to pay Adidas a fine of around £ 30m . If there’s one thing that’s clear about the Man United hierarchy (not including David Gill and Sir Alex), any sort of dip in the value of their commercial interests is something that makes them stand up and take notice. Also, Champions League qualification does help when it comes to attracting the quality of players that Man United are linked with.