Sheikh Jassim bin Hamad Al Thani has made an improved offer to buy Manchester United.
The Qatari banker and Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s Ineos group are the two main players looking to buy the Old Trafford club.
Both groups submitted a third offer end of April.
Sheikh Jassim submitted a new offer on Tuesday morning in new talks involving the Raine Group, which is handling the process.
The offer is for 100% of the club, will clear United’s debt and includes a separate fund solely for the club and the local community.
The March figures showed United owed £969.6m by a combination of gross indebtedness, bank loans and outstanding transfer fees with the associated payments.
The Glazer family announced in November that they were considering selling Manchester United as they “explore strategic alternatives”.
Although there has been no response from the Glazer family since the last submission deadline on April 28, there is growing confidence in the Ineos camp that their bid to buy United would be successful.
It is understood that one of Ratcliffe’s suggestions was to reduce the amount of United he wanted to buy from an initial 69% for all of Glazer’s stake to just over 50%, which would allow co-chairs Joel and Avram Glazer to retain some involvement.
Avram Glazer followed his appearance at the Carabao Cup final in February watching United’s women’s team lose in the FA Cup final against Chelsea at Wembley on Sunday.
Glazer then visited a London hotel owned by Sheikh Jassim’s father, sparking more rumors about the sale process, although BBC Sport were told no discussions had taken place with the Raine group.
There is no indication when the Glazer family will make a decision on United’s future direction.
They bought the club for £790million in 2005 and established a valuation of between £5 billion and £6 billion.
It had been estimated that an announcement could take place this week given that the transfer window opens in less than a month, which would give manager Erik ten Hag some clarity on his summer budget.
However, there is no guarantee that this will happen.
