They can complain about the Profit & Sustainability rules. They can moan about Financial Fair Play. But it's obvious - so, so obvious - that no decision-maker inside Manchester United is going to fight to maintain the club's youth traditions.
From the Busby Babes. To George Best. Right through to the Class of 92. That's the history of United. It's traditions and culture. But with this lot in charge. With such a disconnect between those who make up Jim Ratcliffe's management team and this club's rich past, it's becoming clear that United's link to it's youth system is being rapidly transformed.
Of course, talk of Kobbie Mainoo and Alejandro Garnacho now being up for sale is doing the rounds. FA Youth Cup winning teammates, who now share a senior dressing room, Mainoo and Garnacho are simply carrying on the traditions of what sets United apart. For all the big-money signings. For all the pressure and hype that swirls around the club. There has always been a connection to the academy. Indeed, they celebrate it. Ever since 1937, United have always maintained at least one academy graduate in their senior matchday squad.
As we say, it's a bedrock of this club. But for how long? It's a question that needs to be asked. For beyond the speculation around Mainoo and Garnacho, what's been absent from the soundbites coming out of Old Trafford about "PSR" and "FFP" has been any show of passion or fight to defend the club's academy tradition.
Instead, from the manager, to the CEO, to the just sacked technical director, all the talk about the academy has centred on the saleability of the players coming through. There's been no talk of keeping a group of young players together as Sir Matt Busby and Sir Alex Ferguson did previously. There's been no acknowledgement of how United was built on their commitment to homegrown talent. Instead, it's been all bean-counter stuff. Profit and loss. Sales and signings. What young players like Mainoo and Garnacho represent and offer - those intangibles this column routinely raises - now thrown away and replaced by phrases like 'assets' and 'pure profit'.
We've had Dan Ashworth, now United's former technical director, declaring earlier this season that the prospect of one-club players - even at United - would become a thing of the past. An approach supported by Omar Berrada, the chief exec tempted away from Manchester City: "...the fundamental principle of the rules, we are in favour of, which is that we need to operate sustainably.
"And in order to do that, it's obviously taking good football decisions ins and outs, developing academy players that can contribute to the first team. It's also managing a good business. Growing your revenues, managing your costs properly. So all of that plays into it. And we're all fundamentally in favour of that."
Even the manager, Ruben Amorim, was at it on Friday ahead of United's trip to Arsenal for their FA Cup Third Round tie.
"What I said is that we have to improve our academy," said the Portuguese, "to bring young kids that fills the club in the right way, and also with that rules, we are able to do some business and have some money to invest in the team."
Again, not from Ashworth, nor Berrada, nor even Amorim, none of them drew attention to United's academy traditions and how they've shaped the club. It's almost as if it's not on anyone's radar at all. Certainly from what's coming out of the club, there's no-one willing to publicly fight to maintain their academy culture.
So it'll happen. It's well on track. Sell Mainoo to Chelsea, Garnacho to Real Madrid, or Marcus Rashford to AC Milan - all for Ratcliffe's 'pure profit', of course - and that 88 year-old academy tradition will surely be lost. Under Amorim, you can see it happening. And the worse thing is, none of this lot will care.
One man who would is Ferguson. But of course, he's now no more than a well-connected fan. His opinion isn't sought. His advice never canvassed. And you fear with Ferguson's sidelining also goes the last champion of United's foundational traditions.
Recalling those first days as United manager, Ferguson said at a Harvard Business School lecture: "I knew that a focus on youth would fit the club’s history, and my earlier coaching experience told me that winning with young players could be done and that I was good at working with them. So I had the confidence and conviction that if United was going to mean anything again, rebuilding the youth structure was crucial.
"You don’t ever want to take your eyes off the first team, but our youth development efforts ended up leading to our many successes in the 1990s and early 2000s. The young players really became the spirit of the club.
"When you give young people a chance, you not only create a longer life span for the team, you also create loyalty ... You’re really fostering a sense of family."
A family spirit? Youth traditions? We're hard-pressed to nominate anyone inside United fighting for those values today. This club is changing - and rapidly. And as it does, it's becoming more and more obvious that there's no-one to push-back as these traditions vanish.