Manchester United have announced the appointment of John Alexander as their new club secretary. He will take up the position at Old Trafford at the end of the season after the retirement of the present secretary - Ken Ramsden.
John has been the Secretary at Spurs since 2000 and before that he was Club Secretary at Watford. He started his playing career with Millwall, Reading and Northampton Town, before retiring in 1982. He has done excellent work at Spurs and they were reluctant to let him go but John Alexander had already made up his mind to join Manchester United.
For filing up this post, United's CEO David Gill had started a massive recruitment process in September 2009, which included advertisements in national newspapers which attracted many high quality applications from the world of football and beyond. However, an official statement on Manchester United's website confirms John's appointment.
Its interesting that John Alexander is only the fifth Secretary for Manchester United since the war. He follows Walter Crickmer (1926-1958), Les Olive (1958-1988), Kenneth Merrett (1988-2007) and Ken Ramsden (2007-2010).
David Gill welcomed the appointment. He said: “John is the perfect candidate to succeed Ken. He is a real football man with a wealth of experience in the game. Everyone is delighted that he has accepted the chance to play a major part in the Club’s development. The Club would like to thank Spurs for their co-operation during this process, in particular agreeing to John’s early release from his contractual obligations, which allows us to ensure continuity in the post when Ken retires.”
