Chelsea set to appoint Man United's American media chief who was blasted by Gary Neville for 'creating robots on and off the pitch'

Phil Lynch, the Manchester United media chief blasted by Gary Neville, is joining the American revolution at Chelsea.

The Old Trafford exec was accused of ‘creating robots on off the pitch’ by the ex-United defender after a video emerged in 2021 of him explaining how the club works with players on social media.

Mail Sport understands that American Lynch, who handed his notice in at Old Trafford last month, will be taking up the role of global head of digital for BlueCo, the US-consortium that acquired Chelsea in 2022 and which also owns French side Strasbourg. It is thought he will be primarily focussing on Stamford Bridge and will become the first exec to move between the clubs since chief executive Peter Kenyon made the switch in 2003.

Lynch’s exit is not understood to be linked to the arrival of Sir Jim Ratcliffe and INEOS at United, after they acquired a 25 per cent stake in the Premier League giants and vowed to make performance on the pitch a priority. 

However, his departure will give Ratcliffe and the new arrivals the option to restructure a key element of United’s operation, should they choose to do so.

In his time as chief executive of media, Lynch was responsible for all of United’s output including MUTV, the club’s TV channel, its App and social media channels. 

After overseeing substantial growth following his arrival in 2017, he switched into a new role as chief executive officer of digital products and experiences, with a focus on the likes of NFTs, crypto and emerging digital engagement tools.

He becomes the latest American to join co-owners Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali at Stamford Bridge. The duo have also brought in the likes of chief executive Chris Jurasek and Tottenham commercial boss Todd Kline.

In the 2021 public storm Lynch, a former Sony exec, explained how United attempted to influence fan opinion of its players. 

‘We pull, twice a day, fan sentiment graphs for every one of our players,’ he explained. ‘We have certain thresholds that alert us when we see fan sentiment going one way — be that a personal issue, an on-pitch performance issue and when that happens, we then start to work with the player and his team individually to try and counter that narrative a little bit.’

That prompted former captain Neville to observe: ‘Creating Robots on and off the pitch! Get the f**k away from them. It’s a football club. He makes controlling fans sound like he’s trying to win a general election!’.

It will be interesting to observe how long expires before Lynch arrives in West London. He is still working at United and is serving a period of gardening leave. 

As has been reported, United are currently in a standoff with Newcastle over the situation with sporting-director-in-waiting Dan Ashworth, who wants to move from the north east to Old Trafford. 

Omar Berrada, who is joining United from City, is expected to arrive in the summer following ‘grown up conversations’ between the two rivals.