Brailsford set for Man Utd role despite government concerns after doping claims
He's the man behind the golden age of British cycling - but with a tainted legacy.
Sir Dave Brailsford, knighted in 2013 following Team GB's remarkable feats at the London Olympic Games, is expected to soon become a leading figure at the biggest football club in England - if not the world - Manchester United.
As director of sport for INEOS - the petrochemical conglomerate owned by Britain's second-richest man, Sir Jim Ratcliffe - Brailsford has been keenly involved in the £1.4billion bid which is set to result in the company owning 25 percent of United by the end of this week.
But who is Brailsford and what should fans know about him before he gets to work at Old Trafford? Mirror Football takes a look.
From humble beginnings growing up in north Wales, having been born in Derby, Brailsford got his big break in sport 22 years ago when British Cycling appointed him as their programmes director. Within two years he'd move up to become performance director and at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, the Sheffield Hallam University graduate was part of a ground-breaking operation, guiding Team GB to their best finish in nearly a century by winning two cycling gold medals.
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As Brailsford's name was on the rise, so was his modus operandi: marginal gains. "The whole principle came from the idea that if you broke down everything you could think of that goes into riding a bike, and then improved it by 1 percent, you will get a significant increase when you put them all together," he explained in a 2012 interview with BBC Sport.
Team GB didn't just gain marginally, though, they in fact led the cycling medal table at both the 2008 and 2012 Olympic Games, winning eight golds on each occasion. Midway through his success with the nation's best cyclists, Brailsford also became manager of the newly-formed Team Sky. Under his leadership, while marrying the role with his British Cycling commitments, Sky won all but one of the seven Tours de France from 2012 to 2018 thanks to stars Bradley Wiggins, Chris Froome and Geraint Thomas.
Team Sky dominated the Tour de France between 2012 and 2018 (Pool - Tim de Waele/Getty Images)But it was at the tail end of Sky's dominance when Brailsford - who quit his role with British Cycling in 2014 - became embroiled in a controversy which would forever leave a stain on his storied career. It centres around a mysterious jiffy bag delivered from British Cycling to Team Sky at the end of the Criterium du Dauphine in 2011, leading to allegations of doping.
After five years of simmering speculation, Brailsford said he was told by now ex-British Cycling doctor Richard Freeman that the package contained the decongestant Fluimucil. Freeman, however, didn't have the medical records to prove so.
Following a UK Anti-Doping (Ukad) investigation in 2017, no doping charges were brought against Team Sky or British Cycling, but the select committee report still concluded that Team Sky had "crossed an ethical line". In 2021, Freeman was found guilty of ordering testosterone "knowing or believing" it was to enhance the performance of an unnamed rider. This August, he was handed a four-year ban from all sport for possession of a banned substance and twice lying to Ukad investigators.
The 54-page report criticised "poor record keeping and poor medicines policies" within both British Cycling and Team Sky. It also alleged that the drug Triamcinolone had been "used to prepare" four-time Olympic gold medalist Wiggins "and possibly other riders supporting him" for the 2012 Tour de France, "not to treat medical need, but to improve his power to weight ratio ahead of the race."
Four-time Olympics gold medal winner Bradley Wiggins insists that he isn't a cheat (Tom Jenkins/Getty Images)Froome came to Brailsford's defence in the aftermath of the report being published and to this day Wiggins insists that he didn't cheat, saying that the Triamcinolone was used to treat his asthma and hay fever. Brailsford, who also continues to deny the allegations, told the Cycling Podcast in 2016: "I have looked at this allegation and I can find no wrongdoing.
"We're not cheating. We're not doing anything wrong here. The one thing I know about Team Sky is that this is a clean team. If I didn't think we were doing it the right way I wouldn't be doing it."
Chairing a government inquiry into 'Combatting Doping in Sport', which was published in 2018 and partly focussed on Team Sky, was Conservative MP Damian Collins. The former junior minister questioned whether Brailsford was "well placed to be advising other sports" amid speculation that he was set to venture into cricket as part of the ECB's high-performance team.
"We took evidence on governance failures relating to the performance programmes at British Cycling and Team Sky," Collins told BBC Sport. "In our report we concluded, 'How can David Brailsford ensure that his team is performing to his requirements, if he does not know and cannot tell what drugs the doctors are giving the riders? David Brailsford must take responsibility for these failures'.
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"Whilst I'm sure David Brailsford has learnt from past mistakes in cycling, I'd question whether this makes him well placed to be advising other sports."
Have your say! Will INEOS bring Manchester United back to the top? Let us know your prediction in the comments section.
Sir Dave Brailsford had a highly successful 11 years as British Cycling's performance director (Gary M. Prior/Getty Images)Those concerns haven't stopped him from making it big at Ratciffe's company, though, as Team Sky were rebranded to INEOS Grenadiers in 2019 following a change of sponsorship. For the past two years, Brailsford has been INEOS' director of sport alongside his role as team principal of the Grenadiers.
His responsibility is now to oversee the running of INEOS' wide-ranging portfolio of sport teams, such as French side Nice. Following a rocky first few years since Ratcliffe and co purchased them in August 2019, the Ligue 1 outfit sit second in the table behind Riviera rivals Monaco.
In December of last year, L'Equipe reported that Brailsford was living in a luxury caravan at Nice's training ground, desperately trying to get the club back on track. Now that new manager Francesco Farioli - who's just 34 - has hit the ground running this term and Les Aiglons look as strong as ever under INEOS, Brailsford's attention has turned to Old Trafford.
Alongside Sir Jim Ratcliffe, Sir Dave Brailsford watched Nice beat rivals Monaco in September (Jean Catuffe/Getty Images)The 59-year-old was part of INEOS' delegation who made a visit to Manchester for in-depth discussions with club chiefs back in March. "We'd very much like to do it," Brailsford told ITV when quizzed about the company's pursuit.
"To be custodians of one of one of the biggest sporting teams, brands, in the world and trying to really support the team and go back to the success they deserve. And also the fanbase.
"I've worked in Manchester for a long time, we saw the team become a global phenomenon, Team Sky have done the same. I know Manchester really well so you get a sense of what the club is all about and what the fans want."
Easier said than done, but Brailsford's got the track record.
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