The Manchester United chief executive, David Gill, has claimed the club are purposely developing a young squad to smooth the transition whenever Sir Alex Ferguson retires as manager.

With the exception of the £30.75m striker Dimitar Berbatov, United have concentrated their resources on younger talent in recent transfer windows as they look to groom replacements for players such as Ryan Giggs, Paul Scholes and Gary Neville. The policy has invited accusations that United can no longer compete for the most expensive players due to the debt loaded on to the club by its owners, the Glazer family, and Wayne Rooney expressed concerns over the club's transfer policy before committing to a new contract.

Gill, however, claims the intention is to help Ferguson's successor once the Scot, who turns 69 next month, steps aside. On the issue of the manager's retirement date, he told the US-based radio station Sirius XM: "He is on a rolling contract for a year but seriously I've not discussed this issue with him for quite a while. He works and enjoys it, he talks about his health, he looks after himself in terms of the gym and exercise and all of that, he delegates well to the team around him and so long as that desire and enthusiasm is still there it sort of becomes a non-issue.

"Obviously at some stage Alex will retire, whenever that may be. What we're doing with him, with his coaches and scouts, is getting a great squad with the right age profile so that a new manager coming in – yes, he will probably want to change one or two players, that's always the way, or two or three – but he won't need to make wholesale changes. They'll be a sensible transition to the new manager. So that's where we're at. As I say, it's not something we worry about. We worry about other things but we don't worry about that."

Gill also revealed the club will seek an experienced candidate to replace Ferguson whenever the time comes to make their first managerial appointment since November 1986. "I tend to agree with that," he said of the need for experience. "It's obviously crucial that the main person at any football club or an NFL team I suppose, is the coach. What happens on the pitch is crucial to all of our off-the-field aspirations and we have to understand that. So someone coming in to take over Manchester United will have to have that pedigree, will have to have that logical success and achievement because it's such a big club.

"But I think the other key asset, or key requirement for someone coming in, is to understand the history and heritage of the club, to understand how we work commercially and what we aim to achieve and to get the right balance there and make sure we can continue as seamlessly as possible as we have done under Sir Alex. Those are the things but identifying that person is not easy but I'm sure we'll get it right when that times comes and I stress that we don't know when that is."