Arsenal Finances

[Makingtrax]

It isnt about spending big. It's about spending right. We didnt do the latter.

Look at the money we have spent on players that just were mediocre.

Mustafi 35m
Sokratis 17m
Kolasinac 100 odd k a week.
Xhaka 35m
Torreria 22m
Mikytyran swap big wages
Özil 42m plus 300k
Lacazette 52m

All failures

Defenders that cost less.

Maguire to Leicester.
Soyuncu
Joe Gomez
Robertson
Evans
Rudiger
Alderwierld
Vertonghen

Mf that cost less.

Maddison
Neves
Ndidi
Kante
Fernandinho
Eriksen when came to Sp**s


Forwards that cost less.

Salah
Firmino
Mane
Gabriel Jesus
Son
Vardy
Jimenez
Hazard to chelsea.

That's all of the top of my head. It isnt about who spends the most money. By that logic we should be above Leiecester and Sheffield United easily.

It's about spending it right and buying the best players within your budget. It may mean scouting more or taking a few gambles a year before your sure they can make they step up like the smaller teams do.

You cant tell me by swapping

Sokratis for Gomez
Kolasinac for Robertson
Xhaka for Neves
Torreria for Ndidi
Maddison/Grealish for Özil
Jesus for Laca

We wouldnt be better off. And have spent less.

Its not easy finding every top player before they peak but our signings have been terrible.

Of course it's about spending big. City have made some awful buys, and they've won the league 4 times since an oligarch bought them. How many times did they win before. The more you spend, the better your odds.

People on here!!

 

[Makingtrax]

our own fans mocking our own team, and saying Top4 isnt a trophy. Now look at them.

It's in their interests to keep blaming Wenger because sometimes it hard for people to accept blame for this mess we're in.

 

[14Henry]

Of course it's about spending big. City have made some awful buys, and they've won the league 4 times since an oligarch bought them. How many times did they win before. The more you spend, the better your odds.

People on here!!

I'm not saying spending big doesnt increase your odds of winning the title.

I'm saying signing the right players and better players does increase it.

Man United spent big and are still struggling. Why? Because they are signing the wrong players and those said players are not improving what they already have.

We spent big money on players and none of them have improved our team and brought us any closer to challenging.

Sanchez and Auba are the only two of a long long list.

Sick of harping back to liverpool but they signed a couple of players every year. With those players year on year improving the team. When they sign players the club doesnt go backwards it moves forward.

They also develop players and make them better which isnt the boards work. It's the manager and coaching staff.

We signed 150m worth of players in the summer and has it worked? No. Some of it bad luck but some of it just the wrong players or poor decisions like letting a player we desperately need stay on loan.

 

[GDeep™]

Just like how you say current Liverpool team > Arsenal invincibles

I have never said that.

 

[DanDare]

Yeah our transfer business really has been poor.

Hoping that Arteta will influence things for the better.

 

[Ceballinhos]

More than the lack of funds, we've been simply terrible at building a squad together, with players who fit together and get the best of each other.

And it has started under the Wenger reign, during his last years. Whether it was because of him or Gazidis is not relevant. And it kept going after he left.
And today we're still paying the price for it.

Just look at the state of our squad, with the hundred of millions spent over the last 5 years:

- we have 6 seniors CB, not a single functionning pair in the squad. We haven't played the same CB partnership for more than 3 games in a row this season I think.

- our FB are injury prone, or coming back from an injury.

- We have 6 seniors midfielder under contract, and yet we don't have a decent DM, they all have the same flaws: they all lack athleticism, they're bad on the defensive end, and they are all mediocre at best at creating chances.
Our most creative midfielder, Özil, has just a goal and an assist this season.
Torreira is at 1 goal and 1 assist.
Xhaka has 2 assists
Guendouzi has one
Ceballos has 1 goals and 2 assists in 9 games started
5 goals and 7 assists between our senior midfielders. Which is poverty.

Just to put things into perspective, Mkhitaryan last season, who had a mediocre year, had 6 goals and 4 assists in 25 games.

Forget even about their end product. How many of our midfielders is really comfortable at going forward, playing a pass that breaks a line, or dribble 1 of 2 players, creating a difference and give a good ball to a team mate as Cazorla Rosicky Wilshere used to do?
How many of our midfielder have a significant impact on the offensive end?
How many of them have a significant impact on the defensive end? Torreira is our best defender in this position, but he's a midget and lack athleticism to cover for his team mates anyway.

- How many senior players do we have in our squad, who can make something happen with the ball in their feet, on a consistent basis?
Auba? It's not his game. But at least he bring something else to the table.
Özil? He only performs 1 in 5 games. Can't be trusted.
Laca? He's been terrible this season.
Our midfielders? Nope.
We only have Pepe in the squad, who can make things happen if you give him the ball, either for himself or for the others. And he's not even having a great season!
(We also have Saka and Martinelli who showed they could make things happen, but right now I'm only talking about senior players).

If you compare with our team from a few years ago, we had Özil who was still a decent player, Alexis, Cazorla, Ramsey, and you could even throw Wilshere and Rosicky there who were bench players back then, but still had an important part to play in our seasons and could make stuff happen when they got the ball.
Even an injury prone wilshere from 2014/2015 or an aging Rosicky would walk into our midfield because it's that bad right now.

Our squad is just broken. It doesn't make any sense anymore. There is no fix for it.
We have to go into full rebuild mode now. Embrace it, and start to build something new from here.

 

[GDeep™]

We’re a poorly run club and have been for a while. Hiring Emery was part of that.

Our transfer business of the last few windows looks terrible. It’s no surprise we’re in this position.

Current regime signed guys like Sok and Torreira who both have been poor and look surplus to requirements under Arteta. 70M for Pepe and we’re waiting for him to have two good games in a row.

Sold Iwobi didn’t replace him, Ramsey went for free no replacement. Signed bums like Luiz and Dani who between them have had 3/4 good games.

 

[Ceballinhos]

We’re a poorly run club and have been for a while. Hiring Emery was part of that.

Our transfer business of the last few windows looks terrible. It’s no surprise we’re in this position.

Current regime signed guys like Sok and Torreira who both have been poor and look surplus to requirements under Arteta. 70M for Pepe and we’re waiting for him to have two good games in a row.

Sold Iwobi didn’t replace him, Ramsey went for free no replacement. Signed bums like Luiz and Dani who between them have had 3/4 good games.

Our windows have all been disappointing since Gazidis famously said we finally had the funds to compete with the likes of Bayern, Madrid, and we could afford to buy anyone except Ronaldo and Messi.

And it all started with signing Mesut Özil, while he was a fantastic player back then, we didn't need his profile. We spent most of the summer trying to sign a very good striker, we also had to sign a competent DM since there was already signs that Arteta was already close to the end of his career and started to become a liability in midfield...
we ended up getting Özil and Flamini on a free.

Next year, we've spent almost a £100M during the season, only Alexis was a good aquisition.
Chambers and Welbeck were both bought for 16/17M and were flops, Debuchy was a flop, Gabriel Paulista too, Ospina did ok considering the amount spent on him and that he was a back up GK.

And then we had the summer who definitely killed us for years, with Mustafi Xhaka Perez, and then tied Özil to a new record deal .

Finally, we had this new regime, but the thing is Sven has worked during 2 windows for us, and had a whole different approach from Raul's one. So last summer we were back at square one.

 

[Makingtrax]

I'm not saying spending big doesnt increase your odds of winning the title.

I'm saying signing the right players and better players does increase it.

Man United spent big and are still struggling. Why? Because they are signing the wrong players and those said players are not improving what they already have.

We spent big money on players and none of them have improved our team and brought us any closer to challenging.

Sanchez and Auba are the only two of a long long list.

Sick of harping back to liverpool but they signed a couple of players every year. With those players year on year improving the team. When they sign players the club doesnt go backwards it moves forward.

They also develop players and make them better which isnt the boards work. It's the manager and coaching staff.

We signed 150m worth of players in the summer and has it worked? No. Some of it bad luck but some of it just the wrong players or poor decisions like letting a player we desperately need stay on loan.

Not disagreeing that using money wisely will increase your odds of finishing above your spend position.

Our squad is currently the 5th most expensive, but we're 9th in the league. But I still think we'll finish 6th or 7th. Perhaps 2 places below our investment position. That's undoubtedly due to poor buying and Emery.

Wenger out performed the clubs investment in players for 20 years. It took a concerted effort by fans to remove him from that accolade, starting in 2015/16.

 

[14Henry]

Wenger bought only Petr Cech one window.

He bought Xhaka and Mustafi.

He bought 2 number 9s. One that couldn't even play in Europe.

 

[Makingtrax]

Wenger bought only Petr Cech one window.

He bought Xhaka and Mustafi.

He bought 2 number 9s. One that couldn't even play in Europe.

When the fan pressure was ramped up after the 2015/16 campaign, we had some panic buys. Xhaka, Mustafi, Perez, Asano, Holding didn't do anything for us.

 

[14Henry]

When the fan pressure was ramped up after the 2015/16 campaign, we had some panic buys. Xhaka, Mustafi, Perez, Asano, Holding didn't do anything for us.

You cant blame the fan pressure for panic buys. That is caused by poor planning. Nothing more.

 

[Makingtrax]

You cant blame the fan pressure for panic buys. That is caused by poor planning. Nothing more.

Wenger was crazy to stay so long, the knives were out for him as early as 2010. Most fans don't understand how football works. It was inevitable that they would think he could continue like the invincibles with no money to spend.. He should have gone to Real or another rich club and not given them the chance to disrespect him.

By 2016/17 the club was in a pressure cooker, that's not the place for careful decisions.

 

[GDeep™]

It says a lot about Wenger when the same two players are constantly used to criticise him - Xhaka and Mustafi and they were 30 odd million each.

One of them was a captain after Wenger left.

Wenger walked the tightrope of perfection. Without him the club is 10th and Arsenal Mania were sucking off a Chelsea reject just until last week.

Massive decline.

 

[Yousif Arsenal]

It says a lot about Wenger when the same two players are constantly used to criticise him - Xhaka and Mustafi and they were 30 odd million each.

One of them was a captain after Wenger left.

Wenger walked the tightrope of perfection. Without him the club is 10th and Arsenal Mania were sucking off a Chelsea reject just until last week.

Massive decline.

Wenger is reason why didn't fall further behind. He just didn't have good people around him Ivan Dicky law etc..

 

[Makingtrax]

Wenger is reason why didn't fall further behind. He just didn't have good people around him Ivan Dicky law etc..

Ivan and his stat DNA certainly didn't help. Too early.

 

[Ceballinhos]

Wenger is reason why didn't fall further behind. He just didn't have good people around him Ivan Dicky law etc..

But it has been said by most trusted sources, including Ornstein, that Wenger always wanted to have full controll of the footballing operations, and even went on record that he didn't want to work with a sporting director.

The truth is the competition has caught us up.
10/15/20 years ago, we were the among the first on the market. We had plenty of choices to pick from. The market wasn't the same. Football players under the radar were more of a thing, whereas now any football fan can watch a youtube video on a player in just seconds, and have a first opinion on a player.
Imagine how it is now for professional teams, with the rise of data in sports, internation scouting, agents from abroad who offer their players to smaller clubs, the amount of money any PL club can spend...

I just think we didn't see all those changes coming in football, and it was everybody's fault at the club, including Wenger.

And now we have to play catch up.

I don't want to say it's Arsène's fault, or Emery's fault, or idk whoelse fault.
But they all do share some blame.
And that doesn't take away the fact that Wenger is still the GOAT at Arsenal, and one of the best in the history of the PL. But he wasn't flawless either, especially by the end of his reign.
He still achieved tremendously, but still, some of his calls were really questionable from the moment we were able to spend some money on the market.

 

[bandaid]

But it has been said by most trusted sources, including Ornstein, that Wenger always wanted to have full controll of the footballing operations, and even went on record that he didn't want to work with a sporting director.

The truth is the competition has caught us up.
10/15/20 years ago, we were the among the first on the market. We had plenty of choices to pick from. The market wasn't the same. Football players under the radar were more of a thing, whereas now any football fan can watch a youtube video on a player in just seconds, and have a first opinion on a player.
Imagine how it is now for professional teams, with the rise of data in sports, internation scouting, agents from abroad who offer their players to smaller clubs, the amount of money any PL club can spend...

I just think we didn't see all those changes coming in football, and it was everybody's fault at the club, including Wenger.

And now we have to play catch up.

I don't want to say it's Arsène's fault, or Emery's fault, or idk whoelse fault.
But they all do share some blame.
And that doesn't take away the fact that Wenger is still the GOAT at Arsenal, and one of the best in the history of the PL. But he wasn't flawless either, especially by the end of his reign.
He still achieved tremendously, but still, some of his calls were really questionable from the moment we were able to spend some money on the market.

TLDR Wenger bad. Wenger stubborn. After he left we got worse.

 

[tap-in]

You think a team and manager spending 5th can reach the top 4 in one of the most difficult leagues in the world with planes overhead, rants, protests and boycotts? You are joking. How did Emery get on with the fans behind him?

You're twisting my words. If Wenger hadn't started to decline the fans wouldn't have been on his back. I can remember appalling sub decisions that even had players looking perplexed. You talk like Wenger was at his peak right to the end, he really wasn't!

 

[Makingtrax]

You're twisting my words. If Wenger hadn't started to decline the fans wouldn't have been on his back. I can remember appalling sub decisions that even had players looking perplexed. You talk like Wenger was at his peak right to the end, he really wasn't!

He came 2nd in 2015/16 ahead of City, United, Chelsea, Sp**s and Liverpool, with the best defensive record in the league. The fans had to work really hard to spin that as a decline. If it hadn't been for Leicester on top, they've had been stuck.

Anyway that's all water under the bridge, 2016 to 2018 they pulled out all the stops.