straw man
noun
1.a mass of straw formed to resemble a man, as for a doll or scarecrow (c.f. Peter Crouch).
2.a person whose importance or function is only nominal, as to cover another’s activities; front.
3.a fabricated or conveniently weak or innocuous person, object, matter, etc., used as a seeming adversary or argument: “The Glasgow Rangers example is something (Arsenal have) got to guard against. They spent far more money than they could afford. We’re ambitious enough but we’re not going too end in the same plight as Rangers. That’s a fact of life so my advice is don’t get miserable about it”.
Peter Hill-Wood sat down with Mihir Bose for a wide-ranging interview which covered all of the public relations points that Arsenal needed to make after a summer which ended in a puff rather than the firestorm of activity that some expected. When the question of whether Arsenal had money to spend in the transfer market came up, after all Arsenal did make a profit again this summer, Peter Hill-Wood had his lovely assistant wheel in the straw man who was conveniently wearing a Rangers jersey and thrashed that straw man to death with the quote above.
Because you see, Arsenal are trying to avoid the bankruptcy that so many Arsenal fans want.
I actually don’t know any Arsenal fans who want Arsenal to encumber $1bn in debt so that Arsenal could buy players like Adebayor, Roque Santa Cruz, or that Ukrainian guy Chelsea paid so much money for who was as big a bust as ever busted. But I do know a lot of Arsenal fans who like to use the idea that Arsenal are avoiding bankruptcy (like Pompey, Rangers, Liverpool, Man U, etc etc.) as an argument whenever Arsenal make a profit in the transfer market by selling off our top players and then bringing in cheaper replacements.
I’ve never heard a single Arsenal fan say that the club should go bankrupt, but I have heard a lot of fans wish that Arsenal were just a little less parsimonious with the money that they seem to be stockpiling.
This argument that it’s either bankruptcy or nothing is so pernicious and thrown about so often that it has become dogma for many. And along with the dogma of avoiding bankruptcy come the concomitant arguments of ”the Adebayor” and “buy for buying’s sake”.
“The Adebayor” goes like this: Arsenal have to be prudent and can’t buy an “Adebayor” because he would cost £50m in transfer and salary and then be a complete waste of time and money as he leads the League in offsides and turnovers per game. No one is suggesting that Arsenal should buy Adebayor, or even “an Adebayor”, selling Adebayor to City was a great piece of business.
Instead, the club should be lauded for buying three of the world’s top talents for just £33m: the same price as one Eden Hazard. But wait… just because we don’t want to pay £50m for an “Adebayor” doesn’t mean that there were zero other frugal purchases that could have been done. Purchases that would increase squad depth.
Of course, conversely it doesn’t mean that the players were there or weren’t there (you can’t buy a player like buying a loaf of bread, I know, I’ve made the argument), but my point is that rather, “the Adebayor” can’t be used to simply dismiss arguments against Arsenal’s frugality. For example, you can’t tell me that Arsenal weren’t overly frugal in the Xabi/Barry deal with Liverpool — because I know for a fact that they were.
Similarly, no one I know is saying that the club should buy for buying’s sake. Just simply buying any guy for £30m isn’t anything I or anyone I know have advocated here or anywhere else.
I know that some football fans are not happy with ambiguity. They crave the simple answers like: buy or don’t buy; genius or waster; bankruptcy or profit; loyalty or betrayal. But the reality is somewhere in between. I suspect Arsene did see deficiencies in the squad and that explains why Arsenal were pursuing Sahin on loan. I also suspect that something blocked that deal (Mourinho, money, player attitude, a staunch valuation of players, salary demands, sell on fee, he wanted a glass of ice-water chilled to exactly 5c before every match) but no matter what stopped that deal it’s completely disingenuous for Peter Hill-Wood to mention pulling a “Rangers” as the reason why Arsenal turned a profit. Arsenal are so far away from that reality it’s actually an affront to the fans to mention them in the same breath: Arsenal have in excess of £115m in cash, on hand, after operating expenses — and don’t be at all surprised if September’s accounting shows that number to be closer to £200m.
Which brings me to the title of my piece. Cesc Fabregas has made what comes across, to the wildly hopeful, as a bit of a “come and get me plea” detailing how “unhappy” he is to be a bench player for Barcelona. This sparks Arsenal fans’ interest because A) he’s still a world class player B) Arsenal have first dibs on him if Barcelona should sell and C) Arsenal are probably his second choice club in all the world, which is nice.
The manager knows what I can offer. But across the three positions that I can play, I am competing with the three best players in the world. I’m delighted to be a part of this team but when a coach tells me I have to go, I’ll go. But I will not make it easy for him to do so, by any means. I will keep going, looking forward to the time that things change. I came here to see out my career.
But here’s the questions we should all be asking: would Arsenal be ready to “go bankrupt” to buy back a player who has a £200m buyout clause in his contract? Even if the club could get that for a reduced fee of £30m plus £7.5m a year in salary? Wouldn’t that also bankrupt us? Doesn’t any transfer price over £13m automatically bankrupt the club? And what if he pulls an “Adebayor” and is not as into this second stint in our relationship as he once was? Would he be a waster? Also, now that we have Santi Cazorla isn’t this just “buying for buying sake?” Or would the team be strengthened by having Cazorla and Fabregas in the squad even if it meant Arteta or Diaby had reduced playing time. Oh and finally, would Cesc “kill” Jack Wilshere or the Ox?
I guess we’ll have to wait until January to find out the conclusion to this thrilling adventure with Straw Man and his sidekick Fabregas!
You made your bed, now lie in it.
That ship has sailed.
On the other hand politics make strange bedfellows and we could take him back if it is in our best interest to do so with a favorable financial arrangement.
Truth is long term, he will get more playing time when when someone gets injured or loses form and this little hiccup will be forgotten.
Fabregas would be worth every penny of £35m if we could get him for that price, even at £120,000 a week as well. Tried and tested in the PL and still very young, consider that’s what Chelsea payed for Hazard. Unfortunately it will not happen.
I wish Cesc coming back was more than a fantasy. Barça will never let him go before seeing if he actually is Xavi’s replacement. I think the truth is that he left Arsenal a few years too early for their sake as much as ours. I’d be worried that he’d come back to us for a few years, Xavi would retire, and he would get all of that stupid DNA garbage coming back up and we’d repeat it all.
Either way… it’s nothing more than hypothetical. It’ll never happen. I’d be shocked if a world class, competitive player like Cesc wanted to give up competing for his spot.
Great, great piece, Tim.
The Liverpool game has helped calm the nerves a bit, especially those (like me) who were extremely frustrated with our transfer dealings this summer. But regardless of the good feelings that have gone around this week, the reality is that, as a squad, we’re still light in some areas, and yet the summer priority seemed to be (once again) “make a profit.”
Nobody expects us to “compete” with petrol money transfers / wages, but as we’ve shown many times over the years, there are “top, top” quality players available between the £10m-20m mark (and sometimes less) that would make our squad tighter and better able to last the distance.
I’m so very tired of the excuse that we don’t have money, when a) it’s clear that we do, and b) we don’t use it when it’s obvious that we should. And I’m glad that “if we buy X, then we’ll kill Y player” is now used ironically instead of seriously (in a figurative sense…err…anyway), because no team with any semblance of ambition says no to quality and improving the squad since it means hindering the growth of a less able player and destabilizing an average squad. It’s bloody infuriating.
Anyway, again, Tim, just want to say what an enjoyable read that was. Keep up the fine work.
Yes we have money. No we don’t spend it foolishly. Buying Marquee players does not guarantee they will be a success – look at Adebayor, Kolo, Santa Cruz, Shevchenko, Dzeco, Henry (to Barca), Vieira (to Barca), Petit (to Barca), Hleb (to Barca), Torres and many others. Our most ballyhooed signing was Arshavin who was good only for a few weeks.
The excuse that a new signing would ‘kill’ the young players hasn’t been heard for at least three seasons.
What really stirs things up is not the club’s transfer policy but the blatant rumour-mongering and invention that comes from the Press and the Blogs. Supporters read these things and think they true and then are aggrieved when their favourite is not signed.
I reckon Arsene knows – particularly when buying and selling players.
We don’t buy Marquee players – we make them!
I like the idea that Carl Jenkinson comes over to the Arsenal blogs to comment along with the rest of us plebs.
He’s the only recent departure I’d have back.
I don’t care what anybody says, you can never have too many world-class players. I’ve heard it said that he and Cazorla are too similar and we couldn’t accommodate the pair. Nonsense!
Cazorla simply moves out to the wing, where he has played before, many times, or Cesc plays a little further back.
You’d have to be blinded by bitterness to think that Cesc wouldn’t walk back into this team and send us back challenging at the very top.
Yeah, but he’s not coming back.
Agreed with all you say Tim. But the question for me is, if we’re not skint, if we have money in hand, and if the players we feel we need are available, then why don’t we spend the money? Why do we try to make a profit on player trades?
http://myhollywooddream.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/scrugemcduckmoneypit.jpg
Excellent stuff, Tim. Razor sharp skewering of some false arguments trotted out routinely to justify a rather calcified position in the goonersphere/goonerverse.
I’d like to see the club use all possible resources available to push toward challenging for the league and going further in the CL. But the profits in player sales each summer seems to insure that this is not actually being done. I wonder if AW will tire of qualifying for the CL but little more and losing his best players to more successful and bigger spending clubs? I hope this isn’t his last contract, but sometimes, I think it will be.
As far as Fabregas, of course I’d like to have him back! Who would we rather have, Cesc or Sahin? AW obviously felt we could do with another central midfielder. Cazorla can play on the right, deeper alongside Arteta or in that forward attacking midfielder role so he would still play plenty. I would see Diaby and/or Ox/Walcott losing time, but I can’t say I would prefer any of them to Cesc!
Unfortunately, none of this is going to happen. Cesc plays quite a bit for Barcelona but he isn’t the man, the creative force or engine of the side and its style as he was with Arsenal. I always said that Barca would not value Cesc properly. It was a mistake to go at this time. The only way he should have returned home to Barca was as Arsenal’s title and trophy winning captain–but he didn’t have the patience or the leadership (or the players around him who were experienced and talented enough) to achieve that before he succumbed to the siren call.
Maybe that’s why we sold Song to Barça? To pave the way for Cesc’s return. Haha! Sounds ridiculous even as I write those words…
Or we could be a feeder club for Barça and take Cesc on loan for multiple years until they are ready to take him back. That way we get to use his talent without getting attached (emotionally)
Of course the loan would have to be minimal or no cost to us, and we pay Cesc 100k or 120k and not a penny more
your worst article ever. boring. stupid. hate the obsession with spending money
Buying is not the problem.
Retention is.
…cried Gary, before sulking off to his room, where he drew vampire faces while listening to the Misfits.
Danzig.
MOTHER.
A credible piece Sir,
A couple of observations from myself. Firstly as a season ticket holder and Arsenal fan of almost 35 years:-
We all want success for our clubs.
We all want to be ‘in’ for all stellar transfer targets.
We all want to go to work on Monday and rub the faces of our footballing foes in a muddy puddle of banter-fuelled mock hatred.
Sometimes it happens and sometimes it doesn’t.
I would have loved to have seen another £20m signing before the end of the window but I would ask the question: Was that because of the whipped up frenzy that surrounds Transfer Deadline Day – which soon I foresee will become a National holiday?
Face facts guys – we aren’t Man City or Man Utd. We are Arsenal. This is a tight ship for committed team players. Frugal a long time before Wenger and frugal hopefully until after. Let us see how Financial fair play plays out.
Arsenal will never be in the mire financially – guaranteed. And if you want to call that a straw man – get an economist to analyse the figures that factors in a new build A1 stadium -through a property recession – and ask for his best adjective. I’m sure they’ll be no such journalistic tabloidry that’s offered.
We’ve seen them come, we’ll see them go – that is the nature of the game more now than ever. The ones that know, the ones that truly care – we will take to our hearts and share in their success.
But not at any cost. No sir. Wenger is the most shrewd a judge of footballing talent and one of the sharpest dealers in the transfer market for sure. If you think he is happy at a trophy-less cabinet for 7 seasons you need to restudy your subject.
As I say, a credible and emmotive piece – one suggestion if I may be so bold – would be to avoid occasional BS words that the average Joe might lose the thread of your sentence on. I.e. Parsimonius, pernicious, dogma.
Keep up the good work!
Up the Arse!
Regarding the 7 season trophy-less season, i have been thinking that maybe it’s more suffice to say 7 Premiere league title less and Champions league trophy less season. Not disregarding FA cup and our history on that, but if we put all our resources and our focus on the FA cup, I’m sure we have win it by now. I seems to think that Arsene build his first team to tackle on PL and CL, but he also want to have a go at Carling and FA cup. Nevertheless, the first team suffered and they ultimately falter. I don’t remember (or might choose not to) any PL club for this past 7 season do the PL and CL double, and in every season i feel that that is what Arsene want.
What does “frugal” mean? And”BS”? Oh who cares – am gong to gowatch eastenders
Silly.
Why on earth would we want Fabregas back for 30m?
1) We already have Santi.
2) Our midfield balance is more in need of a deep lying enforcer type than another creative element
3) If you start paying 30m (plus increase in salaries), the entire base rate for the team goes up. It’s exponential.
Again, we had 116m cash in hand but as Swiss Ramble pointed out, previous year’s balance was a whopping 160m but his estimate was around 50m+ was available for transer spending (which he got about right considering we spent 55m on 8-9 players that summer)
There are other expenses to pay for besides transfers with cash in hand.
OTOH, if your argument is we can afford to spend a little bit more and we are slightly spending shy (which Arseblog’s is), I have no argument with that.
We may not be able to spend 30m for a player but we may be able to push our limit per player up to the 18-20m mark (in accrodance with reality albeit .that will still not make us competitive with certain clubs, the gap is just that wide)
Also we could afford to pay slightly more (eg Song 55K -80K which was about how much we would have to pay inw ages for Sahin anyway). However I do think the club is ebing conservative bearing in mind new sponsorship deals do not get renegotiated till 2014. Until then, I think the board is a bit careful that we keep our wages in comensurate with our income ( I believe at 55%)
What HillWood is saying is nothing we don’t know. HOnestly, I’m not sure what all the pavlava is about.
What we should be asking is :
1) how much we can spend to retain our players better for continuity within the squad ?(with a direct relation to competitiveness…as illustrated by your recent chart)
2) can we adopt a more flexible / less dogmatic approach towards player renumeration in concert, particularly bearing in mind pressure from the current competition from super rich clubs?
3) Can we avoid selling on to PL rivals (which is tied in somewhat to the above two questions)
All things being equal otherwise, the current trasner purchase policy nis quite sensible.
I don’t really understand Fabregas’s complaining. He’s gone back to his hometown which just happens to have the best club team in the world these past few years. What did he expect?
His place with team will wax and wane according to everyone’s form and health including of course, his own. Europe is in economic crisis. Spain’s unemployment rate is over 24%. These guys (yes I’m thinking of CR7 as well) have absolutely everything and are in such a privileged position. Of course they work hard, but so do many of their fellow Spaniards on the dole. They have absolutely everything it’s possible to have to kick a ball around for money and yet they still find reason to complain.
Disappointing to say the least. As for him coming back, about the same chance as us winning 4 trophies this year. Well maybe WITH him on the team…aarrgh! Never mind.
we built a team around cesc that was too slow and too easy to disrupt and was unable to win anything. why are we obsessed with re-signing him? yes he is a good player but not suitable for the prem. paying over £13m for a player is’t going to bankrupt the club but it is going to increase the risk we make a loss on them and unfortunately we have to break even these days.
That’s is exactly why I prefer Cazorla to Fabregas, speed and the lack there of whenever the ball went to Fabregas on the counter. Ramsey was also useless on the counter because he could never make that key first pass.
To further back my whining and whinging about footballers’ whining and whinging, I say again: It could be much, much worse. You could be killed by a squirrel:
http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/scunthorpe-boss-alan-knill-reveals-1305146
Nice piece Yours is the second article I have read recently that states we have in excess of £100m stockpiling. If my memory serves me he maintained £50m was being retained in case we miss out on CL this year.
Santori,
Something I wrote the other week with regards to FFP and selling to our rivals:
It occurred to me yesterday and I don’t know if I’m clutching at straws but I started to wonder weather Wenger is fcuking around with the Manchester clubs FFP status.
It first came up with a BBC article that was saying with FFP and the requirement to break even over three years clubs need to start considering the retail price of players, highlighting as an example that Chelsea are going to struggle to minimise the loss the make on the £50m they spent on Torres.
Yesterday the reports were that Wenger is pushing for £20m+ for RVP and RVP wants £200k+ per week. We paid ~£3m for RVP eight years ago and he’s currently on ~£90k per week. The transfer would mean we turn a profit of him of about £17m, get £4.7m per year off our wage bill and put £10.4m on Utd’s wage bill. Also at 29 years old you can guarantee that Utd won’t get anywhere near £20m if and when they sell him, especially if he’s injured. So it’s profit for us and loss for Utd, improving our FFP status and damaging theirs.
You then look at Man City over the last two closed seasons we sold them four players:
KOLO TOURE:
Bought for £150,000
Sold for £16,000,000
Transfer Fee Profit £15,850,000
BARNDOOR:
Bought for about £3,000,000
Sold for £25,000,000
Transfer Fee Profit £22,000,000
GAEL CLICHY:
Bought for £250,000
Sold for £7,000,000
Transfer Fee Profit £6,750,000
NASRI:
Bought for £12,850,000
Sold for £25,000,000
Transfer Fee Profit £12,150,000.
So City bought 4 players for a total of £73m and a profit to us of ~£46m. They would all have been on about £60-£70k a week so we reduced our wage bill by ~£13.5m a year off our wage bill and probably twice that on to theirs.
They will also never recoup the money paid on transfers by selling the players on, so further losses for them. Made me smile today when I thought that whilst we struggle to find a club that will pay Bendtner what he thinks he is worth we are only swallowing his academy costs and wages of ~£50k a week, City are in the same situation with Barndoor, but they paid £25m for him and he’s on £170k a week! If current reports are correct Spurs are going to pay £5m for him and city are going to have to give him some of that and subsidise his wages for two years!
Also by “strengthening” the City squad it prevented Utd winning the league and dented their earnings and now we appear to be “strengthening” Utd to stop City winning the league and denting their earnings.
But maybe I’m over thinking this
Worth noting all values are paper/internet talk so not necessarily correct but will be in the right ball park.
It would be a brilliant plan, if we won the league.
@Johnny
Yeah the problem with your argument here is if they didn’t buy at those prices from us, they would have bought at those prices from somewhere-else.
Really, we are screwing ourselves more than tehm as they are strengthened regarless whilst we have to manage change in key areas.
BUT
We are a club that needs to earn our own keep so inevitably, we will have to sell some prized assets as they fetch the best price in market (you only have to look at how much we’ve recouped with our rejects this summer to understand the economic dymanics here)
As I have mentioned before, the main issue IMO is our retention ability. We are selling off our top players at a younger age these days and this is a worrying trend (let alone strengthening our competition in the PL)
Actually just like Santori pointed out, if i looked at the last transfer window, i will be worried more from our obsession to have to get profit rather than maintaining the profit. Forget the debate on how we may or may not buy Fabregas, move the debate to how can we get profit without selling our players. It would be nice if our fringe players can easily be sold but even if they can, the money wouldn’t even worth a player plus his wage for the remainder of the contract. Just ask yourself this, who will our club sell to get profit on the next summer transfer window? Wilshere? Sagna? Szczesny? Ramsey? If we take Wenger statement that Song was sold not because of his attitude and even if he is, every players have the possibility to be sold and judging by the last transfer window, we just might have to.
I do have a question for someone who follow baseball. I think Tim might have mention it and just want to make sure, is Red Sox 10 years ago also has the same situation as us? Are they also can’t compete and just recently can keep up with other big spenders in the league? If it’s true and how they can compete with others through their financial project, will we be like them when our new sponsor dealings come up?
Oh, and if it’s not to late for Tim. If you have the thorough data for MCFC players, would you mind looking at the data of our ex players? I have been wondering whether they actually improve there or not? Is Nasri performance mirroring his 6 months purple patch with us or even surpassing it? Is Kolo really regress since we sold him? Kolo is someone that i really want to know his actual specialty when put on data. He was reknown for his recovery pace and i don’t know how you can captured it in data.
And i also wonder about Yaya, Diaby said that he is more like him than Song. But from my perspective, Yaya when he was in Barca, was a back up to Busquets and not Xavi so if right now Song is a back up to Busquets, wouldn’t that also mean that Diaby actually like Song in term of style of play? Oh, and is Yaya a good dribbler like Diaby and someone who can work at tight space? Thank you Tim and sorry for the many questions.
Yaya was always a box-to-box Vieira type, and at WC2006 he played as an attacking midfielder for the Ivory Coast. It was only when he went to Barca that they forced him to play in a more limited holding role, and even at centre back. He was first choice at Barca for a while until Busquets emerged because Busquets fits the Barca style of play better.
“”doesn’t mean that there were zero other frugal purchases that could have been done. Purchases that would increase squad depth.”" well name them then, put your money where no-all mouth is
If you look at the info from the last transfer window and not including the info that is recently been there, like the performance of Mannone, Diaby (more of his fitness), or Jenkinson then i wouldn’t mind Arsene brought Craig Gordon (still don’t know what his problems because no clubs want tto bring him), Affelay, Van der Wiel, or Dempsey. We could take a bid on , Sorensen, Capoue or maybe Rangel. All of these players wouldn’t take a fee that could be compare to if we want to buy Falcao, Ronaldo, Messi, Iniesta, or even Fabregas as Tim suggested.
I would love to be a recruitment scout for you Silent Stan, please feel free to contact me at 7amkickoff via gmail with the job offer and I will decide if I can accept terms.
THANKS!
See… there were players purchased by other clubs during the transfer window. Meaning, that there were players available. There were probably other players available too that we don’t know about.
But like I said, and you didn’t get “just because we don’t want to pay £50m for an “Adebayor” doesn’t mean that there were zero other frugal purchases that could have been done.”
Read it again and again until you get what I said.
There are ALWAYS more frugal options out there.
BUT as Wenger pointed out, we have a very deep squad and what we need now is quality.
Considering 25 man squad , we must also be mindful of “opportunity” cost”
Meaning if we load on with a “frugal” player now (say in midfield or attack), we may be denying ourselves the opportunity to load on with a top quality player if he becomes available shortly down the line (say in Jan)
Wenger doesn’t think like most of us, looking just ahead of our noses to what comes. He is projecting a year to two years down with knowledge on who may become available and where his squad players may end up.
You take on say Capoue now and if he is mediocre in performance, you may be stuck with him for 3 seasons. Considering the difficulty at the moment off loading our rejects, it seems wise to be very careful who we bring in.
Sahin was useful in a sense that he was to be on loan (and if we pegged on a sell on clause, very sensible indeed). BUt any other player coming in must :
1) Not upset the current squad dymanics (in cluding projected player growth within the squad)
2) be able to be offloaded if not successful.
therefore it will seem very prudent to be careful with whom we add. Any mediocre player will not do.
Fabregas is hoping to wind up the manager with his comments and eventually be a regular starter and plays till its finish. All this “fab to arsenal” rumours are getting him closer and closer to securing a permanent place in the starting line up.
What exactly is this piece about?
Like Dr.Phil said on the Simpsons “dont sell me an outhouse and tell me it is the Taj Mahal ” Exactly the same can be said about Peter Hill Wood,he is selling us a Skoda an telling us it is a Ferrari.No one in their right mind believes Arsenal is on the verge of Bankruptcy because we buy 2 or 3 players at each 20 mil,it is ridicilous,we are never gonnaend up like Rangers or Leeds it is out of the question but Hill Wood is scaremongering us in to believing if we spend a penny more then we earn we will forever be bankrupt,rubbish and it just serves Wengers purpose of never spending any money.
Surely if he is was serious, he wouldn’t have waited until just after the transfer window has shut. Like some of the comments above said, I reckon this is more down to trying to force himself into the starting Barca XI.
Paragraph 12 for the start of this article.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/arsenal/8703312/Arsenals-sense-of-loss-from-Cesc-Fabregas-departure-softened-by-clauses-in-his-Barcelona-contract.html
Hey Tim, according to this article, not only do we get first dibs, but we also get 50% of any sell on fee. So if Cesc’s going rate in the market is say 40mil, and if Barca sell him to someone else, they will get only around 20mil from the transfer. Shouldn’t this clause drive down the price to around 50% if they sell to us? Because regardless of who they sell to, they are only going to get half his value.
I actually was aware of the sell on fee and converse to your lovely idea was going to put a line in the penultimate paragraph like “If Arsenal get 50% of Cesc’s sell-on fee wouldn’t Arsenal just let Barcelona sell him on for £200m and collect the money?”
But it didn’t fit with the flow of the writing.
At the end of the season a bunch of players will have played well and done well for their teams. Everyone else will have seen who has done well for their team. Maybe the player starts daydreaming of playing for bigger clubs, or dreaming of enormous pay rises. The agent makes sure these daydreams are publicised as ‘unsettled’, and encourages opposition teams to sniff around, but club doesn’t want to sell and have to rebuild their squad AGAIN. They use the principles of economics and set a price on the player far far in excess of their worth.
How many teams am I describing ?
The greatest casualty of agents manipulative press releases are the fans. We get played like a cheap fiddle every year. Some players agent hypes them, despite the fact that nobody in England has heard of them, makes sure their YouTube clip compilation goes as viral as poss by posting on every fan site. Suddenly the fans are demanding that we sign this player ( who in reality, like any transfer , is a gamble on an unknown player and unknown personality fitting in to the team in a footballing way and the changing room in an interpersonal way).
Having seen the way that the nouveau riche clubs had to pay bribery wages in order to attract famous players to their clubs’ second rate competitive reputations, the player now wants to adopt these bribery wages as the ‘going rate’.
Our manager and CEO are paid well to be astute. We we expect them, as a matter of professional competence, NOT to be mugged off by those manipulative press releases, and to only buy genuinely world class additions and to pay them fairly. Even then, transfers are always a gamble. Andrey Arshavin was bought as a top top, unequivocal world class player in his prime, and we only got a couple of good seasons before he lost his motivation and became disinterested. That is always a risk with every transfer. Look at the amount of players city and Chelsea have to sell on at a loss because they don’t work out, because their proprietors are just as manipulable as fans.
We are a well run club, Tim. We pay our manager to buy clever and would be on his ass like an upturned wasps nest if he messed up. What exactly do you want,mate ?
I want tickets to see Arsenal v. Tottenham.
Is that what you’re asking or do you mean “existentially” what do I want? Because that’s a lot longer of an answer and chief among reasons why I write a blog.
Also, as for your assertion that Arshavin was an “unequivocal” world class player, I called him overrated back in 2008.
http://www.7amkickoff.com/2008/the-hulk-is-trapped-in-an-arshavin-bubble/
I also argued that the Premier League was in a bubble economy. Which I had been saying for three years up till that point. And which seems quaint now, considering the fact that the bubble (if it exists, which I still think it does) has only grown larger.
Anyway, thanks for the comment.
So, existentially, if the Premier League is a “bubble economy” (and I hope you’re right), and the FFP regs are the pin (and I hope they are), then the inevitable “pop” will (hopefully) leave the bloated corpses of Manchester and West London clubs twisting in the wind (sort of like Rangers but with more putrefaction), while those clubs who have practiced fiscal prudence (frustrating though that be for supporters starving for any kind of trophy) will float gently down to settle on a cushion of approximately 100m 1-pound notes. Can it really be that simple? (Probably not…)
Given that Arsenal have never brought a first choice player from a top club-but has sold 5 to Manchester rivals in the last 4 years- its academic. Arsenal is a selling club- not a buying club. Its far too early to proclaim that either Cazorla is a success or that anyone else is a failure. Remember- Liverpool beat us at home this time last year- look where it got them.
Tim i like ua piece let cesc finish his term n come bak but 4 now let him maintain patience
Fabregas would return to his AM position, and Cazorla could occupy Walcott’s usual position (when he is sold) on the RW. Arteta/Diaby/Ox/Wilshere would all be fine.
You say we have £115m cash we can spend because of our “frugal” transfer dealings, but your forgetting that we are multi-million pounds in debt from our new stadium. When that is paid off, we can stop making profits each transfer window. And i would argue that yes we made a profit and we lost RVP and Song but i believe we are still a better team than we were 12 months ago, due to Cazorla being better than Song, Poldi and Giroud combined being better than RVP and Bould’s influence meaning the back four has conceded 10 less goals than this time last season. Oh and we’ve got Wilshere (soon) and Diaby back too.
Whilst Fabregas would no doubt improve Arsenal, it would surely mean the progress of the ox, wilshere, ramsey, etc. would be severely stunted if we had arteta, diaby, fabregas, cazorla, wilshere, ramsey and the ox all competing for 3 spots. They would get unhappy with such limited playing time and would want to leave (Fabregas and Cazorla would be musts when fit, so the other 5 would have too fight over the last spot. Such talented players won’t be satisfied to sot on the bench 4/5 of the time)
I’ve been trying to get this across too.
The figures bandied around at whim are fanciful at best.
There are bills to be paid/wages etc beyond just the playing staff.
swissramble estimated on the summer before’s cash in hand (a whopping 160m), that roughly a third was available for transfers and he was right @55m quid.
I think we are sanctioned to go slightly higher if need be (as Gazidis alluded to some cash still in hand thereafter…powder dry)
This summer, we had 116m. Going on that basis, we should have had about 35m to spend (a t hird) which was close to our opening salvo (39M) for 3 additions.
This excludes of course RVP sale (22.5m) and the Song sale (15m) not to mention paltry sum for Vela.
That does give us 37.5m left to add so I think we are very healthy and we do have money to spend, although not in the fanciful amount as suggested by this article.
Even if we make the (rather false) assumption that Arsenal always have only 1/3 of the cash on hand available for transfers then you’re still not accounting for the £42m the club made on sales.
So, using your logic, de-minimus Arsenal had (£39m from the 1/3 and £42m from player sales) £81m available and spent just £32m strengthening the squad.
Also, please try to stick to the point of the article: that Arsenal are in no danger of bankruptcy as Peter Hill-Wood and others suggest.
i lov to see cesc”s back to arsenal squad bcos he his our player ,is part of us.when a son returned back to his father i think d father shld forgive and forget
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^^^ JACCO just pointed out the same issues i had with this silly article.
arsenal have 115 million sat in the kitty? absolute nonsense. any profit we will be making is being used to pay off the stadium of which we still have a significant amount to pay off.
cesc is a great player, no doubt, hed walk back into the team. but arsene is a principled man, he believes (rightly) that no single player is bigger than the team as a whole. allowing cesc to waltz back in on 130k a week (thats 30k more than even the highest estimates of what cazorla and podolski are on) after nearly doubling out transfer record (which is 16m by the way) to secure him is not something i think he will do, nor should he do. Although I think that deal would represent reasonable value for money in todays market, and whilst the prospect of seeing cesc back in our starting line up may sound exciting, you have to look at the bigger picture. what is far more important to arsene is the message that sends the rest of the team, having players who have previously fucked us off to go and play in spain, return to our biggest contract because it didnt work out so well. Also, he has to think not only about the balance of the squad on the pitch, but also about the development of players we currently have. Young players like ramsey, wiltshire, OX, and some of the fringe players, need minutes on the pitch to progress. Finding a way of keeping players happy, honouring their contracts (which frequently have ‘assured time on pitch’ clauses written into them), AND falling in line with uefas squad rules on homegrown players and all that malarkey, is going to be difficult to impliment.
I know its early days, its only been three matches, but Bouldys influence is obvious, and hes the reason I think we may see a change in arsenals playing style slightly. A solid, organised back four, a creative midfield with quick widemen, and a powerful hitman up front. defending throughout the squad and hitting teams on the break. The way we cut through liverpool on the break on the weekend might set the trend for the rest of the season. The thing is, to hit teams on the break you need pace, and to be honest, cesc isnt all that quick, his range of passing is superb, but nothing significantly better than cazorlas. His tackling isnt all that good either, he can be overly rough in tackles and concede fouls easily.
Overall id say id like to see cesc back in the team, but the logistics of actualy putting him back in are difficult. Its too early to tell how well the current team are coping. By the end of the season i may have gone full circle and say hes totally necessary, but for now. i dont think theres 30+ million reasons why he needs to come back. A great player, but just that, ONE player.
This is the problem I have with Tim’s otherwise excellent posts lately. They just seem a tad disingenuous with such figures bandied around on a whim and fancy and do nothing to help us view our situation in a more balanced manner.
I’m sure he has intended some jest in the piece but it creates the wrong impression that we are a well heeled club with too much money in the bank.
We are not.
In fact, although our finances are healthy, we are in a more precarious position than before with the wage bills threatening to go out of hand and the transfer market more challenging (thanks to the addition of a couple more petro-dollar funded teams)
I’m not sure why anyone would want to put down 30m for a player when you could get 3 for the price.
Yous et a benchmark on your tolerance in terms of the market. The moment we start paying for 30m players, the asking price for all our targets will go up.
Part of bargaining 101 is to call the other’s bluff and ensure they believe that there is a finite amount which you can spend commensurate with target.
In addition, we are not at the level to compete with the teams who can make 30m purchases. The wage gap at the moment is absolutley huge (even with our restructuring)
What Tim tends to forget as well as we as a club have to earn our keep. Yes, some money comes in from the high ticket prices we charge but we also have to make a healthy profit to ensure we PAY our players the salaries they need.
There is also contingency money built in as we do not know where the economies in Europe may turn and how that could affect us down the line. Not to mention we do not re-negotiate the short sponsor/stadium naming rights for another season at least so there is reason to be frugal meanwhile where possible.
30m players are simply out of the question. I like Hazaed personally and would be stoked to see him at Arsenal but let’s be honest, we can’t afford him.
And lest one forgets, Santi (everyones favorite player at the moment) rejected us for the more lucrative advances of Malaga just a season before so we should be sensible and not overstretch ourselevs playing a game we cannot keep up with.
makes dollars and sense to you?:D
I do not appreciate being called a liar and I especially don’t appreciate your tactic of calling me a liar the day after my posts go up.
Where did I lie? Exactly. The number I used (£115m) comes from the corporate accounts. The way I used it was to say that Arsenal are not in danger of bankruptcy.
Once you admit that I did not lie I expect an apology.
And frankly, I don’t appreciate your condescending tone. “What Tim tends to forget…”
You really need to stick to the facts of the articles presented and stop veering off into your woodshed to build straw men for you to destroy.
Show me where in my “silly” article I said that Arsenal had £115m “kitty” — by which I assume you mean “transfer kitty”. I specified that Arsenal have £115m in cash reserves (probably more, a lot more) which is a fact you can look up for yourself. I used that number to show that Arsenal are as far from bankruptcy as could possibly be. Which was the point of the entire article.
Im not calling you a liar directly, nor am I suggesting your article has no merit. I just thought that this sentence > ‘Arsenal have in excess of £115m in cash, on hand, after operating expenses’ tends to suggest we have the ability to use that 115m, in transfers ect, which we dont. Maybe that just my interpretation, and i concede that maybe thats a wrong interpretation of what you wrote.
The reason i said it was a silly article (and i dont think ALL of it was silly, before you get your knickers in a twist) was because of the last paragraph, beginning with;
‘But here’s the questions we should all be asking: would Arsenal be ready to “go bankrupt” to buy back a player who has a £200m buyout clause in his contract?….
we shouldn’t be asking that question, its fucking retarded.
Although I re-read the article and alas i think i may have taken it slightly more serious than it was intended. I just dont think these are the sorts of things we should be filling our time wondering about, maybe thats just indicative of not having much else to talk about during the interlull.
My articles are almost always multi-layered. There’s a serious point in that we all need to stop talking about Arsenal and bankruptcy in the same sentence unless that sentence is “with £115m in cash reserves and no debt apart from the highly manageable £20m annual stadium payment, the only way that Arsenal could possible go bankrupt is if there was fiscal malfeasance on a grand scale.” That was the whole point of my article.
As for transfers, I do believe that Arsenal need to be a little less parsimonious in the transfer market and absolutely need to overhaul our wage structure. I may be wrong about this number but I believe that Arsenal’s total wages are just £20m below United and I know for a fact that wages are less than half of turnover. A small change could make a huge difference.
As for my last paragraph… Yes, I had tongue firmly in cheek. I do that from time-to-time because I think we all need to take a step back from the brink and stop taking everything so seriously. When PHW claims that Arsenal are trying to avoid the fate of Rangers, we should point out how absurd that notion really is and should do so in a humorous way. It’s the only logical reaction to a surreal comment.
Anyway, thanks for reading and re-reading. Hope you stick around.
I would say a main sticking point for us when recruiting us is not transfer fees, but wages . How would this cash excess fare if our wage structure was competitive with Chelsea/United? , with our top players on 150-200k per week?
if haywood thinks he can buff his way out of spending money in tranfers hi is rong if he and the board stoped taking the big money thay take out nof arsenal football club and stopedc paying mr wengar top money in from the profits he makes on selling players the club would be better of and would be able to bring in top playeds have you hard of rip of britian well arsenal chairman and the board are riping of arsenal and their pockets are full of arsenal money that is the real true about the way arsenal football club and the fans are being riped of i love my club i dont like the club being rip of by the chairman and the board