Here’s a chart you’ll probably hate me for making:
This chart is an abstraction of just top name players that Arsenal have sold or let go during Arsene Wenger’s tenure. From right to left, the list is broken down by season and only the following player’s sales were considered:
van Persie, Song, Clichy, Fabregas, Nasri, Eduardo, Adebayor, Toure, Hleb, Flamini, Reyes, Henry, Cole, Cygan, Campbell, Vieira, Pires, Keown, Edu, van Bronkhorst, Seaman, Sylvinho, Overmars, Petit, Anelka, Bould, Winterburn, Wright, Helder, and Merson.
Before I go any further, a note on accuracy. Arsenal do not divulge player sale prices and anyone who tells you that they know or have a more accurate transfer fee table than someone else is selling you snake oil. Don’t get bogged down on the numbers, if we use one source and stick to it, while there may be some inaccuracies, the point is that the whole picture becomes clear and perhaps we can see a trend at Arsenal. I also included many players who left Arsenal on a free. The point wasn’t their sale price, but rather if they were a big name. Pires and Campbell both left for free and both were big names. Arsenal made a killing off Bentley but I didn’t include him because he’s a rat-faced chav. Etc.
Even if I’m off by a pound or two here and there, the trend is obvious. Since moving to the Grove, Arsenal are cashing in on the crazy marketplace and consistently selling off their top names for top dollar. This is in direct contrast to Arsenal’s most successful seasons in which they made very little or no resell value off their top named players. The big bump in player sales (Overmars, Petit, and Anelka) at the turn of the century coincides with Arsenal’s three year League title drought. The dip in player sales in 2007-2008 coincides with the year that Arsenal finished just 4 points off the title. And so on.
But really, this is hardly earth-shattering news, is it? You can’t be a title contender if you sell off all your best players year after year. Right?
Here, let me illustrate with one simple aid: imagine if Sunday’s match against Liverpool featured a starting lineup with Podolski, Giroud, Cazorla, van Persie, Song and Cesc. For me, that’s a title contender right there. But as it stands, we don’t have three of those big named players and while Arsenal have a good team with an exciting front three I am not going to consider this a title contending team. I’m looking forward to the season and the fight for a Champions League place, the FA Cup, an the Youth Cup. And I’m not hating on the club: I’m like Dennis Bergkamp, I love Arsenal, not just Arsenal with trophies. But I’m also realistic, and I think it’s a bit of a stretch to think of this team as a title contender.
I’m not saying it’s as simple as waving my hand and keeping Cesc, van Persie, and Song at Arsenal and there is obviously something going on with the players over the last two years which necessitates these sales. But the point is that selling our best players year after year almost certainly decreases the Arsenal’s title chances. Somehow the trend needs to be reversed and I’m holding out hope that the club and manager are aware of this. The last person I’d want to be is Ivan Gazidis at the AGM if Arsenal reveal that the club made record profits again and are sitting on a mountain of cash.
One final thing, you must give huge credit to what Arsene Wenger brings to Arsenal FC. The fact that he has kept the club not only in the Champions League places but had the team nearly win a title all while consistently selling off the top talent is practically unfathomable.
It would be completely unfathomable but for the fact that he’s done it.
The stats make depressing reading as does the apparent lack of deadline day activity. Will Bendtner go? Park appears to be gone but all I’m really interested in is anyone coming in?!
ITS TRUE AND I AGREE 100%.
1 further point, the team to line up against Liverpool could have included Cesc, RVP and song, we chose to sell them they were under contract!
RVP, Nasri were on contract run down so there was not much we could do considering the competition from certain clubs could pay them double what we could afford. Plain and simple.
cesc had some sort of recessive Catalan gene.
Song we could have fought for and showed more gumption. He was under contract and the fact that we have let him push us around is a bad precedent for things to come.
Walcott @100K (purported wage demand) is perfectly replaceable. Had we kept Song, we should have sold Walcott early and gotten in a suitable replacement. Affelay was itching for a move.
I think we dallied too long and the opportunity to sell him at good price was gone. Wenger will probably hope that the price dips back up and that we have chance to sell again in January.
“One final thing, you must give huge credit to what Arsene Wenger bring to Arsenal FC. The fact that he has kept the club not only in the Champions League places but had the team nearly win a title all while consistently selling off the top talent is practically unfathomable.”
+1
lorentee..please……( if not him, no trophy believe me..hn!)
Wenger must be given credit for the trophies he has won. But since then the game has moved on and he is still stuck in his time warp.He still thinks his self sustaing model is the way.But Arsenal are still adhering to it 100%.
I am afraid by the time Uefa ffp kick in,the decline of Arsenal will be so
deep that it will take eons to reverse it.
All gunner fans hope their pessimism will be proven wrong.
I don’t get it – what is the opposite of a self-sustaining model? It’s a model that needs sustainment by means of outside funds i.e. sugar daddies or bank loans. That’s your preferred method? Short term gain for long term pain i.e. bankruptcy? No wonder our world economy is fucked, if everyone thinks it’s ok to live on borrowed money.
Wenger should be applauded for doing what he’s done and not going on his knees to investor owners pleading for cash.
It isn’t easy qualfiying for CL time and again considering what he is up against.
It has become more difficult to operate in the self sustaining mode because of the pressure brought in by an increase number of debt run clubs across Europe.
In England alone, we have doubled the clubs run on debt with City’s new found ‘wealth’.
LORENTEE OR DROGBA OR EVEN HENRY WOULD MAKE A BIG DIFFERENCE TO THIS CURRENT TEAM. WE SUPPORTERS ARE TOO LOYAL TO THIS CLUB AND ALL THEY DO IN RETURN FOR US IS GIVE US FAKE PROMISES OR HILARIOUS EXCUSES.
Drogba or Henry?!
No, I think we should resign Cliff Bastin on the wing. Then we’ll win 3 in a row.
SELL, SELL, SELL, SELL, SELL, SELL………… LETS SEE WHERE WE FINISH THIS SEASON. NEVER MIND THE 7 YEAR TROPHY DRAUGHT.
Seriously, do you have a busted caps lock?
Given his posts, I think a few other things may be busted as well…
Yes but if we are a club who survives only on income the club makes , why are we allowing Walcott to .lets be honest ,walk away without a fee 12-15 million pounds , Wenger has to realise the supporters pay the highest prices ,and w ecan live with that , but allowing Walcott to go into the last year of his contract is very very poor management , when you consider this lost revenue could mean cheaper tickets for the fans, Wenger gets his 7 million a year , Kroenke and the board get their increased share price and dividends and directors fees, what do we get for all our loyalty ,our best players sold , and continually fed bullshit.
I think there is a lot more to Walcott’s situation than we know. I don’t know anything more than anyone else, but I think the real issue is that no one came in for Walcott.
I think it is good we are sticking to our guns on this one. Walcott thinks he is worth more than he is. We have offered a fair salary. He has turned it down. No one has come in with enough interest to buy him for the right price and to stump up what Walcott thinks he is worth. Thus he doesn’t go anywhere. We can’t force him to sign. We can’t force someone to buy him. These things happen.
But should we be held over the barrel by him and just match his salary demands?
I think this is similar to Dempsey at Fulham who thought he’d be able to demand a big bump in salary and I don’t anyone has come in with enough interest to put in that money.
I’d love it if Wenger got him as I think he is an effective player and it would be cool to have American on arsenal.
The issue with the salary of walcott on our side is that with 100K per week, we could easily get a suitable replacement (if not better)
Board don’t take dividends.
Would you rather have Walcott for a year or 12 million that won’t get spent?
Uhhhhhh….I’m pretty sure I read Cygan on that list.
But one thing that stood out for me is how most of those players were sold in their prime, there are mostly attacking players, with the only world-class loss in the defending area being Ashley Cole.
It’s a sad reading, to be honest. It will be even sadder after tonight if you were right in your previous post about Arsenal not bringing anyone else.
Interesting point about the defender vs attacker breakdown.
Attackers are the more exciting type, so are worth more money. I would also say that they are, all other things being equal, more easily replaceable. Thus, the constant out-flow of offensive players for vast sums of money isn’t the end of the club.
Defense is where you want stability, and there Arsenal aren’t doing that bad. Cole and Clichy are the big losses. Sagna has stuck around, Koscielny reportedly snubbed Barca interest, Vermaelen, Szczesny and BFG have yet to respond to any pursuers, but I think if Arsenal were really a full-bore “selling club” we’d see bigger losses among the defense.
Cheers! My sentiments exactly – we should just enjoy Arsenal as they are, forget about title pursuits, hope for good runs in the Cups and for some good football from our guys on a consistent basis. We can’t compete anymore for the title, let’s be realistic. We can’t compete financially, and pretty soon we won’t be able to compete from a pedigree/titles/big team aura perspective any longer. So take it for what it is and enjoy what you can. Or go cheer for a squad of mercenaries if all you care about is trophies.
Why not a shot at winning the Champions League? Just ask Chelsea…you can get a few lucky bounces and win any knockout competition, even one as prestigious as the CL.
Two or three comments:
First, you combine at least three motives into one trend — early on, with the likes of Viera and Henry, it involved players reaching the age at which they would no longer get contracts. Second was City’s systematic and vulturous — one might call it Bain-like — effort to both build its squad while weakening the one member of the top four who they thought was financially weakest. Finally, it is Cesc, who was never going to stay as long as he said, and realized that the Barca bus would leave the station sooner than expected. RVP was the last straw — Song is evidence that Wenger is clearing out and starting afresh.
So, maybe, instead of pointing out these profits — ignoring how close Arsenal came a few times, how we did make a number of cup finals and were close to winning the league once or twice — we should ask how Arsenal persevered while being buffetted by (a) a natural trend amongst late twenties players, (b) the unprecedented financial blitzkrieg from the second-most powerful family in the Emirates, the wannabees who never can really make first place, and (c) Cesc’s whims. That’s what I would want to know.
Second, maybe you didn’t notice, but in the interim, Arsenal got a stadium, unlike any other and any other team. A stadium that puts them on a par with United and ahead of everyone else in the EPL for the foreseeable future. This is an investment that will gain Arsenal tens if not hundreds of millions in the future which will not come to Spurs, Liverpool or Chelsea. Once the rash sponsorship deals that helped kick-start the stadium are replaced with realistic sponsorships, the financial edge will be even greater. Americans know that the home field box office is the last bastion of competitiveness in an ever-more-level financial playing field.
So one might equally write, look what Arsenal did in the face of adversity. They weathered several onslaughts, didn’t waste their money, and built a financial fortress that will insure they remain in the Top Four indefinitely. And clearly it was the road less travelled by.
And they didn’t have the Glazers, or Gillette and Hicks, to load them down with debt.
But they did have one large albatross, and that was David Dein. Talk about a string of destructive acts.
First, there were the horrible sponsorship deals he cut to make a downpayment on the Emirates. Then he brought in Kroenke. OK, that’s looking ok at the moment, and if anyone thinks he won’t spend when necessary, look at what he’s doing in the NFJ.
Then Dein sold out to Ousmanov. Then he launched his son to move the best talent away as fast as possible, to help his friend Usher. His quiver is nearly empty, but he’s probably got another trick up his sleeve. You know that he was behind that coordinated attack with RVP this summer.
David Dein is He Who Must Not Be Named. Though unlike Voldemort, he’s had better press amongst the muggles who think he is their saviour.
Now, of course, maybe Dein is right and I am wrong. But we’ll all have a clear contrast on Sunday at “This is Anfield”, the field of unrealistic dreams. Where they are still reeling from years of bad spending of all those profits you talk about in your piece, where they are particularly hurting from Kenny Dalgliesh’s horrible wasting of, what, a hundred million quid or so? Whether they win or not, you are offering support for those who would rather have taken the Liverpool approach than the Arsenal approach. I disagree.
I disagree with most of what you’ve said.
First, I’m not “offering support” for anything. I am merely pointing out a painful truth: Arsenal have been systematically selling off the best players at their peak value and that is not how they operated during their championship seasons. There are myriad reasons for this: some are as you point out Dein’s fault, some are Wenger’s fault, some are the hyperinflation of the Premier League market, some are players being unrealistic (I know, for example, what Walcott wanted in his contract that held it up, it’s fucking ludicrous). I intentionally did not address those issues because, frankly, that’s a 300 page book.
Second, you set up a straw man that I want the club to spend hundreds of millions “like Liverpool”. Nothing could be further from the truth. I want the club to spend the money they have and they have a LOT of money sitting around. You also use the stadium as an excuse and frankly, that’s worn thin. Sure, they built a stadium and I am very proud of that, I’ve written about that extensively. But Arsenal have money sitting around, in the bank and not invested on the field. The stadium is not a drag on their finances.
And in the end, let me just remind you of what Arsene Wenger said last summer:
“Imagine the worst situation — we lose Fabregas and Nasri — you cannot convince people you are ambitious after that. The message we give out is important. For example, you see about Fabregas leaving, Nasri leaving. If you give that message out you cannot pretend you are a big club. A big club first of all holds on to its big players and gives a message out to all the other big clubs that they just cannot come in, serve [themselves] and take away from you. We worked very hard with these players for years to develop them and now it’s a time for us to keep them together.”
And then the next year we sold the Golden Boot winner and one of the best midfielders in the League.
Wenger was right, no one will consider us a big club if we consistently sell off our best players.
“Once the rash sponsorship deals that helped kick-start the stadium are replaced with realistic sponsorships…”
What makes you so confident that sponsors are going to be throwing money at what’s likely to be a fifth or sixth placed club?
…”built a financial fortress that will insure they remain in the Top Four indefinitely.”
See above.
It’s a question of degree.
We may ahve to expect one top player (or two) being preyed upon because we simply can’t match up to wages at some other institutions.
BUT we are losing player (s) who are firmly in contract now which is setting a bad precedence.
When you think about it (assuming rumours be true of course), what Song was looking for @80K per week from 55K may not seem so bad to accomodate considering we would have had to match Sahin’s wages anyway.
It is one thing to take a critical element out of the team (Say the top scorer) and hedge with two relatively decent scorers in their own right 9albeit with obvious need for adjustment0
But when you take another effective contributor to last season (14 assists) out of the equation in a critical node in the team, you have decreased exponentially the ability of the team to gel and compete effectively, at least in the short term.
Considering this season may be decided on even finer margins than last, I would imagine the start to be less forgiving this time round for us and any slippage in points to the leader quite costly.
Hey Tim,
You allude to this in your post when you mention “the crazy marketplace” since moving to the Grove, but I do not think that it is a coicidence that the chart begins to rise significantly in the 2004-2005 season, which is the year after Roman Abramovich bought Chelsea and broke the market.
I think your conclusion is correct, of course, that you cannot keep selling your top players and expect to be a top competitor, but I don’t think anyone gives Arsene or the club (especially the club) enough credit for what they have done in the circumstances they have found themselves. As soon as Abramovich brought his model of spend without thought and lose money to win trophies to the Premier League, life changed. I don’t believe that it was a matter of Arsene or the Board looking at the fees on offer and saying “yes, let’s capitalize!”. I think it is that they saw the landscape change such that we could not hope to keep our best players and they said “since we will have to sell, let’s at least get a lot of money back as it is a way to moderately compete with this condition”.
People need to understand right from the get-go that we cannot compete with Chelsea and City and PSG and their ilk for players. It. Cannot. Be. Done. I could go on forever on the proof of it, but lets just look at the case of Eden Hazard for example. A player that, prior to Abramovich, we likely could have had – we scouted him early and identified his talent, and we offered wages and development opportunities that wree at least competitive and in some cases top market for players like that back pre-2003. But now, all Chelsea has to do is get a sniff of our interest, pay the player double, pay the selling club double, and we lose. It is not a matter of us have the 35 million to match their offer. If we took all the Cesc money and gave it to Lille and said “Hazard please”, Chelsea would just offer more. Don’t believe me? Juan Mata, anyone? Torres? They will spend what it takes to get their man and there is nothing that can be done about it.
So, one of two things happens. We don’t sell our best players and every one of them agitates for a move, plays without conviction, and runs down their contract to move to a money-backed club. We lose them for nothing and get bad performances. Or, we sell them for outrageous profits from these monied clubs and try to use that money to invest in young players that can blossom into talent that will let us compete. Compete, not win. That is the only area of the market where we can still win – getting in Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain for 12 when he’s going to bloom into a bigger name. Or Ramsey. Or Jack. Basically we have to punch above our weight and that is just the nature of the game we are now in.
And there is nothing we can do about it. Nothing. You tell me to keep our players. We don’t need the 25 million for Van Persie. We need him in the lineup for 1 more year and we’ll take the loss? No. Because the player will not play hard when he is in the last year of a contract, can’t afford to get injured, and feels forced to be there anyway. Given that or the 25 million, I will take the money.
To use an analogy, we are a barracuda. Nice predatory fish. Swims around and eats lots of other fish. Is a bad-ass. Except in 2003 someone dropped a Great White Shark into our little ecosystem. We still get by and all, but one thing you don’t do is fight the shark. When the shark comes to eat the fish you are after, you go find another, less tasty fish. If the shark wants to pay you for your fish, you take his money, rather than his teeth.
Don’t like it? Well, go support an oil-backed team. You are gutless, but if you want to back a winner every time, we’re probably not your club. We never were to be honest. If you are a fairweather fan like that, you’ve probably already been supporting Manchester United.
We can win. We can do it by finding value on the market and developing players. We can grow the business so that one day we will be able to compete with the sharks, only better, because unlike those weak oil-backed money sharks, we will be a giant robotic self-propelled nuclear shark with a laser on its head. But to do that we need new sponsorship deals, commercial revenue, worldwide fan base, and to continue to develop world-class players in the academy. That, and time.Let’s hope Arsene has enough of it to give.
Rant over. And that is a rant that even Clint Eastwood can be proud of.
Cheers,
Jon
“Punch above our weight”, hey are you calling us Everton.
An excellent point John.
The landscape of the market place has changed entirely since Abramovich came in.
It has become more difficult to find value in the market (coupled with the fact that market knowledge has become more flat as far as players are concern)
Now with the likes of City (PSG, Anzhi, at one point Malaga), we are facing retention issues because we simply can’t match up in terms of wages
Conversely the high wages we have had to put up to have made it difficult to offload players and free up our wage structure quickly. This is a problem across the board affecting football in europe’s big leagues.
There was also the issue of the stadium (debt) which coincides with our sell off period.
So it is facile to merely draw conclusions just reading the chart as is.
Clearly we are facing strong issues that cannot be resolved easily and that will continue to exert pressure on our ability to retain our top players (unless you think FFP will make a dent)
Just one, small, minor concern, Tim, and that’s inflation. I’m not sure that it would even be possible to adjust for the increase in prices paid for players over the years (perhaps compared to an average, + or – ?), and even if you could, I think the shape of the chart would probably be about the same. But it might be a little less dramatic.
It would be dramatically bigger in the first bump but that’s it. There were several years where Arsenal didn’t sell their best players.
A lot of valid points today. Selling players good , bad or indifferent is the natural process of clubs these days. My point is that we do have the necessary funds to replace players, it is not being used. IMO to carry on until Christmas with just 1 recognised striker is madness, we are under pressure from the start. We can manage with the midfield as is, defence is ok. We may be good, but we are not spanish good.
I wish I could give you more than one +1
Well said, Michael.
Podolski is a back up. And (ahem) you forget Chamakh. God save us!
Bay gooner,Dein DID NOT do the shitty commercial deals,Keith Edelman did,and he ended up being sacked for it.Get your facts straight with your anti Dein nonsense.Worst thing Dein has done is bring in W***er.
Why does having the Emirates mean we will attract big commercial sponsors?Companies are not interested in stadiums,they are only interested in WINNING teams with good players.Arsenal has neither.I take it you are like me a season ticket holder who travels home and away to watch a team being asset stripped by your hero Kroenke?Tell you what,why don’t YOU and your ilk F**k off and support Wigan as you clearly want to support a team that with no ambition that constantly sells its best players.
Here’s some news supporting today’s post:
In the GK department, Tim’s wishes have been granted. Today, we signed Illiev, a 17 year old keeper from Macedonia
And in case you have not heard, the Spurs signed Lloris.
Advantage: ARSENAL
Here’s a little fun fact I’ve never shared on Tim’s site: I’m from Macedonia.
And I’ve never heard of this kid, who plays for a really small town local club.
Another thing that freaks me out is that now I’m aware that are Arsenal scouts in my country. So my 5 on 5 Tuesday/Thursday games will never be the same again.
Sign him up, Arsené!
Spurs had to sell Modric and VDV.
That’s their entire creative hub.
No Moutinho.
Lloris at best is a replacement for their outstanding American keeper.
Not worried about Spurs. They have AVB to worry about.;)
I am sick of us trying to balance the books every transfer market. I honestly thought this was going to be a different summer given how it started. Even when we sold RVP and Song, I was sure we would buy proper replacements as it looked like we were doing a makeover. But now here we are, at the end of another summer, and it looks like we are going to be net positive in our transfer activities again.
I do give credit to Wenger to keep us competitive in the face of this financial doping by Chelsea and City but I don’t think he’s been perfect. You could argue the club has done better than last summer but given how incompetent we were last summer, anything was going to an improvement. We are looking short in multiple areas (again) and I think we all know despite Wenger’s positive outlook of having Diaby, Wilshere and Rosicky back from injury, we are going to run into injury problems at some point in the season which will see us struggle, and will most likely see us get eliminated in the cups. It happens every year, and going by the fact pattern I would say it’s most likely to happen again.
What bugs me is that we always take about 2/3rd of the steps we need to make but always fall short. This summer is yet another perfect example and our on field results are often a direct reflection of our off-the-field activities. Every year are about 2 to 3 players short. You can’t tell me that regardless of how much money Chelsea /City/ Utd. have, you can’t find a couple of players that will add some real value to the squad. I am not asking for superstars, but there has to be players out there in the mold of someone like Arteta or Santos who are necessarily not “top, top quality” but someone who’s good enough for Arsenal. What’s good enough for Arsenal these days anyway?
Wenger says this is a team that can challenge for the title. Is that what he really believes? He is far more intelligent that you or I, so I don’t think he actually believes that but doing is bit in PR. Anyways I’ve dialed back the expectations some time ago, so I will just try to enjoy our fight for 4th.
It’s not that we ran out of money, I believe we had at least 15-20m left to play with. (out of 22.5+ 15 =37.5, assuming some of this was reserve for next summer or January)
We could have also sold Walcott early (stopped fooling around) and got ourselves say Affelay on a rent to own basis with the money.
Arsenal gonna be a bargain club again because he is not considering as premiere league title contender.he is just exactly aiming the 4th again…if he want a cup..he need to do something crazy changes..thats previously he got marvelous Henry..but now past is past get RADAMEL FALCAO!!!Giroud and Podolski is great but falcao has almost same sense like Henry!!split the cash in him than find 1 more defence like our great legend wall Sol Campbell..Big and Fast!!the opponent need to fear with our defence and not fooling around…SAnti is great so just get one great DM to replace Song and Wilshere is not worth it to put all burden to him by giving no 10!!!he is great but still need to recover…
I don’t think you live in the real world.
Falcao is one of the most sought after players in the business. He won’t go for 12m.
i agree that edin dzeko is great!!but he is similar to podolski and giroud ..we need better creativity foward like Falcao is the best replacement for Henry the great!!its one time spend…chelsea and City have done it to get Champion and now its Ars turn to get Crazy!!!the current squad is good but not good enough to match with fergie,City or ex specially when meet Giant Barca and Real Madrid..Falcao has the spanish league experince and thats can make us more comfort when facing the Big Giant Team!!!
Tino pointed out that comment from AW from last winter when asked if we would bid for Hazard. He said (paraphrasing) that they must make a profit every year from player sales. I can’t see AW actually thinking their was no one good enough to bring in. He had to turn that cash in to the board rather than reinforce the squad. But he also said this week that if no one is bought today, then January. At this point we just hope we can survive this season. A winning streak is desperately needed.
This is understandable. We still have to chip away at the debt and we have to pay for salaries etc.
Hazard was too big on the radar.Unless he was a closet gunner (and we all know how RVP turned out), we would not be able to match the club that got him (for wages or transfer fee)
To put it i another way, because we pay our own bills, we are not able to afford our top players the luxury of leaving for free at end of contract (I cite Didier Drogba amonst others)
This is not issue to replacing The RVP or Song!!ARS must realize this is about Premiere League Title COntender and We are the EPL Giant that did not ever Won Champions League!!!what a shame!!!So thats why we need splash the cash properly and get our best..We already have good Keeper and great Santi but How long can them be patient for Title!! No big team fear our striker neither our Defence!!!thats why we need Falcao!!The opponent need to be fear when facing us!!!Not fooling around with us!!!
Two top eprformers went out. One is at the club still but seemingly on life support.
I think at very least, whilstw e’ve added 3, we should have kept one.
The one we should have kept which would have solved the headache of pursuing sahin for noought was Song.
He holds an important position in the node in midfield just ahead of the back 4 and at a juncture where attack converts to defense (vice versa)
We are OK at the moment with Diaby and Arteta but we have had to relearn the balance.
At very least for an extra year, Song would have afforded Diaby, Coquelin (or whoever-else may have come in) adequete time to transition.
If ARS want a be Title Contender the Opponent have to be fear!!! thats what we lack of!!! Barca,Real and Mancherster Club got it!!!thats what make them easier to win!!!Get a Fearless players and Be a Fearsome players like Falcao in the squad with Santi,sciezny,Verminator,Podolski,Chamberlain. Wilshere is great but we cannot rely on injured Players!!!Its not sure wether he can be Better again and thats is highly % he can get Injured again and again like Rosicky the Great but nothing to be fear because he is fragile!!!
Well, that was depressing.
But hey, I’m sure Ramsey and Diaby will have breakout seasons, and Wilshere will be instantly back to his best next month, Arteta can play defensive-minded midfielder all season without injury or fatigue, while Chamakh will become useful again. So who needs to strengthen?
So ends my Wenger brain-reading session.
Did anyone see the latest odds of us staying in the top four?
Fuck. I can’t wait to start drinking.
Don’t be so pessimistic. At least we still have Squillaci.
I love you Squillaci. All is forgiven.
Apparently this year Spurs are doing the Arsenal Transfer Deadline day, only with money.
I wonder what American Gooners think about Dempsey to Spurs.
Don’t worry, folks, Diaby will come good. I promise.
Might have to start drinking early today. What is it, 3pm? Good enough.
If I hated Freidel for playing for the spuds, I’ll have no problem hating dempsey bc of it.
Conventional thinking is best when supported by facts which I why appreciate Tim actually doing the work to prove what is glaringly obvious. If teams can buy championships (most, if not all of the time), then surely the converse is true.
Great post today, if for nothing else than really crystallizing that THIS IS ARSENAL and Jon @ 9:13 points out. Now, let’s get over it and play some f^&king football.
I’m not asking Arsenal to compete with City and Chelsea, but there are plenty of players out there we can afford who would improve our squad. You cannot let a player of Song’s caliber (not perfect, mind) leave the club and replace him with inferior internal candidates. But that’s what we do, year in and year out. Somehow we manage to stay in the top four, but how long can we gamble on other teams cocking it up so bad that we somehow manage to get into the Champions League? (Btw, thanks Spurs!)
Van der Wiel was available at a reasonable price. So, too, were Julio Cesar, Lloris, Loic Remy, Capoue, Dempsey, Gonalons etc. Any two from the above list would have improved our squad significantly.
I think one must remember opportunity costs.
Yes I agree that we needed at very least another striker to improve our odds up front, a back up for our holding players and a Walcott replacement (ine ffect)
But (in particular with the striker situation), remember we want to add a really good player to the squad.
IMO Wenger wanted a younger striker as both our new strikers are close to peak age. It would have been preferable if this player also had speed and technicality (hence Mbaye Niang) to match the physicality of Giroud and the directness of Podolski.
Had we ended up with a reasonably good striker signed this summer as third choice, well we all know how hard it is to offload (with wages that have to be paid to stay competitive currently) if the player does not come good.
more importantly, this player will hold a spot and take up space on the wage structure that would deny us loading on a truly outstanding signing down the line when opportunity presents itself.
The transfer window opens again in less than 4 months (Jan)
Wenger meanwhile, can use the period to assess where we are at that stage and dip in if the prices have soften,.
meanwhile, of course we are at risk and must get the strikers we have in hand on the score sheets.
All doomers and gloomers! When you wake up tomorrow, your focus will be on Scousers away. Tonight, drink and complain all you want. Tomorrow we get ready for battle (also known as 2012-2013 season). And Sunday, who knows where we end up? I sure hope it’s on the winning end of a vengeful 4-0 thrashing of the racist and co. It matters not who transferred in or out.
Come on you Gooners!
“It matters not who transferred in or out.”
===
I’ll need at least another 5 whiskeys to get there, Ssinderias.
The transfer window is officially shut.
Somewhere in London, seated in an expensive leather chair, Wenger takes a sip of old French wine and…ah fuck, who am I kiding? He was probably in bed by 10.
Depressing.
Surely not before beating a plastic bottle to death?:D
Fuck, fuck, fuck!
You were expecting something?:D
Wenger said give his policy 5 years and if it doesnt work he will change. 7 years later no change.
so this year when we dont finish near the top and he made a balls up by having chamack as our 2nd striker what do we do?
Kroenke and Gazaidis and morons and not fans. Let usmanov give Wenger the money and Wenger can balance the books then. KROENKE OUT
Kroenke and Gazidis, are far from morons. Just chancers, who extract money from us and do not have the ambition for the club as fans would.
The surprise for me is Dempsey for only 6m and Liverpool could not come up that. The player wanted Pool (why oh why?) but ends up with Sp**s (not a step up) after turning down Villa (a definite step down). Anywhere but Fulham is not a great plan B for Dempsey.
We are not surprised that our business is done with no late transfer news.
Goes around, comes around for Benayoun.
Liverpool have spent quite a bit of money in prior seasons if you remember.
I read somewhere that Fulham were asking for more from Liverpool on account on them pissing Fulham off with their tapping up of Dempsey.
Wonderful as usual & a welcome change from the day of insanity/nonsense.
Alas…all too graphically illustrated.:P
The question is not whether we should sell our top players. At some point we have to let them go.
After all, we are a self earning club that relies as much on player sales as on (exorbitant) gate receipts to fund our team. Some other clubs have had the benefit of a head start in branding (United) or sugar daddies to help fund them.
We don’t.
But to what extend or degree do we allow ourselves to sell top performers and how extensive a reconstruction of the team should we tolerate is the point in contention.
The issue in recent seasons is not that we have sold top players but that they are going and with good years left on contract (Song). This is indeed a worrying development.
Add to that the fact that we have effectively culled (2-3 of our top performers) last season, we have created too much flux to enjoy the continuity that must surely be the basis of any challenge beyond the thankfully high stagnation point that wenger has continuously achieved since our last league title.
I think I could tolerate the fact that (our top scorer) RVP to some extent was outside of our control (or had become so). I could even contemplate with relative calm the prospect of Walcott leaving (with a suitable addition coming in)
But I cannot understand (despite the purported antics of the player) how we can let someone like Song, who plays an important part in the node of the team just ahead of the defense (where transition between attack and defenseis exceuted), leave with 3 seasons remaining on contract.
Some would say it was a business motivated move. Id on’t buy that. 15m is paltry for a player @age 24 with more upside to his development.
We didn’t even get any kick back from the goodwill we must surely have cultivated from recen sales to Barca. At very least if Walcott was eager not to put pen to paper, we should have structured a rent to own deal for Affelay in the opposite direction.
It’s been two seasons whereby our top performers have been allowed to leave in the summer. The rot has evidently not been stopped and we are arguably weaker for the crucial start to this campaign (which surely will be decided on even fner margins) than before.
Something is evidently wrong with our retention scheme.
We must of course recognise the fact that even with our restructured wage scheme (and we’ve done well I feel to have gotten rid of some deadwood, loaned others ), we are nowhere near what certain clubs can offer our top players.
Let’s not kid ourselves that this is as much n issue of wage as it is about ‘ambition’.
if we put ourselves in Walcotts cleats for instance, here is a player whose main asset is pace.
We are trying to sign him on for 75K. he wants 100K
More importantly, we are signing him on for 75K for 4-5 seasons when he can easily earn double (if lucky) at some clubs.
When he starts to run out of speed by the end of his (assumed) extended tenure with us, he will de-value very quickly. So if we were in his shoes, it seems ludicruous in this dag and age to expect him to take that much less over 4-5 seasons…surely not on the basis of blind loyalty alone (which doesn’t exists anymore)
Therefore it seems to me inexplicable that we have let the issue fester for quite so long. To me, we should have put a gun to walcott’s head and told him that the first day of season was for him to put pen to paper. And if he didn’t, we should have started proceedings to bring in a replacement forthwith whhilst placing on market with the likes of Sinclair, Moses, Johnson, Rodwell instead of trickling to end of the countdown and be backed off for price.
But here is the other issue which seems to point to a certain overly dognmatic approach on our part.
Granted yes, I do still agree with the clubs current approach that we muct hold a strict disicpline with our wages and purchasing policy,the likes of Song and Walcott (if rumour be true) were not asking for 140-160K per week (which you may find some mediocre players are payed at certain clubs) but 80K (up from 55K) and 100K respectively.
That isn’t a huge jump for players who have improved vastly in performance over last season.
Now granted we should not be pushed into re-negotiating on acontract with 3 years left to run (in the case of Song, which itself may set its own precedence, yetperhaps there is leeqay for us to be more creative in our approach tomake up for the differnace in money.
We live in the real world and the fact is that top players can/will be renumerated vast sums in current situation with clubs that have deep pockets.
Why could we not work in for eg, a performance bonus say for Song where by the shortfall is made up over the course of the year by money that may not necessarily betied into a new contract. Tie in the player with a caveat that we will again revisit his contract closer to end date but that we wil meanwhile reward him for the outstanding performance he has put in for the club.
At very least, it will develop and incentive tie in to our renumeration system and push players to up their performance levels.
The entire approach to our ability to renumerate and retain the top level performers IMO needs vey serious tinking.
Yet again as is, we are 2 players shy of true contention for the tile and have more importantly handicap ourselves by saddling the need to settle new players in critical areas of the team without effective transition, thereby reducing our chance for succes in the title push.
Song for instance could have been at very least retained for one year (bearing in mind his role is critical in importance and understanding and not easily replicated, hence presumably our intent in ‘unecessarily re-inventing the wheel with the unsuccessful pursuit of Sahin)
It would have at very least afforded Diaby, Coquelin or a new player time to come into the position and adjust to the structure whilst giving us suitable back up in the service of the existing incumbent.
It isn’t that selling off the players is an issue for this club. We have always sold players and made new stars. We have much potential still with Chamberlain, Jack, Giroud etc.
But our transition is poor and badly executed.
I hope we abate this but feel doubtful since it has repeated itself like clockwork yet again.
Naturally I hope to be proven partially wrong at least.
A victory at Liverpool then with both new boys up front scoring a brace?:D
By way of note, we go on aboout Walcott but we still have Arsharvin on the books.
As an impact player, he is a tricky character where much of our wing play has been a little more direct.
Perhaps of some use to our campaign till January at very least.
i think this not only signals a trend in what Tim has pointed out but also how the behavior of big clubs has changed towards us.
Affelay and Nuri Sahin are clear cut cases of their managers refusng to send them to Arsenal rather than the other way round by putting unreasonable price tags. I dont think Sahin or Affelay would have minded some pay cut in lieu of first team appearances.
Wenger has to make do with what he can get. And he is doing a great job.
Very interesting, but you really should have controlled for inflation in transfer fees. It’s been massive, and way above general inflation. From 96/97 until today, we are talking about 250 % inflation, according to http://transferpriceindex.com/2011/09/transfer-inflation-1112-update-2/. As far as I can tell, 00/01 was actually our worst year.
I thought about it but when I saw that the lows were 0,1 , and 3 or 4 I realized that 250% of 0 is 0.
What you would see is that the Anelka and Overmars sales were well above Cesc and Nasri. So, if anything it would have made my point more dramatic. It would also have required an explanation of the TPI and provided people with ammo to make spurious arguments like “ANELA WAS NOT SOLD FOR £100m!!! This Blog iz RUBBIGHS!”
So, I choose the simpler route and to explain to smart folk like you my reasons