So it looks like the managements changes haven’t stopped at Arsenal, with the latest news being that the Premier League director of football Richard Garlick will be moving to the Emirates to take up the same post, as lately vacated by Huss Fahmy.
This was first leaked by David Ornstein on Thursday…..
🚨 EXCLUSIVE: Premier League director of football Richard Garlick to leave later this year & take up post as director of football ops at Arsenal. Ex-WBA exec was with PL since summer 2018. Succeed Huss Fahmy at #AFC, working on contracts etc @TheAthleticUK https://t.co/bbUrIJMAgp
— David Ornstein (@David_Ornstein) January 14, 2021
Will this be the final change we will see since seeing Ivan Gazidis leave, and then Raul Sanllehi was ousted by the Board, ostensibly in a round of cost-cutting, but Russ Fahmy’s job couldn’t be absorbed into another position, so Mikel Arteta is really excited about Garlick coming to join the team.
“We lost Huss at the start of the season,” said Arteta in the Standard. “He had a really important role because it is a very important link between myself, Edu the technical director, the board, Vinai [Venkatesham].
“We needed a person with a lot of experience, who knows the job really well, has all the connections in English and international football.
“As well, someone that can bring some ideas and some qualities that we believe are required to [run] the business the way we want. I am really excited. I met him.
“He is certainly the candidate we wanted and now we have to respect the process. He is at the Premier League at the moment and we will see when we can get him.
“It’s not about the pressure, it’s contribution, it’s to bring people into our team that are better than us in certain things. That’s going to make us better.
“We had to replace Huss, and Huss had a really important role not only with the first team but with the academy, and a lot of administration work he’s been doing with other entities across Europe.
“We needed to replace him, there was no question about that. We were looking for months and we all decided that the best person to do that was Richard.”
As Mikel said, we don’t know yet exactly when Garlick will arrive at the club, but his vast experience and connections will be a great help to Edu and Arteta in getting the Gunners back to being one of the biggest sides in the UK and Europe.
Let us hope he fulfils those expectations…
Can’t help but feel the way he talks is like a person with a lot of power than most of us think.
I had the same thought right after reading the article!could we be reading too much into it?I just hope that by “we” he doesn’t mean “I”!
“We needed to replace him, there was no question about that. We were looking for months and we all decided that the best person to do that was Richard.”
That paragraph stood out for me. He might be involved and have a say in all big decisions now.
But its NOT now is it! It is later in the year. That could mean many months away, as we are not told precisely when he will come.
“LATER” IS NEVER “NOW.”
I meant Mikel, Jon. Not Richard.
‘We needed a person with a lot of experience and who knows the job very well’. According to Arteta, those are important attributes to become Director of football at Arsenal. What about in his position as Manager? Are those attributes not needed?
I agreed with the views posted above me by Highbury Hero. For first team manager, Mikel may have a lot of power, or he may be the official spokesperson of the execs…
Any leader knows that your business club etc is one. There for “we” is used as unity.
If Mikel had to say the board wanted to replace him or named a certain person you villify that person. Taking responsibility off you.
“We” stamps down on that it’s a uniform decision, a group decision It’s Arsenal decision.
Wouldn’t read in it too much