Amidst all the speculation over the future of Arsenal stars Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil, perhaps the most important contract situation at the moment is that of the boss himself. The latest news on the matter, as provided by the Metro, is that Wenger will stay on and be given a £200 million war-chest to improve the club’s fortunes.
The report by John Cross in the Mirror futher goes on to state that contract talks are in an advanced stage and that an announcement will be made at a more appropriate time – perhaps when the team manage to string a couple of wins together or manage to creep into the top four at the end of the season, although the latter looks unlikely now.
In my opinion, I think this story has a fair bit of credibility considering that there have been various hints dropped over the past couple of weeks that Wenger will stay on. Moreover, if the Frenchman was about to leave, there would have been an announcement by this time. Persoanlly, I belive a decision has been made for Le Boss to stay, the club are just waiting for a good time to make the announcement.
But coming to the part of the story that says he will be given £200 million to invest on the team, I would take it with a pinch of salt. For me, the Arsenal board, infamous for penny-pinching, is unlikely to sanction anywhere near that amount for transfers. But then again, with the real possibility of losing Champions League money and all the other monetary losses as a result of potentially missing out on the top four, maybe the board is finally ready to undo the financial chains.
In any case, if the board cannot get a quality replacement like Max Allegri, the next best thing would be to finally give Wenger the financial firepower to bring in world-class talent capable of leading the team to the title.
Anurag