Arsenal shareholder Piers Morgan has claimed that the recent failed protest has just given Arsene Wenger the ammunition to sign a new deal, which is already on the table.
The Frenchman was the subject of a protest at the weekend, with banners being held up in the 12th and 78th minutes of the match, as well as at the final whistle. Said banners read: Time for change. Arsenal is stale – Fresh approach needed’.
Arsenal have gone 12 years without a Premier League title win, although I think it is valid to bring up the fact that Roman Abramovich brought his millions into the Premier League the summer before that win.
The fact still remains that we fans have grown frustrated with the lack of progression in recent years, having tolerated the excuses of building the stadium previously, the Emirates is now fully paid off, and rewards are expected for being so patient.
A number of fans want Wenger to go, but shareholder (and all-round nuisance) Piers Morgan has claimed that the manager is sitting with a three-year deal waiting to be signed, and he will use the failed protest as reason to accept the terms.
The 66 year-old was welcomed by cheers of ‘there’s only one Arsene Wenger’ following the supposed raising of the banners, which is claimed to have given him the idea that 80% of the supporters are behind him, contrary to previous belief.
Morgan said: ‘Wenger, I know for a fact, has a new three-year contract on his desk. He is, as he normally does, trying to strategically play the fans and the media to a point where he can legitimately sign that new £25 million contract.
‘On Saturday, the fans had a chance to basically make their view known that it is time for change, but it turned into a massive damp squib. Yes, a few thousand did put their placards up, but it wasn’t well organised and it didn’t play out particularly well.
‘What Wenger immediately did was turn this into: “I was so surprised. I’m so delighted 80% of the fans are with me”.
‘I know what this means. It means he is going to sign a new contract, and that means Arsenal will go another three years without winning the league and without winning the Champions League. If fans continue to chant Wenger’s name, they will get him the three more years.”
Would a new contract for Wenger provoke more intense protests?
It is incredible that failure is awarded with a new contract. Where in the world would you get it? Tired, antiquated, lack luster, easy to over come tactics is what will be a head of us if he gets a 3 year contract. Lord forbid.
Don’t be mad folks. Morgan is just pulling your leg. Him also is fed up with the state of our football.
I think he is trying to use this comment to rally the troops into further/bigger action.
It could have the opposite effect and turn already apathetic fans into prawn flesh eating zombies 😉
I hope you’re right, because if he gets the new contract, I’m going to make myself go through the process of forcing myself to not love, and get over a girlfriend ( in this case, Arsenal)
Better than three more years of misery and disappointment.
So it means another 3 years of 4th Place trophy.
Its unacceptable for any fans that Wenger contract to be extended beyond this final year.
I know he would not go until thrown out. If he can not win us the title next year, then he must go
There are plenty of better managers available.
Assume that he only signs only one recognized players this summer, all the fans will have no confidence, and how a team can win without their fan’s support
The board should tell him to spend the money and bring few classy players.
Even 4th place won’t b easy to get…
sometimes u feel its just against a dictator u r fighting with…
i have a feeling world class players would b hard to buy if they just see our record and ability to win title
Yep I agree. We will struggle to sign certain players as we are not really champions league or PL contenders. If the board gives Wenger another 3 years then so be it as I think fans are still not realising how stubborn this guy is. I have been a Fan of Wenger but his tactics and inability to not change it scares me.
Every Manager is evolving except Wenger. He also plays players no matter their form. How is it still that Giroud starts and Walcott is chosen before Campbell.
No one takes this man on. He does and says what he wants. Even blaming the fans for bad vibes at the emirates when fans feed off the players and results and not the other way round.
Didn’t Gazidis already come out to state they had over £250mil for Transfers?
Where does wenger stand in all of this?…… The major culprit i guess
Still some AKBs here will have justifications to explain why Wenger did not know about all that money being available
I’m not an AKB or an AOL but an Arsenal fan. And I see that the tweet said that 250m was made available for transfers in the last four years.
I was always understanding that those figures were supposed to include the wages in the contract as well.
So I have just checked transfermrket and their figures say that IN THE LAST FOUR YEARS Wenger has paid out over 200m for incoming players.
Is that a considered response or a deluded AKB excuse?
Not sure much a response as an excuse
I knew straight off that that is what he meant. Wages and transfer fees, then agent fees, and I bet you the last four seasons are right about that number. Could be a little less due to the handicap nature of last summers window.
Deluded AKB excuse of course, he pays very average people a handsome amount of salary and claims that there is no money? If those flops were sold then there could be enough cash for buying class players and pay them well. Walcott on a 140k a week? More than Sanchez?? So funny
And there you have it folks, REALITY…
According to Piers Morgan….
Boy, do you sound chuffed with the prospect! Can’t think why..
@AOT
“According to Piers Morgan” As opposed to it coming from The Star, Telegraph, Metro or some SkySports pundit. At least Piers is a shareholder in the club as well as a supporter/fan.
Am I “chuffed”? You bet I am. Because, unlike you, I like the guy. Yeah, there are some things he does, regarding the squad that p**s me off. But overall, I don’t have a problem with him.
I like cheese, all types of it but I wouldn’t want it managing the club I love if it wasn’t any good at it.
@AOT
Your choice dude…I respect that.
Ok, I’m not exactly thrilled that he might be staying a further three years, but I have said it directly and indirectly that these protests were only going to make things worse, there is nothing we can legally do to force Wenger out, they don’t come more defiant than the old man, trust me. We need a different approach to make changes but until then we just have to hope while we come up with a plan that would actually work.
Someone mentioned something a while back which I thought was pretty sharp logic. All the online abusers who go way to far in describing Wengers capabilities, or incapabilities as it were. You know the people I’m talking about, slanderers, wishing harm upon the man. Well someone mentioned how these people are doing more harm than good for the people who want change. I have to agree with that. I was furious at one stage of the season and needed to get stuff off my chest, but then after reading some comments, I found it wasn’t too long before I felt the need to back Wenger up on a few things.
85% of Arsenal fans are
3rd or 4th place wimps
because competing for
the title is too tough.
So if Wenger gets an extension these
AKB wimps will declare a national holiday.
Very true mate, with all the failures that the whole world witness, the lies, the excuses, failed tactics, blaming the fans, the zip on his coat, still people here are happy to keep him even for more years, and they are willing to go another level just to defend the senile one.
Without the old man, the team is still there and will keep existing. Give him the boot and all of us will live happily ever after
Wenger another 3yrs contract … Arsenal Football Club RIP …
It’s now Arsenal Football Brand, Sam! Get it right!
@AOT
It’s been Arsenal football brand since 1895 dude…Catch up.
Mmmmm….If you say so NY (laughs whilst looking firstly at a small picture on the wall, and then a BIGGER PICTURE;)
Arsenal Supporters Trust June agenda:
As soon as the season is over the AST will, as we always do, issue an on-line questionnaire to all members seeking your views on key issues. The results will then be presented to Ivan Gazidis and the Board ahead of the end of season supporters’ meeting on 3 June.
In the meantime the AST Board has discussed this issue and considered the feedback from our members in person, at recent meetings and on-line and we agree that there is a need for change at Arsenal, so we support that call and those who will raise this issue at the Norwich game.
The AST view is that we believe change is particularly needed in the following areas:
1. No more unaccountable, unexplained consultancy payments to Stan Kroenke and KSE. We believe that football clubs should be run for the benefit of supporters and communities, and not for the sole benefit of the owner.
2. New appointments to be made to the Arsenal Board so that it is fit for purpose; this means a better mix of youth and experience, more independence, and representation of all shareholders and the diverse fanbase. We would like to see more direct football expertise added to the Board.
3. Cash reserves to be taken out of the bank and used for the benefit of the team and supporters.
4. Overhaul of the football management and coaching structures, to put in place an organisation that doesn’t rely on one individual, however talented. All organisations need to evolve, and there have been no senior external appointments on the management or coaching staff for over a decade. Last year we called for an independent review of the club’s arrangements for the scouting, negotiating and signing of players; we still believe this would be a valuable exercise.
5. Genuine dialogue and engagement with fans by Arsenal, where supporters are listened to and their views are taken into account.
Make.your views known!
now, that seems a more viable course of action
I don’t think any Arsenal fan could disagree with any of those objectives….
Someone did 🙂
If that is a reference to me, i actually agree with AST comments, it is just that kroenke owns over two thirds of AFC so can do whatever he wants providing it is legal.
Thank you!
Arsenal is a business currently valued at 1.3 billion dollars with kroenke being the majority shareholder (owning 66.85%). The only way to get money released from reserves, more football expertise in the board etc is to set up a fund and raise about $900m and make kroenke an offer for his shares, probably need a bit more say $1000m, that is 690 million pounds.
The only other course of action is to stop buying tickets and merchandise.
Kroenke can do what he likes at/with arsenal provided it is legal and can ignore AST. I have criticised Kroenke a lot but he has his good points
1. It would appear that he has not raised the money to buy arsenal using Arsenal as security for the debt, like glaziers at manu.
2. He has not appeared to have taken significant amounts of money out, unlike the glaziers at manu.
3. He does not appear to try and influence the day to day running of the club. Remember ray wilkins being fired, reportedly for saying to abramovich “if you had played the game you would know otherwise”.
4. He is only interested in Arsenal as a business, hopefully he will realise that to grow the business (or brand as he would call it) requires success on the field and that means winning PL and seriously challenging for CL
Oh God! The nightmare continues….
Article states that stadium is fully paid off. My understanding is that there are still long term loans which are at low interest rates. Still has to be paid though.
Future excuses………..incase things don’t pan out well in the course of time
According to forbes, arsenal are valued at $1307m, percentage debt to value is 30%, debt is therefore $392m.
A debt of £270m is substantial and hardly a “future excuse”. In fact we have one of the largest debts in the PL. The difference between us and other clubs is that our debt is tied to long term loans with low intetest rates and we operate at a profit.
It could become a future reason for failure if our income drops due to lack of sucess on the field and we start operating at a loss.
Even the richest clubs in the world like Real Madrid are in debt, but still manages to buy quality WC players every single season. Why can’t Arsenal do that if the debt is still there? Why use the debt excuse to not buy enough quality for the team to really challenge for title?
With debt or not, we know the stingy old manager failed us big time, and now he wanna use the failed protest as a measure for him to sign new contract? His excuses will never end. One day he’ll come and say ‘my dog just gave birth so I can’t retire’ and he signs 2 or 3 more years because giving birth is a very good sign that the team is moving in the right direction.
i like arsene always have
but as a football coach hes shown he has not moved on with the times, ideals are dated an this has caused are lack of titles.
if this were to be true i would be greatly disappointed as in all this time all he had to do was share the load an spend money.
he has done neither an that wont change.
dennis bergkamp helpin out an 50 mill
a season in reinforcements an in my mind we would have had 3 titles in last 6 years.
an winning those titles only attracts better players an larger profile. a legacy
yea……… Feel so sorry for wenger…..all that’s been happening in his life……at work……at home…..at the age he at
He should quit the Job….buy an island….stay on a pension…..get back 2 his family and go get his house in order!
At least we now know that the deluded one has had £250 million available, for the past 4 season’s to spend on transfers… (Thanks to Gazidis latest comments)
Add them facts to Wenger’s denial of not having that kind of budget, along with his words of treating the club as if it belongs to him, in other words he doesn’t like spending money ( The man is sooo tight that there’s no bubbles when he farts in the bath) ??
But he has no problems in wasting money on injury prone and out of form player’s by giving them bumper contact extentions! ?
The signings of Ozil and Sanchez proved that the money is there to be spent but it also proves that Wenger only spends when the pressure is forced on him through constant bad results and fan’s anger! … So going by that form, we should see at least one star signing in the summer, time will tell.
And according to Piers Morgan, time is what wenger seems to have in abundance.
Could you please give source of the statement about wenger having£250m for last four years. All I have seen is report based on a tweet, no quote from a reliable source.
Hahaha ? well … if you ask admin nicely, he might do an article based on Gazidis’s recent coments. ?
I am surprised that he hasn’t done so, already! ?
See my reply to Don above. Gazidis said 250 was made available in four years and Wenger spent over 200…. not including wages
I’m confused. Com ? ?
I thought that Gazidis’s said that wenger has had that budget to spend on transfers (for the past 4 years)
Yet, wenger has spent more money in that time on contract extensions rather than spending on signings?
So where did the so called 200 million go, if that amount doesn’t include wages! ?
Ozil – £41 million
Sanchez – £ 35 million
Debuchy – £8 – £ 12 million ??
Gabriel – £8 millon?
Elneny £7- £8 millon?
Chambers £16 million?
Welbeck £16 million?
Who else was signed in the past 4 years?
Did he spend over 60 million on youngsters?
LOVIN IT…CTFU!!!!!!!!
I’m sure that you are ? Just Like McDonalds … And thats not healthy either!
@FBG
What diff does it make, when you’re gonna die anyway?????
Hahaha ?
Typical loser mentality ???
No wonder you love wenger sooooo much! ?
@FBG
Nah son, just a realist…Try it sometime, it’s refreshing…
realist = no hopes
What are you talking about? Realist and still living in dream land? Do you know how the team is doing right now? Not like we are still in 2004!! Wake up and taste the reality, we are the laughing stock everywhere in this world, unles you live in the deluded one’s house
Laughing stock? Everywhere? What, like Chelsea, Manchester, every other club below us in the League? And every team in Europe thats not in the Top 16?
Grow up smell the coffee. We may even end up second in the hardest League in the world, and you think people are laughing at us! Haha I’m laughing at your stupidity!
This whole debate is pointless. We all know, including Morgan, that no amount of fan or media pressure is going to influence Wenger or Arsenal.
The fact is that the Board and Arsene will decide when it finishes. Fans getting worked up over it is pointless.
@RVPayslip
The REALEST of REAL…FACTS.
the unfortunate truth. Wenger fires Wengers. He’s his own boss. Our club has become a dictatorship. The board is only for show to keep us fans thinking we have a choice in the matter.
The board may only be for show but one board member is not. When you own over two thirds of a business you are in control. Wenger may be very influential but Kroenke is the boss, he knows it and so does everyone else at AFC.
Yes he even went and bought Kim kardashian, plays his favorites, and set the team to play the same boring tactics the whole season without plan B, and so on, it’s all kroenke coz he owns over two thirds of the business. Wenger is immune
And the crap players and crap tactics from the deluded old fool, still manages to finish ahead of all those managers you want to replace him!
haha cmone guys,in football its the fans who hve a say its just that arsenal fans are not united in the quest for change.if all fans become one voice then what will stop change nothing.its a shame some arsenal fans hve turned the Emirates into a shrine and there god is wenger.this is why we will never win the league lets change our mentality.no one doesn’t deserve criticism but just criticise wenger and ull see how deluded pple are.
@khangunners
You’ll get over it soon enough…
Some fans here are more retarded than Wenger they abuse. Piers Morgan, adding 1+1 together to form his opinion came on social media to write that Wenger will sign a new three year contract because the protest failed, and justarsenal went up in flame with abuses of a man who hasn’t said a word on new contract, neither has the board.
The man, Wenger, that I saw against Norwich city at the sideline did cut a figure of a happy man. He looked bewildered and forlorn.
If anything, Wenger will only stay beyond his contract only if he wins the EPL next season and make a telling progress in the UCL. He knew he goofed not buying outfield players last summer because he felt Walcott and Welbeck had come of age to stand up and be counted. He felt they could share the burden of scoring the goals among themselves and challenge for the title. But lo! and behold!, injuries and inconsistencies ruined that faith. To say this unapologetically, Walcott didn’t write his name in glory this season, same with Giroud
*on the sideline….didn’t cut a figure of a happy*
Having said the above, there is something I quickly want to point out about the hypocritical nature of some Arsenal fans on here who always accuse Wenger of rewarding failures like Walcott who is on the 140k a week.
If you have accused him, would you say you were be fair to the man?
Many players have left us to rivals in not too distant past bordering on wages we pay as compared to what rivals offered them. I won’t mention names but we all know them. Some camouflaged their jumping our ship for opportunities for where they could we silver wares but we all know it was for the money.
My point is when those players left then, many fans criticized Wenger for being too thrifty, persimonius, stngy . They claimed he could have made them stay by offering them the wages they asked for.
When Walcott contract was running out, he was on top of his game. Scoring goals with relative ease such that he was cynosure of all eyes from rivals i.e Liverpool, Chelsea, United and Barcelona. Because he had options, he held us to ransom and we eventually gave him what he wanted just to avoid another one getting away.
I remember that year on here many before the contract was signed begged that Wenger do whatever it takes to sign him to a new contract so he does come back to haunt us. Hence, the name ‘sign da thing’.
Imagine if Wenger refused to give him that deal and he has come against us and score few goals against us, would you all be saying as you say now that Wenger should have let him go?
My problem with people here is that there seem to be nothing Wenger does that make them happy. If he starts Giroud , people say why start him when he is a lamp post. The other day he removed him to play their once favorite speedster Walcott after going one man down, I think against Chelsea, they still say why remove Giroud when Walcott is useless?
This life, you can’t please no one. Just do your best and leave the rest. No matter what you do, you’d still be judged nonetheless.