Time For Clarity by Dan Smith
I’m both depressed but also appreciate Arsenal leaking out the news that they won’t be spending heavily this January. At least we don’t have to spend the month clinging to the hope of rumours. It is worrying though that the club don’t even care about the fans from a PR perspective to even pretend they have ambition.
Normally they would send out Arsene Wenger with the company line insisting funds were there if we found someone special.
Now our recruitment team have the criteria of finding bargains such as loan deals or contracts due to expire. As we pay the most expensive tickets in Europe and share a TV deal worth billions, I think we have a right to ask for some clarity.
We keep hearing how we are a self-sustained model like that’s been success. No one is asking us to go into debt or gamble with our future. If missing two years of Champions League revenue has put us in the red, you get better empathy from gooners by being transparent. Of course that’s not true.
Even if the action plan of moving to the Emirates was assuming we would always be a top 4 side, no one could have envisaged the TV contract which in theory makes it less crucial to be in Europe.It’s not like we were big spenders for most of Kroenke’s ownership when we were in Europe’s top competition.
With Ramsey to depart we continue to lower the wage budget. Like Ramsey, while some would try to convince you Ozil might be loaned out for footballing reasons, again it would see the American save money. During our 22-game unbeaten run, he was in the dream scenario of losing two of our best players while making his customers think it was a good idea. The reality is we live in a world where Chelsea are quoting 40 million for a youngster yet to start in the League. No one else in the top 6 would try to strengthen with loans at a time they are 5th.
We simply cannot compete under the current model. Yet how can anyone give us clarity if the clarity is a lie? To give us clarity you have to say the truth. The truth is Mr Kroenke doesn’t care. That’s why he doesn’t even need to tell us what we want to hear. The man lives half way across the world, unaware that he’s not liked. We are just one of many projects in his portfolio, certainly not top of his lists. Like his American Sport franchises, he becomes rich even if we win nothing, no matter what position we finish in. He would do his image a favour by telling us if there is something stopping us from spending, but instead, he says so much by saying so little.
Dan Smith