Is Money the key to Arsenal’s title ambitions? ED
I’ve seen a lot of people write about how “all we need is a CDM and Striker” and if those players were “World Class” that all our problems would be solved, perhaps not to that extent but there is an insinuation by most that we would all of a sudden be capable of challenging for greater honours other than the FA cup, talks of title ambitions and European glory seem to be synonymous amongst these individuals. There is a huge flaming ‘but’ in this whole situation, which is that in order to procure these ‘World Class Players’ you’ve got to spend the money. It’s not simply a question of paying an astronomical fee. I mean you’d expect that if you’re looking for any high end product, there is also the issue of wages. Good players don’t come cheap and they don’t simply take what you give them, more often than not they’ll demand whatever the hell they can.
Having experienced austerity measures before pretty much the rest of the entire world, in terms of ticket prices being raised, our best players being sold and not really having much of that money being put back into the club…to pay off the massive stadium debt we owed. We all grew frustrated with the lack of success that had come arguably due to a lack of investment in new players during that period. Fast forward to 2013 – the debt had been significantly reduced, and basically had allowed us that extra leeway in investing in players, not just the ‘league 2 French player’. We started getting proper players, people who had started to produce performances that mimicked that of successful squads that we had in the past. Arsene spending £30+ Million on a player, if you had told me 5 years ago I would have told you, ‘you’re full of it’ and I’m sure most would have had a similar opinion.
With us winning effectively 3 pieces of major silverware in the last 2 seasons as a direct result of investment in the squad, logic would dictate that spending even more would lead to greater success. Of course it does, but what worries me is the extent to which people believe we should be investing… It’s not ideal but I’m quite content with Wenger’s strategy, finding that one player – your Ozil or Sanchez – rather than what United or City are doing having a constant £150 million ‘trial and error’ transfer fund, whereby if it doesn’t work, who gives a crap they’ll do it all over again next window. If we had spent £32 million on Luke Shaw or £26 Million on someone like Soldado, I would be a pretty pissed off man.
We’re never going to be able to compete with the lavish spending habits of City and PSG, we may have the financial capabilities of competing with United and Liverpool, but if collectively £360 million spent in the last 2 Seasons (not counting this year) hasn’t produced a single thing between them, why fall into that trap of reckless spending potentially crippling the clubs finances?
Eddie D