What is happening with the Arsenal board and why the lack of action?

The actions of the Arsenal board make no sense and raise a torrent of questions.

Surely the Arsenal board know what is happening? They must know the dissatisfaction among the fans, they must be aware of the criticism from almost every corner.

These men are not stupid, they are highly paid men and the owners are billionaires. You do not reach that status in life by being stupid.

There is football experience on the board at every level so why are they not acting? What has paralysed them?

I ask because I simply cannot explain what is going on.

Taking so long to name a new manager at this level when the team is playing in such a manner really is incompetence. However, as I have already explained, these men are not stupid, so why is this lack of action allowed to occur.

This happened under the old board and management so we are not talking a single period in time under one board.

What is the common thread here? Well, on this one I do have the answer. The owners, that is who. They have been the only constant over the last decade.

It is bewildering why the board or owners or both, are so frightened of making decisive, strong decisions.

Arsenal needs a new manager, everyone knows this, there is almost no one suggesting that Freddie Ljungberg should continue as the manager.

Why one has not been named I do not know, only the board know. Is it a financial decision made by the owners? The questions just keep on coming.

Why was there no plan in place when everyone and their uncle knew Unai Emery was on his last legs?

What the hell is going on with this board?

29 Comments

  1. It is to do with money, we are trying to get someone in on a tight budget. I think the board hoped Freddie would either give them time or save them money but yet again they were wrong. Spurs were proactive went and got their man (not my choice) and they are moving on. We didn’t and we aren’t.

    1. Everything about this board is wrong, hiring a coach has become something else, the board is more confused than the players, tell me how hiring a coach is more difficult than electing a president of a country.Kroenke lead board has failed and embarrasing the club.

  2. I don’t think they are going particularly slow

    They fired Emery in decent time.

    Also, it’s not easy to hire a top manager which I hope they are trying to get.

    We don’t know what’s happening behind the scenes (if anything)

    Hopefully they will get someone by January. January transfer window is for emergencies. And boy are we in one. The new manager will need it

    1. You must be joking in saying they fired UE in decent time they fired him very late when the team will take some miracle to recover. Why did they not start this process before firing UE? Why were they not proactive? Why did they not have a contingency plan in place? I am against this whole three man interview as well where they go through the candidates who have applied for the job, no big club does that. You identify who you want as your first second n third choice then make a move according to that. Clubs need to convince top world class managers to join them not other way around ….no top manager will ever come n give you auditions …..I thought Ibra have the clue to them already years ago. Top establish players n managers don’t do auditions n interviews.

  3. Was never convinced by Raul, still not helping at all.
    I see the man as a fraud, not so different from Gazidis.
    Zero plans.
    He opted against signing Diallo and Soyuncu with the reason being we want experience defenders for Emery.
    So instead we ended up with Sokratis and Litcsteiner, we all saw how that ended up heh?
    The following season, he adds David Luiz to it.
    Diallo and Soyuncu are doing absolutely fantastic now at PSG and Leicester, while we’re stuck with our experienced dross.
    He’s yet to convince Me he’s competent.
    I refuse to stay blind or create excuses for him just as I refused t create excuses for Emery.
    How are we doing so far with his black book of contacts.
    Total bozo

    1. Eddie, you blame Emery, yet he wanted the players you named plus Partir in the midfield. He deserved to be sacked because the Board wanted a fall guy. In truth the team exceeded its potential last season. Many of these players have now failed three Manager/Head Coaches.

    2. Thanks for pointing that out.
      A lot of people forget it’s Raul that is behind much of what has gone wrong at this club for the past 18 months.
      I had at the time thought Soyuncu looked good and that if he failed as a CB, he would make a top DM with his ball-playing skill. Was good value too, compared to SokaPapa.

      1. Not only that; apparently Pepe was his signing too. Raul should be kicked out ASAP. Don’t know who to bring though to run the football side of the club. Look at Bayern as a blue print. It is being run by former players who have the club at heart.

  4. Paralysis is the only word that comes to mind. It also describes the performance today. Once again Leno was the exception. Sad when, match after match, your goalkeeper gets MOTM.

  5. There isnt enough quality at center back or central midfield for any coach to work with. Even if we appoint a world class coach today it will make no difference, we will only break their moral with this rubbish team. Hopefully we are waiting for jan transfer window to bring in some quality players along with a coach. The arrival of multiple ppl at the same time should give a mental boost everyone fans included hopefully bringing some positivity to the club.

  6. Reine-Adelaide did his ACL. Not our player anymore but still a legacy of our training ground.
    On topic, the owners don’t care until they start losing money. But if they were losing money then no decent manager would come to us (because we can’t pay them lol!) CATCH 22

    1. I was just checking Transfermarkt.

      Reine Adelaide – market value at Arsenal 3 M, sold 1.6 M
      market value at Angers one year later 11 M, sold for 25 M

      We sell our top talents for peanuts while keeping donkeys, then other teams make 1500 (!) percent profit on them in 1 year (!). Mind boggling.

  7. It’s either they do not care enough or they do not know what they are doing. We already know both apply for Stan.

  8. First things first.

    Arsenal are NOT looking for a Manager, they are looking for a Coach (See Pochettino).

    If you were an experienced Manager, and you had to go thru several interviews (this process was reported by Arsenal themselves), each with two different people who would be senior to you, what would that tell you about where you would be in the food chain if you got the Job.

    I am sure that the current list of candidates would have done some due diligence and looked at the past few matches, and seen what a forlorn bunch of players make up the current first team squad

    If you knew that Arsenal had already overspent in the summer transfer window, with possibly only enough money for ONE new cheap face in January, would you get a warm and fuzzy feeling about turning Arsenal’s fortunes around?

    I like Mikel Arteta, but his most recent experience is with Man City, who chase all over, trying to get the ball back. Could he change this lot? Maybe Dr Pavlov could condition the Arsenal players to instantly press their opponents when he rang a bell.

    As for the list of candidates mentioned so far, I do not see any miracle workers.

    Final Indictment on the Kroenke’s. I think they are looking for the “CHEAPEST” option, which might mean keeping Freddie on the Job. That could be why the selection process is taking so long, they are hoping that Freddie can turn it around (rather like they gave Emery 4 more matches).

    So, as many people have commented. Instead of making the change at the International break, when the new guy would get 2 weeks to settle in, they have fritted away 5 games, and are still no nearer an announcement.

    I think we can guarantee there will be no European football next season!!!

  9. Why would any top manager come to Arsenal, it’s a career killer for them.
    Poor management, no ambition, no support.
    I’d be suprised if Poch or any other half decent manager wanted to come.

    1. The 4 types we can attract:
      – someone looking for one big final payout (Ancelotti)
      – someone even lower in the food chain (Howe)
      – someone who is just starting (Arteta)
      – someone who will take any job (Big Sam, Moyes)

      I would go with Arteta, but would he join us knowing he’s stuck with 5 or 6 shit defenders which will take 2 or 3 years to improve??

  10. They are looking for yes sir! Any experienced manager will say no to Arsenal job unless they are desperate for a job.
    So it will probably be Arteta but he’d have very little control at the club.

  11. For most teams success starts at the top, which certainly doesn’t mean the most involved owner always wins the day…an owner’s devotion to success can come in many different forms…some show their commitment by becoming intimately involved in the day-to-day operations, whereas others show it by simply backing the manager, then leave the footballing decisions to the experts…in our case, neither really applies…I get it, at one point it seemed like Kroenke’s involvement just might be a boon for the club; he didn’t have controlling interest, he never appeared to interfere with the footballing side of things and it certainly didn’t seem unreasonable to think that a new Stadium might provide some real tangible benefits….little did we know that this was the beginning of the end

    Personally I believe wholeheartedly that Arsene was well-aware that the grand pronouncement about our future possibilities was nothing more than a calculated business strategy to quell concerns and justify the exorbitant ticket prices…Wenger undoubtedly believed that left to his own devices his genius would always prevail, regardless of the financial constraints…unfortunately this was not the case and things started to go sideways relatively quickly…as expectations were tempered, the Wenger Cup emerged and our once great leader started making decisions that were best for him and not necessarily for the club…selling our most talented players, surrounding himself with totally subservient players/staff, constantly shipping out former/acting team captains, not regularly playing anyone who challenged his authority, not addressing obvious team shortcomings and closing the lines of communication between the club and the fanbase…this is how we lost our way

    Wenger had created an environment that wasn’t conducive to building leaders, in fact the exact opposite…when a manager starts to lose the unconditional support of the fans, he simply can’t afford to lose the locker room too…as such he needs to eliminate any dissenting voices…when this occurs the team in question loses it’s steel…that’s why it was such a revelation when Sanchez arrived…he refused to accept that mentality, until he went too far and Wenger had to reestablish his control…why do you think this team literally chose timid little Ozil over Sanchez…by the time Wenger departed the only “leader” left from the old regime was Kos and we all know how that ended

    strangely enough I think Gazidis actually tried to help us when he boasted about our supposed financial might…at the time, I felt he was simply a company man sent to buy our short-term silence, but if he was one of Kroenke’s lackeys why would he leave right after Wenger’s departure…wouldn’t he have gained significant power once Arsene had been removed from the equation…I believe he was a bitter man with little if any tangible influence within the club, who felt belittled by Wenger, betrayed by Kroenke and harassed by the fans, with little to show for his grief…so to exact some revenge on the real powers that be he said the one thing that every fan wanted to hear…in doing so he drastically changed expectations…this put considerable pressure on a club that was already being confronted by an increasingly restless fan-base…maybe Gazidis did it for his own selfish reasons or maybe he had no interest in being part of this shameful rouse anymore, regardless his words had relevance…the fact that we have failed to push on since then proves that this club was never committed to competing for football’s biggest trophies so long as our absentee landlord continues to rule the roost

  12. Sad, so so sad. What the hell is going on with the Board of my dear Arsenal? No direction, no ambition, no nothing. Poor signings in the wrong places. We needed desperately a CB and a DM but nobody came. Is the Board seriously interested in running Arsenal? Or else let the Cronkeys sell Arsenal to someone who is really serious about running a football club for the sheer passion of it. There will be so many multi billionares out there who will want to buy Arsenal and turn it back to the club it once was.

  13. That insipid performance yesterday was nearly as disgraceful as the 3-0 drubbing they served us up at the Carabao Cup final vs Wenger’s men. Anyway, I hear people hyping up Arteta? What is the difference between Ljunberg and Arteta? Both are assistants with no significant experience or accomplishments. If Freddie is failing, Arteta will most likely fail too when he takes the hot seat and has to work with jokers like AMN, Chambers, Sokratis, Guendouzi and Ozil. Even after Xhaka got booed for crawling off the pitch, Ozil took his sweet time strolling off, knowing well how the fans take to idiot players wasting time. We need an OVERHAUL of the entire defence and midfield!!

  14. Arsenal, as a club, have forgotten they`re in the football business. Power politics and finance is their game. There are no managers who can put it right it has to come from the heart something Kroenke and the board don`t have. Mikel Arteta should stay well clear if he wants to be successful.

    1. Exactly right Grandad and when people who know football, like O’Leary, Bergkamp, Keown et al put their names forward they are rebuffed. The Board doesn’t want strong assertive people, particularly if they have football knowledge and credibility.

  15. Broke provide the club with a budget and the board spend it based on the amount given. 2 problems with that. 1 is that the budget is too small and 2, the quality of player is not at the standard to compete at PL level!

    The club are penny pinching and Kroke is at the head of the problem!

    The board are pretty useless to do anything because they selected the players and wasted what small budget they had. Not buying in key areas cost us. We went for Pepe at 72 mill yet we needed quality in defense? WTF!?

    Clueless people running a sinking club!

  16. I understand Arsenal may interview up to ten candidates. I can tell you, as a consultant who helped select very senior people for a number of very large, well know organisations over many years, if you are interviewing more than three candidates you are in serious trouble. In addition let us consider if you were one of those ten and it became known that you had been a candidate and you were unsuccessful would you really want the world to know. If you were one of three they the world will think that you were being bracketed with the best, even if you were unsuccessful. The fundamental problem is undoubtedly the Krankies. They just do not care about Arsenal.

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