On the eve of the carnival of wanton consumerism that is ‘Black Friday’, Arsene Wenger has reiterated that he’s only looking for top quality players in the January transfer market.
Noting ‘bargains’ come in all shapes and sizes the boss referenced the purchase of midfield maestros Patrick Vieira and Mesut Ozil as examples of great value for money…despite the £39 million difference in their price tags.
“I love a bargain,” the boss said at his weekly press conference. “Who does not love a bargain? I don’t know many people that don’t like a bargain.
“If people need two TVs, yes, [buy them]. But if they don’t need one, why should they buy two? That’s where you come back to a bargain.
“What is for us a bargain is to buy players of top quality, because only top quality strengthens our squad.
“I can tell you I bought Patrick Vieira for £3.5million and it was a top bargain because he was a top quality player. we spent £40m on [Mesut] Ozil but I still consider it a bargain because the player is top quality and the priority has to be the quality of the player.”
No doubt comparing Vieira and Ozil will provoke heated debate, but one thing is for sure…Ozil is certainly starting to demonstrate the quality expected of a man who cost us £42.5 million.
Anyway, we’re off to queue outside Currys with our boxing gloves…that 1998 Sony MiniDisc Walkman will be ours.
Well in today’s market, he really is.
Someone please tell wenger that Messi is available for bargain basement wages of 600k per week. To good to miss, that one!
When you compare to De Bruyne.. for 57 mil .. for sure!
Fun fact Arsene sold his one TV.
To Barca for 16M£.
And it was a broken TV that took a year to fix!
sure, but what if the top quality comes with overpricing? cause that’s the case in today’s market
This is the time when Wenger could go out and prove that he is still a great manager. He absolutely must make a couple of signings this January window. A DM and a striker could make all the difference in the second part of the season.
But I bet you he brings nobody in.
so, let’s see
back to back FA Cups = he’s a shit manager, he’s only won 6 of those now
Buying a couple of available players in January = he’s a great manager
errrrrrr… Not sure how to break this to you, FG dear chap….
The PL and the CL is what matters
He’s won three of those.
He’s won one of those 3 time’s and the last one of those 3 over a decade ago, and he should have won it probably twice more but the team bottled it. Let’s also put this out there, when Wenger arrived in 97, both Man U and ourselves had both won the league 10 times, now we’re on 13 and they’re on 20. Ferguson won it 10 times to Wenger’s 3 and he’s been retired for over 2 years. Ferguson also won 2 Champions League titles in the same time, all this whilst Old Trafford was also being heavily redeveloped… Read more »
Guys, it is “debt” and not ‘dept’ ?
^He says… completely ignoring the Emirates and financial constraints Arsenal had.
Here’s a fun fact for you.
Before the Emirates was built, the record between Wenger and Ferguson was 3-4.
(Only including those won from after Wenger joined)
Your fun facts are wrong, before the Emirates Ferguson was 5-3 ahead, 97, 99, 00, 01, and 03, thats 5 and a European Cup. And Old Trafford was being heavily redeveloped at the time.
The 5 after and another Champions league were achieved with several hundreds of millions of pounds worth of dept brought on by the Glazers takeover, which they still have.
Wenger joined in September 96
It should have been 5-3 Wenger but as i said we bottled it in 99 and 03
John C but did ManUre and SAF win the premier league as invinsibles to make premier history (by the way, I hear there’s a fuckin’ excellent book on the invinsibles which is on sale now)? I think not. Progress is being made each season with AFC winning trophies and spending (some) money on quality players. #InArseneItrust. Besides, ManU and SAF are cunts.
Sanchezy, i know exactly what he’s won because i was there, where were you?
Ah, the moving goalposts argument. When we don’t win a trophy, ‘any trophy’ matters, then we win the FA Cup (twice), only the PL and CL is what matters. If we win the PL this year, it’ll be a case of only the CL being the trophy that matters.
So on and so on.
Exactly! I remember so many people talking about how that Arsenal have to win any trophy.
I mean so many people would say they would rather take a Carling cup over yet another top 4 finish.
Lets win the League first before you come with your moving post theory. Fact is the champions league and the league are the 2 most important trophies no matter how you try and twist it…and we haven’t won either in over 10 years.
Trez… you missed the point and show exactly why it’s the same argument. 2 years ago, the argument was that he needs to win a trophy, any trophy, even if it was the Capital One Cup trophy and the fans said that they would happily drop out of the top 4 if it meant winning one. Well, he kept us in the top 4 and still won the FA Cup, then he won it the next year. And now the moaners are saying the FA cup never mattered and that only the PL and CL are important. It’s the same… Read more »
I do agree that we need a couple of signings in January. And I agree, I cant see him buying anyone.
– (hypothetically speaking) – do I think that the decision by Arsene not to sign anyone will cost us in the title race and we’ll fall short again.. .. its painful to admit it, but yeah, it probably will.
I am not going totally banana’s about it, because you never truly know what will happen, but still, my gut instinct tells me that’s what will happen.
Fat Gooner, the comedy villain of Arseblog News.
your last sentence confused me. then i decided to dislike it.
In fairness Wenger did say he paid a little bit too much for both Ozil and Sanchez but had to add a couple of more million to make sure they were ours.
And I’m glad he did.
I wouldn’t call Ozil/Sanchez expensive considering current market values. But they aren’t bargains either. Right price, maybe?
right price maybe, but damn good investments still.
At least it shows that Wenger has moved with the times, I remember him saying the only time he’d spend £50m is if the player could score a goal every time he touched the ball, I think in response to Chelsea buying Torres for £50m. However you splice it, in today’s market, Ozil at £43.5m is an absolute brilliant piece of business when teams are spending that much on the likes of Raheem Sterling. Sanchez at £35m is also an incredible piece of business. Even when it comes to buying high quality players at high prices, the boss still recognises… Read more »
Oh man, I still remember the day we signed Ozil. My friend called me on the phone screaming that we bought Ozil.
I still sometimes can’t believe that we have Ozil and Sanchez in our team
living the dream 🙂
I can never forget that day. I kept the arseblog transfer deadline day page on refresh for 8 hours! And when the deal when through, I felt as if Nigeria had just won the world cup! Unbelievable!
Market value dictates that something is only worth what someone else is prepared to pay for it. So ozil cannot be overpriced because I’m sure if we didn’t pay it many other teams would have. Example, Charlie Austin. All summer he was offered to various clubs for £15m and no takers, this is because he was overpriced.
or because his knees are from the same factory that made Jack Wilshere
That does assume that Ozil would consider playing anywhere.
If Ozil performed as he has done in his first two seasons but for one of the $$$ clubs, he’d have simply been lauded as a top class signing.
Signing for Arsenal has brought more pressure and expectation and now he’s showing how laughable the criticism was.
He’s a class above.
Hey Mesut, why r you referring to yourself as Ozil? Is that like a Zlatan thing?
Right on. Class, class, class and supreme intelligence…. poetry in motion..
I hope Wenger finds a bargain in the Jan transfer window.
£40,000,001?
Bargain!
Still can’t believe we missed on Suarez…Even tho he’s a cunt, he’s a helluva player.
He’s also a nasty little racist. Not someone I would want at Arsenal.
Plus a niggly, bitey, hand-balling off-the-line, diver. I too would wince a bit if he signed for Arsenal. WE’d no longer have moral high ground over Chelsea and their odious captain. But everyone deserves a chance of rehabilitation. Has anyone here never once done anything wrong?
If we bought Suarez, we wouldn’t have got Sanchez. I know who I’d rather have in this team.
as much sanchez has been brilliant , suarez is on another level as a player (not much as a human been ) . i wouldnt have mind to have both to be fair
Both was never an option. Sanchez left Barcelona because they bought Suarez.
But not a team player necessarily and divisive in the team cohesion… I’d warrant. We have better….. in the round. IMO
We missed him because he was more interested in picking up his Liverpoo loyalty bonus instead of forcing through a move at the 40m buy-out clause price.
Ozil and Sanchez are two of the best players around no question about it but imagine where the side would be with another couple or so of similar quality . We should be doing that every season .
It only happened because of what Real Madrid and Barcelona did. Madrid spent big for Bale and this forced Ozil out of that team for us to grab. Barcelona bought Suarez which forced Sanchez out for us to grab. This year, Barcelona (under a transfer ban, of sorts) did not bring in a world class player, neither did Madrid. Our market still doesn’t operate on the level with Real Madrid, Barcelona, Chelsea, United, PSG, Bayern and City. We are still being shrewd enough to wait for them to change the market and then reacting to the tide changing. Cech was… Read more »
Oh no…he better not be talking about dm’s when making that TV analogy. Because we do need two. One isn’t enough
For me, Santi Carzola is the ultimate bargain. You just need to compare his transfer fee to what City paid for Silva.
Cazorla – amazing bargain
Monreal – turning out to be the same
I would love to see Marco Reus at The Arsenal – his game is perfectly suited to how we play.
Le Coq Santi
Sanchez Ozil Reus
Theo
That’s a team with some serious bite!
Ozil 42.3m….De Bruyne for 55m.
I’d say Wenger did well considering it was a “Panic Buy”.;)
Other good buys :
Walcott 15m considering you have to pay 49m for Sterling to show ‘ambition’ these days.
Or Alexis for 32m as oppose to say Martial for 36m so the press can bleat on about ‘money well spent’.
Or maybe just Cech for 11m