Arsene Wenger says the transfer fees and player wages that Premier League clubs are currently willing to pay could strangle their financial muscle in the long-term.
Highlighting the ‘huge amounts of money’ being spent on ‘average’ players, the Frenchman cited his concern that failing acquisitions could be stuck on the books for the duration of their contracts because clubs elsewhere, particularly on the continent, would not be able to afford to pay their wages.
Facing the press ahead of Arsenal’s game with Leicester City the boss was repeatedly quizzed on the way money is being splashed by rivals. As usual, he was bullish in his stance.
“You could say that today in Europe you have two markets,” noted Wenger.
“One for the English clubs and one for the rest of Europe. The danger of the English situation at the moment is that the English clubs can suffocate themselves in the long term.
“Why? Because they buy players at a very high price. That means there are very high wages linked with it and if they are wrong, they will have these players with high wages who cannot move anywhere else.
“You start the first period now of English clubs having to pay massive wages. Even when the players go out, they have to pay their wages. In the long term, that will mean that the financial advantage the English clubs have will drop because they will be on their wage list.
“They pay for 10 or 12 players who have gone somewhere else because the clubs they go to cannot pay their wages.”
He continued: “If you look at the whole transfer market, very little happens on the whole. It is about the availability of players. There is a huge amount of money for average players – there are plenty available. But to find the players that will strengthen your squad is much more difficult.”
As usual, the boss dodged talk of specific targets, despite being asked about moves for both Shkodran Mustafi and Alexandre Lacazette.
“We do not talk about individual players. I told you already what the are the criteria for the price of a player but you could add one more: the identity of the buyer.
“When the buyer is English, it is true that it multiplies the transfer by two or three or sometimes by 10 because if for the same player an English club does not come in, he is worth five million. But if an English club comes he is worth 35 or 40 or 50.”
On Sunday some Arsenal fans vented their annoyance at the lack of transfer activity by chorusing, ‘Spend some f*cking money’ as the Gunners slipped to 4-1 down against Liverpool.
It’s not the first time the chant has been directed at the boss, who stressed that he’s still open to opening his chequebook.
“We are working very hard. You are absolutely convinced that I don’t want to spend the money, but I would like to reassure you that we are ready to spend the money we have. As always, not the money we haven’t got [because] it is not my money.
“Buying calms the fans down, but it is important to spend but even more important to spend it the right way.”
I am now 100% certain he has become a professional, time troll of paparazzi and fans alike.
Yeah, sounds a lot like we aren’t buying anybody else..
I’d have abit more respect for him if he just came out and said , were not buying anyone else, instead of stringing everyone along
English clubs risk surrendering financial advantage.
But it also means
English clubs are taking advantage of financial advantage
Moral of the story.
Go get some players in
*full time
I hate it when this happens in FIFA.
Spend some f**cking money ? Surely Arsene can see what the atmosphere at the Emirates is like these days.
He doesn’t care.
In his words It’s part of the job and it has no effect on him…it’s completely normal
The chant should not be ‘spend some fucking money’. It should have been ‘Why aren’t we prepared?’
The Liverpool defeat would still have happened even if we had Mustafi and Lacazette. Why? Because individual players can only have so much influence over the team’s performances. On Sunday there was no team in the second half. Why?
But is Mustafi falling into that overpriced “average player” category? Would that be management’s fear around Lacazette as well?
Exactly. Its not a question of spending money. Its a question of not being prepared and adopting the wrong tactics. Granted Wenger may have been looking long term and protecting some players (Koscielny in particular) bc of current injury crisis but I feel we simply did not take the match seriously enough. KOscielny should have at least been ready to play second half. Santi did not feature in Euros and should have come on earlier or even started (granted he may have been carrying a niggle from pre-season) Granit should have also been involved from the start. We did not… Read more »
Lack of experience due to injuries then?
I think the Ox moment, when three players just watched him let the ball roll by to a mugsmasher who was yards away, was indicative of the lack of preparation.
Fitness, tactics, organization, everything was a mess. Part of the mess may have been due to lack of leadership in the back, but I would say that most of it was due to the fact that Arsenal seem to have no idea how they’re supposed to organize right now.
So yeah, preparation is king, imo.
I wouldn’t say that the lack of experience played a major role in our defeat. Wenger said after the match: ‘Maybe we lacked a bit of experience but if you look well at the goals, I don’t think it was necessarily the inexperienced players that cost us the goals today.’ I would agree with him. The first Liverpool goal was a blue moon free kick by Coutinho (who had never scored from a direct freekick in the PL previously, according to some commentators). It was impossible to save and I do not blame Cech in not doing so. In the… Read more »
**Puts needle through helmet**
*tempered sigh of relief* Arsene always goes to extremes to illustrate his point rather than being realistic. Who has 12 failed players on their books that they want out of their club please? Who would be worth €5m in a normal market and is inflated now to €50? Please, who? You are telling me that a Rob Holding type player is inflated to €25m but please give me one example. I fancy that Martial looked a bit expensive but not many would claim 3 times too much. My personal opinion is that Sterling is a disaster at €50m or whatever… Read more »
Again the man is just patronising us and goes to the extreme to make a point that just isn’t valid or makes no sense. Why the fuck is he of all people saying we are surrendering our financial muscle when we are not actually competing in the market as a club of our size should be. We of all people are have no advantage in the market despite of considerable wealth because we are not willing to spend to improve. Just cannot stand to listen to his ridiculous excuses and soundbites any longer. Get this window over with, get on… Read more »
Excellent point well made sir
For years RM benefitted from government funds
I agree that AW exaggerates. Who are the 5 mill players who cost 50 mill? Sure there are some clubs that can afford to take a loss on expensive players and there are some eye watering prices but this is the new reality. There might be bargains in the lower leagues, but that is also a risk and “one for the future.” But with Mustafi aren’t we talking a much smaller price difference. Penny wise and pound foolish, Arsene?
The word you choose to omit is that he said “sometimes” 10 times higher. Rare, but yes happens at times. Andy Carroll was in this category when Liverpool purchased.
But Pogba is exactly the point. The fee might be twice what it should be but it is now the salary that becomes the obstacle… if they find they need to move him off the books.
I think hes complaining about walcott every so discreetely.
I know i would.
Bendtner was the first one that sprung to my mind. Defo could be having a little dig at Theo though
How about Chamakh for an average player?
Bendtner was a more than decent player when he was at Arsenal. He used to be our super sub. Scored many important goals coming as sub. He was not at a big pay package too. The problem started when once RVP was injured and Wenger preferred Chamakh over him. He complained to the press and he fell out with Wenger and hence with fans. Then, it was a downhill for him. I still remember some of the good moments he provided including that jumping header against Spurs. Also, I still like him for his tweet when we finished above Spurs… Read more »
I would class 52k a week as a very well rewarded
Think it was the last couple of seasons when we were shopping him around and guess what? That’s right the clubs that were interested in him couldn’t match his wages…..
Quite liked TGSTEL but the point I was making is that Arsene has been at fault for it himself. Like the Walcott point above.
By footballer standards 52k Per week isn’t (and wasn’t then) particularly unusual, but is was too much for TGSTEL .
Adebarndoors 175k per week at $iteh is a better example of what he’s saying, where they ended up paying him off to get rid of him. Odd that fans are happy to throw in an extra £5m for a new player but moan about Theo earning more than others which is less than 5m per year…
Just £1m takes an awful long time for us supporters to earn.
you mean the man he offered a 120k a week wage to because he was held to ransom due to his failed transfer policy in the year Theo scored 21 goals. whatever he meant and whoever it was aimed at at arsenal then the blame would lie with Wenger.
Its a really boring rhetoric to always relay the argument to blaming wenger. Even if he is to blame for us not winning the league transfers etc.
Some of the comments he says about many topics are quite true and are discussion points. And i think that football is a shitter sport with some of these things corroding it. Therefore it would be good to also discuss these matters.
Rather than every single discussion having the same end point. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz boring.
Arseblog news comments used to be way more fun.
100% agree mate. He’s normally spot on with this stuff, if this BT bubble bursts, there will be a lot of clubs in trouble. Did crystal palace not learn from the last time. 30 mill on Benteke is crazy money, Liverpool did well on that one. We all just say yeah just spend the 50/60 million, it kinda makes me sick. The gratuitous amount money being thrown about is just nuts. I know the market decides the cost, the problem is this market is bat-shit -insane. You could guy my entire Street for about the same cost as a Benteke.… Read more »
Well how do you explain the Premier League getting so much more money for televising its games when the Premier League does not dominate when asked to compete with its European bretheren?
I mean Arsenal consistently gets tons more money than many in the last 16 which for about 16 years has been Arsenal’s Final Destination?
Marketing= loads more money =/= more quality or European trophies = higher transfer fees?
WHen you think about it makes sense that either the TV wealth gets spread around or UK keeps the money and hence pay inflated prices. Its that simple
I get it. I know, whatever Wenger says does make sense. But it would’ve made a lot more sense 5 years ago. Surviving and flourishing in a market also has to do with competing with direct rivals in the same market. We may have our own ideologies, but if those ideologies are not showing enough fruit, adapting from other clubs may not be such a bad idea. On the face of it, being careful with money and spending only on the right players is a good comment. But there have been several “right players” that we haven’t spent the money… Read more »
Totally agree but the amount of people on here who didn’t want Suarez, at the time
What if we were never interested in Mustafi? What if Valencia use our name because they know we won’t comment on individual players? What if Valencia was using us to get the deal they want from a club willing to spend?
I know it’s frustrating, but getting caught in ITK webs is more damaging.
That would be even worse considering our squad situation.
If you also assume the club aren’t after any other CBs then you’re correct.
If we’re after Johnny Evans instead, yes, that would be considerably worse.
Boss it is probably your last year, 13 days till this window closes. Stop talking about FFP, wages, financial climate and go out and buy what we need in order to at least challenge in the league this year. We must be the only club who tries to find as many ‘internal solutions’ and change players positions as much as we do. We are two players short of challenging for the league and yet here we are with less than two weeks to go till the window shuts still looking for a great bargain. What in god’s name are we… Read more »
Wengers last year? Ha! If wenger wants he can get a contract extension anytime. In my opinion he will sign one regardless of where we finish. He doesn’t seem like he wants to retire.
Personally I find it hard to argue with anything he said, and I like the fact that he is taking a long term view. I realise that probably puts me in the minority of at least people who comment on news articles on this site. I also think he is a good manager in the most basic, “line manager” sense of the word. I also work in a human capital based service industry and the worst thing is when we have too many people to do the work. It seems that his approach is to try to make the club… Read more »
Completely agree. Not enough people show any long-term planning. Even if it isn’t perfect, at least it resembles something sustainable. People are too quick to toss principles aside. Football is becoming a joke of a sport. Drama, media nonsense and clickbait, diving, time wasting (to extreme levels in the last years), poor refereeing, over-the-top pay packets, inflation, corruption. The list goes on and on and on. And even if sometimes Im really frustrated with Arsenal. I still love the club, it represents something and has class. I would stand behind that even if we were in a relegation scrap, which… Read more »
“People are too quick to toss principles aside”? We have waited 13 years since Emirates transfer, in the time we as fans have even paid higher than ever. Highest in Europe to be more specefic in the world football. And not that we dont reached their promises they made at 2004 but the fact that we didnt even try for it. We have no ambitions for trophies. The only ambition our owner businessman and accountant manager have is more profit. Havent you figured that out after these many years? Havent you heard our owner call us his best business brand… Read more »
very little happening in market? lol so to put in perspective the two positions “everybody knew” we needed reinforcement were centre back and striker. lets check how each of top contenders did business in “our” priority positions in the market: *Chelsea: Batshuayi 33 £millions Manchester City: Stones and Nolito for +60 £millions Manchester United: Bailly for 29 £millions and Ibrahimovic free agent Arsenal: Takuma Asano and Holding +2 £millions *here in Italy there us the word Chelsea trying to match Napoli’s Koulibaly valuation of +50 £millions. well Arsene these were our priority positions and we saw how we compared. its… Read more »
And don’t’ come back!
Ariverderci va fungola
Please learn to spell italian if you try to write italian!
I like how you conveniently ignored Xhaka to suit your propaganda
another box to box midfielder wasnt amoung “our priority need”s, still lets check that as well:
Chelsea: Kante 30 £millions
Manchester City: Gundogan 20 £millions *
Manchester United: Pogba 90 £millions
Arsenal: Xhaka 30 £millions
*in the previous comment I forgot Gabi Jesus a Brazilian forward to Man City for 27 £millions.
just for you boy.
Please don’t forget that a new strong DM who can pick a pass and bring some grit into the team was high on fans’ lists for over a year now, not just after the departure of Arteta and Flamini.
And what do you want to prove by comparing fees for Kante, Gundogan, Pogba and Xhaka? That we could have spent more money on Xhaka? Is that your biggest concern? That we buy players for too little money?
as I mentioned this comment doesnt concern you or anyone else. still it has not compared them or concluded anything from it and is solely for that boy “Srivatsan” as indicated. so if reading it bothers you for some reason know that I dont give a flying fuck.
If your comment isn’t for public consumption, maybe you shouldn’t post in a public arena.
Well, as this is a public forum, you should probably ask for his no. and take him out for dinner then. Because I just felt like replying to your incoherent reasoning, no matter if you care or not.
And picking on one guy, calling him “boy” when others make the exact same point, doesn’t help your argument really.
someone asked about mentioning Xhaka and although it didnt fit the arguement I mentioned that as well for no other reason. thats why its only a reply to the fellow. and I didnt want to prove anything by those facts. as I didnt try to conclude anything. I really dont see whats the big deal you guys seem so pissed off why again? :)))
Xhaka was not a priority this season FFS. A striker and CB was what we needed.
Yes he was. We had Arteta, Flamini and Rosicky leaving, so we really needed a MF and he’s a class act. We also need a CB and CF due to injuries.
So am I the only one who read the last part in al Pacino Italian accent? I’m outta order? you’re outta order this whole courtromm’s outta order!
About time we made Valencia an offer they can’t refuse.
Al Pacino doesn’t have an Italian accent.
you’re conveniently forgetting Xhaka who cost £35M.
Never let facts get in the way of a good rant.
first of 30 £millions. second read again ’cause I am talking about priority position needing reinforcement. if I want to count all positions its another fact altogether
deals other than those positions are as:
Chelsea: Kante 30 £millions (+33/50)
Manchester City: Sane Jesus Gundogan Moreno +90 £millions (+61)
Manchester United: Pogba Mkhitaryan +116 millions (+28)
Arsenal: Xhaka 30 £millions (+2)
and that’s not a fit perpective for the arguement, still you can compare the activity and Arsenal gets even further behind.
So you have determined a player that controls the game from deep and sprays passes forward (Xhaka) was not a priority? Are you suggesting Arsenal didn’t miss that skill last year especially without Arteta? I am out.
Most of the players you mention are the exact examples of average players. Batshuayi for 33M£? Tsss. Nolito? Meh. Stones for 47.5M£? Lol!
Sorry, but I don’t think any of these would have helped us in a pursuit for the title. And I’m not even discussing whether these players match our team / style of play.
That being said, I think Mustafi for 25M£ would be a sensible move in our current situation. No clue what’s going on behind the scenes there…
You don’t think Stones would have been a better option than Holding? I do. We’ve signed another cheap ‘maybe’ player who is no good to us straight away, and our competitors have snapped up a prem-ready top class player.
Stones might be the better player now, but for almost 20 times the fee (+ wages)? Phew. Mustafi for 25M sounds reasonable though.
$iteh paid a real premium for Stones as they’re in a difficult position with ‘Home Grown’ players for their squad numbers.
If it wasn’t for that then he’d have cost closer to £30m than £50m.
Stones is ridiculously priced.
If he works out great but what’s his resale value?
If he doesn’t you’re saddled with a player which you will not only take a massive loss but also may have to pay on wages even after he is moved on.
Mangala is another huge mistake (as to be honest is Otamendi)
If Wenger made these sorts of colossal miscalculations, the club won’t be where we are at at present. We would have pissed our earnings away.
Most people who comment do not understand business.
Irony anyone?
Makes sense.
i thought the transfer kitty is meant to be spent? you just said its not your money, buy what we need at the moment… nobody is saying you should go for a sterling or bony.. just get what we need…. dont fucking say what we need isnt available… dont fucking say that
nobody likes to be robbed though.
at least I don’t
Its spent as an investment. Wenger grew the clubs finance because he was cautious and had great acumen in the market. Buy low sell high. This also provided the level of confidence (plus his early wins and continuous CL appearances) for the banks to provide the funds for the Stadium build. Much of the early generation of finance was through Wenger’s sound management of our transfer policies. With the stadium, we now have revenue coming from match day tickets but we still need to improve on commercial revenue. If that can be increased, we are less so dependent on market… Read more »
Can’t fault his logic. Might hurt Arsenal in the short term, but he’s not wrong.
12 years is short term.
Short term like 13 more years short term?
Thaqt’s because he’s talking in generalities and vague predictions. It only obfuscates the situation at hand by ignoring what’s happening.
Its not your money Arsene..its not your money. But the team and legacy of trophies is yours. Think about it. You have 13 more days to put us through this shit storm of a transfer window.
Intereting Arsene. Really interesting. Now sign some players already!!
I’d stop going to press conferences if I was AW. The media and the Wenger Out lot will criticize regardless of what he says. I’d just stop going and see what happens at the end of the season.
Because he keeps contradicting himself and lampooning himself (not intentional) to deflect rightful criticism. Just a couple of weeks ago he said that he treats the clubs money as his own. Now he says ‘It’s not my money’. As well as after Man City ‘We are ready’, to ‘We weren’t ready.’ Not to mention that he seems to value saving money over league points at the moment despite the fact that we are flush with cash. Everyone knows it and everyone knows what we need. Wenger keeps saying that it is a poker game, but I’d argue that it’s poker… Read more »
I’m as frustrated as anyone with the failure to strengthen the squad in key areas. But I am equally unhappy at how AW is treated by some Arsenal fans (the press I don’t give a toss about). He cannot be portrayed as someone who has totally lost the plot. If anything the team has won a couple of trophies and improved its league position in the last 3 seasons while making club record signings. Personally I still trust the man is doing a good job.
He didn’t say he treats the money as if it’s his just a few weeks ago. That quote was lifted from a book that was recently released but he probably gave that interview a while ago. Also, the fact he’s here saying it’s NOT his money is a clue, I think, (along with the tweet from Ornstein the other day about needing to hold some cash back from the Mustafi purchase to have enough for a striker) that the villain here must be Kroenke after all, who must have set a very strict cap on our spending at like 100… Read more »
Semantics. Did he say it or not? Yes he did. The rest is complete conjecture.
Whether or not he has a budget or not, it is his responsibility to have a team capable of challenging for honors before the start of the season.
He hasn’t done that and now is open to criticism of which there is plenty.
Um, so which is it: semantics or conjecture (you are aware that those two words don’t mean the same thing, right?)? It’s not semantics (i.e. a dispute merely about how we choose to use a particular word) to point out that the quote wasn’t made a few weeks ago. I am conjecturing that he made the quote a while back, but that’s based on my reading that that was an excerpt from a book and my knowledge that books take a while to print. So he’s not been saying one thing one week and the complete opposite the next, as… Read more »
Semantics meaning splitting hairs that he said this in the past. The man has a history of contradictory statements and this would be one of them. I could gather more if you like. Conjecture with the Kroenke/budget thing. It is something that no one has any idea of. If we were to go from newpaper talk, they are also equally contradictory, yet if we look at the public accounts and take into consideration the new TV deal. You would conclude that we do have money. Who knows. What I will say is that the Board are culpable for allowing Wenger… Read more »
Jeez man wake up. No top level striker is coming to us. If griezman or lewandowski were available teams far more ambitious than us would be sniffing around. We can’t match the wages so your killing yourself with hope if you really believe he has an ace up hours sleeve Other than financial he’s a busted flush. These top players will know we aren’t good enough and nor is he willing to show the killer instinct to this squad to become so. Ozil and Sanchez are not signing new deals unless reasonable release fees are included The only silver lining… Read more »
If Kroenke is still the owner when Wenger leaves, I very much doubt “the money” will be able to be spent in a dramatically different way by the “next man”. Jeez man wake up: everything we know about Kroenke from the media coverage of his dealings in the US suggests he’s a heartless, greedy tight wad who doesn’t give a shit about pleasing the fans or sporting success. Again, I’m far from believing Wenger is blameless, just don’t think changing managers is going to solve much unless the ownership changes, and in fact I think it’s likely the next manager… Read more »
You do make sense Arsene but Sign some players already.. It is getting really boring reading BS every day in and day out.
He’s obligated to do the press conferences and interviews.
I guess the best option is to stop reading them…
Less chit-chat and more contract closing would do us a world of good.
Well arsene, the market is what it is. Sad but true. No one is saying spend 60m on benteke or carrol. Mustafi is a solid defender. Do not haggle over 5m!! It’s ridiculous. You’ve done this with ribery and alonso…look how that turned out.
So he warns everyone that they could get stuck with mediocre players on long term contracts with a big salary. Like Walcott?
If we had let Walcott go instead of renewing his contract at the time, wouldn’t everyone be moaning about our lack of ambition and how we are letting our best players leave?
Walcotts last contract renewal was off a season where he was out injured for nearly all of it. It wasn’t after his 20 goal season.
The question is, even now, would you be happy to see Walcott leave on a free?
Yes.
Watching the video of the press conference you can tell that the crowd reaction after a single defeat is hurting him.
He could make this a lot easier on himself if he just relented to pressure and spent some fucking money!
People on the payroll for years who don’t contribute. Hmmmmmmmmmmmm that never happens at Arsenal!
– Campbell (for some reason Wenger won’t play him or sell him)
– Wilshere
– Theo of course
– Debuchy
– Rosicky (Love the guy but he barely played)
– Diaby
– etc etc
Those withut sin cast the first stone and all that biblical malarkey
OK but going for Diaby is a low blow.
Campbell was involved in 19 PL games last season.
Not used every game but over half, so he’s not a great example.
Going for Rosicky and Diaby are low blows.
Why? They hardly played.
They got injured ‘for the cause’.
I hate it when Arsene talks about long term, it’s like he has got decades more at Arsenal and there’s plenty of time left to win trophies.
Couple of opening games losses, 6 points gone doesn’t matter if he can get a player 5 mil cheaper.
I’m starting to feel what he enjoys most about being at Arsenal is bargaining, buying player cheaper than his rivals and gambling.
I do love Wenger, the comments he makes about the price of transfers and wages affecting clubs is spot on.
I just wish he’d do what’s needed for Arsenal!! He/Arsenal are driving me mad ?
So the answer Arsene – is to buy 31 year old players and give them 2 year contracts – then you have no worries over paying wages when they leave, you also have experience
Is this why he had no problem bidding for Vardy (29) but can’t stump up a reasonable sum for Mustafi (25)
I think Vardy turned us down because he wanted a 4 year deal and we were offering 3 or 2 –
Vardy turned us down because Leicester were willing to offer a suitably attractive deal. He ends there a club legend too. Not unreasonable. We offered the price because as good as he has been, he is 29yrs old. Comparatively, Wenger was willing to punt early because he is concern with the market. Currently the Cback is intrinsically tied to how much we spend on the CF and vice versa. Should we overspend on Mustafi, there is less money in play for say a Draxler should his price could sufficiently at end of window. If we move for say Draxler now… Read more »
Arsene, you are indeed a clever chap…however
1) please stop obsessing over other clubs and how they do business.
2) whilst most of your observations are built on economics logic in the real world, you should know by now that football bends these laws. Take your stance on FFP for example.
He’s in a market which is effected by other clubs.
It’s impossible to ignore them.
It’s not obsessing, it’s a statement of fact.
I’m pretty sure that Wenger has said the same thing during every window over the last 10 years. People aren’t stupid, they know that spending more money means risking losing more money, the points haven’t changed, only the sums have. If we were talking about other clubs’ performances at a press conference he’d say “what is important is what we do and how prepared we are” – the same applies to the market – what is important is what we do to improve the squad and ensure that we’re prepared. At the moment we’re not performing very well at all…
Now let’s weigh this up;
Option A- Support Wenger with his degree in Economics and two decades experience of transforming my club from a boring team full of addicts managed by a thief to one of the most respected in Europe or
Option B – The impatient, illiterate mob of pessimists and nihilists who’ve never been to a game baying for Ballotelli-esque money to be spent so they can relax and hope.
Tough choice!
It’s like the remain / leave camps….. haha
Precisely, the mob won’t let sound reasoning stop them from pressing the self destruct button.
Let’s vote again because I didn’t get what I wanted and I can’t be wrong 🙁
Talking of people stuck at the club on high wages your £8m a year is quite a lot. He talks about the English clubs loosing their financial advantage through wages and fees, therefore at worst were on a level financial playing field with other European clubs, they still make signings, Juventus have had a fantastic transfer window, its no excuse!
I’d bet that your boss earns more than you.
AW has staff that earn more than him…
Try telling your boss you should earn more than him.
Mostly I just play devil’s advocate on here but being serious for a second lots of people are paid more than their bosses. It’s what a good boss does, it’s how you retain or hire special talents. I work in app development, if you’re a great dev you’ll be on twice as much as your dev manager. You’re the talent he just needs to manage you. He can’t do his job without you. Same with Wenger, the players are the talent, his job is to organise them and get them working to a high level. To get to a high… Read more »
No. many people that are bought in on short/medium term contracts are paid much more than the people they’re managed by. But there are very few (Not saying none!) situations where permanent staff are paid more than their boss.
Football is a cross between the 2 when it comes to the players as they’re on contracts but quite long term. They’re employed for specific tasks but have to work (and train) within a larger team.
Much closer to a standard business structure than a contract workers structure.
Mr Wenger,
Please avail yourself of the Arseblog News comments section on a regular basis.
You’ll soon see – your comments don’t stand up to scrutiny!
Someone left a comment on an earlier article, to the effect that there’s no point in touring the USA/Australia etc in the pre-season unless you spend the money generated. This is an interesting point, which deserves further consideration. Clubs don’t spend Monopoly money. I believe it was the case that the money earned from the sale of Nicolas Anelka back in the day was used to fund the construction of London Colney? Does the clamouring for signings indicate that fans can only see teams improving through the purchase of new players? What about making existing players better? Perhaps Arsenal might… Read more »
We hardly had 10 new players! 3 with the Japanese kid.the chemistry should be there, the fitness should be there. The preparation should be spot in. But no. As has been lacking for so long within our team
All fingers point at one man
Stfu up with this waffle and do your job big bird. Fearing the worst this weekend, again. Unreal for a “major” club.
Ok let’s assume Arsenal FC doesn’t have money this year, not a penny. Okay!!! And take into account Wenger’s statements that you need to find a player and he needs to be top class. Many of us know that worldwide there are players way better then Debouchy, Chamberlain, Walcott, Gabriel, Sanogo. So I think that the team wouldn’t suffer without them so, the club could have sold them and more or less make more then 50 millions on them. And they could have reinvested the money on some better “unknown” players from smaller teams that will rip their socks off… Read more »
Why drag up Sanogo when he’s not in the 1st team squad????
Its not so easy to sell players either. Particularly non performing ones. Bendtner and Chamakh were on our books for a number of season even after surplus to use. We are buying premium players now. Granit is 30m, Alexis 35m, Ozil 42.3m. Make a mistake buying at that level and you have to account for loss but also it will make it even more difficult to move the player on bc of wages. See Aguero. Some accommodation will have to be struck which may mean a club might be saddled with a portion of the unwanted players wages. All this… Read more »
I wouldn’t mind some average players, even if they cost a lot. I mean surely an “average” centre back is better than no centre back, and an “average” striker will still get into double figures when your main strikers are injured/out of form/resting for the euro’s/really a winger
Why do you want to buy Silvestre or Squillaci but at a high price?
You buy ‘average’ and they may turn out to be worse than average.
Why not wait out for the better player?
For every Silvestre there’s a monreal (who lets face it, nearly left because he was only an average left back who was second fiddle, then he found his form/class).
I’ll say it again though – waiting out for a better player is great, if you have something in the void – we don’t. There’s a whole host of players throughout the league who could do a better job with more experience than what we have right now
Arsene continues to push a straw man argument. We can’t and shouldn’t pay like Manure (Morinure now?) did for Pogba or even like City did for Stones. No one is asking for that. But if Mustafi takes an extra 5M because market prices are inflated it will hardly break the bank.
The extra 5m may weigh heavily on how much we can bid for a CF at end of window.
Say we paid 25m for Mustafi.
We’ve paid 30m for Granit.
I very much doubt we will break 90m this summer tops.
So we’ve spent 55m, leaving 35m for the striker.
Say Draxler’s price cools and comes down to 45m.
The extra 5m will make a HUGE diff.
Some times he does have a point to a certain extent. Yet for me he will always completely blow whatever point he is trying to make by completely over-exagerating: eg: – “When the buyer is English, it is true that it multiplies the transfer by two or three or sometimes by 10 because if for the same player an English club does not come in, he is worth five million. But if an English club comes he is worth 35 or 40 or 50.” (Tell me AW, just exactly who do you see worth 5m yet linked with a 50m… Read more »
We are in a situation to have Debouchy as a back up for Bellerin and none of us wants the frenchman to be near the first team. What the hell is that. So we have a backup right back number wise, but quality wise?
Rback we have a number of options as back up. He has yet to assess Jenkinson. IMO he should put Calum back into his natural position at Rback (which is where he played to great aplomb with Soton) Debuchy is also another option with experience albeit whether he will improve is another issue given age. BUt we are not without choice at Rback. The situation at Lback is more concerning. Gibbs is a good player to fight for the spot with MOnreal but Monreal is getting older and GIbbs is injury prone. The academy has no one like Bellerin on… Read more »
Coquelin can also cover in either FB position
Arsene Wenger is turning in to Chicken licken – He keeps tell us that the sky is falling – he is an economist at heart and can’t stand bubbles. Arsene – football may well burst one day and maybe soon and all the saving in the world wont help that. If 99 clubs go bankrupt and you stay afloat then that is a Pyrrhic survival – you will not ever generate the income you have now. The day the wheels come off world football, Stan Kroenke will extract every red cent from the bank and asset strip the club. We… Read more »
That won’t be a problem for us then, because we never offer the highest wages or transfer fees.
Wenger waiting for the day all other top flight English teams simultaneously implode due to massive wage structure deficits leaving arsenal as the only club in existence therefore guaranteeing default premiership titles for the next 50 years.
except that wont happen…
The European press has been saying the same thing, that is English clubs pay high sums for average players. That’s why we do so bad in the CL. In the case of Arsenal, we need to buy smart but we still need to buy. The latter has always been our problem.
Too expensive for other clubs… Is he drawing from their experienc with Theo’s salary.
For those of you who might be unfamiliar with the American sports landscape, there is a long and cautionary history of the long term, negative consequences of overpaying and inflated markets. Baseball, (American) football, and basketball all suffer from this. Quite possible the American ownership is trying to avoid those models. Now, contexts are different, yes. But the principle is the same: bowing to subjective value is not always the right idea.
But yeah, a striker would be nice.
Every day we get a rehash from the media about how we do things and I don’t understand what more has to be said. We may be very, very rich but we only spend the money we make. Simple. There is no outside injection of funds. So every year you have to make sure you make a profit otherwise the amount of money you have to spend next year is limited. And even if the 200mill figure we have in our cash reserves was really all there to be spent in truth we are never ever going to spend it… Read more »
Many salient points made. I think we don’t need to rush into over spending. The issues on the field has as much to do with Wenger’s tactical handicaps as much as to do with him shooting himself in the foot. Santi, Granit and to some extent Koscielny could all have seen more degree of action on match day one. Granted Wenger was being cautious taking the long term approach bc of injury but we were also playing Liverpool (not a very good team these days but still strong opposition) Meanwhile, we need to bear in mind that what we over… Read more »
Mr. Wenger is making a fool of himself. He should stop this over analysis and bring in the players we needs to compete. No fan is expecting us to break the transfer record, just good players, we know good players are out there.
Bailly, Umtiti, Stones, Benatia, Hummels moved this summer. Mustafi, Koulibaly and probably others are allowed to move if the price is right. But yet, there is no defender. If the scouting team can’t do better than Holding, I’m sorry but there is a problem within the staff.
Look, I understand a lot of the current criticism of Wenger, but this seems like a perfectly reasonable point to make. To some extent haven’t we made the same point about Walcott? He is on 140,000 a week and if we were to offload him we don’t know who would take up his wages. If that issue is magnified with foreign targets, why is that not an issue all of a sudden? Its completely true the English clubs are getting fleeced by the foreign clubs for very average players, and even by eachother. I’m not suggesting we don’t need to… Read more »
Arsena why are you so concerned with the future of the league. Live in the moment for God’s sake.
We can’t believe anything in the papers. When knows if we’re in for Mustafa, Lafayette or any of em…frankly I don’t care who were in for I just wanna get something done…even a squad player to back up giroud would suite me fine. New shiny objects please