TRANSFER STAGNATION AT HIGHBURY IS NOW HISTORY?

[QuartzGooner]

http://www.onlinegooner.com/exclusive/index.php?id=611

Article is a continual complaint of fans, please spend more money Arsene!

A few of us here argued this at length over last week , thread is in forums under "Arsenal accounts released"

My point is there are actually not massive funds available, and we just have to be patient for three seasons until commercial revenues increase.

But does anyone want to go into more debt to buy players?

Are you getting desperate?

[g88ner]

I read articles like this, and can't help thinking that we're just going round and round in circles!

Can I suggest that people read the article in the general forum regarding our financial position... (see link below)

http://www.onlinegooner.com/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=6425

If you're going to write about how moving to the Emirates was supposed to allow us to compete financially, and that Wenger should start spending big...then I think you should become a little acquainted with the facts and the reality of the situation!

Basically...we don't have £69m to spend on actual transfer fees... I'm afraid Keith Edelman was being rather economical with the truth on that one

Nigel Phillips of the Arsenal Supporters Trust concluded:
"Of the near £70m of cash balances, £25m is unavailable as it is used to partially secure future repayments of the debt facilities and one also assumes some is set aside to meet the probable £20m of additional transfer fees payable on existing squad members.

This does however leave maybe £25m for the squad building (transfer plus wages).."

I'm afraid we might just have to be patient for a while.....well, that or go knocking on Usmanov's door...but that's another story

[Basil is a Gooner]

Sorry to the author of this article for the late posting. Kev asked me to post this in his absence but the system was down all day and Mike had to come to my rescue at the last to get it on the forum.
Hence the second thread.

[Peter Cavill]

I'm one of the supporters who are disappointed we haven't splashed the cash but only because we were informed that we had some to spend!
At the beginning of the season I, like many gooners, expected the team to be fighting for a top four finish and anything else would have been a bonus. I didn't think funds would be available in substantial amounts until the sale of the various properties being built. I was prepared to wait for another couple of seasons until we could compete in the tranfer market and with Arsene's eye for a bargain did not worry unduly. It was something we just had to put up with.The team then performed above expectations and I was more than pleased with the way the season started.
However, we were then informed a few weeks into the season that we had £70 million to spend. This has done my head in since reading this. If we had this money to spend I thought we should have bid for Torres and other experienced players to add to our already good squad.
Now it looks as though we didn't have the money to spend after all. Why the hell did they say we had the money when we didn't!!!!
This has spoiled a season for me where I could have appreciated the team that we have got instead of worrying about who we could have bought(when we couldn't have bought them anyway!!!)
If we have very little funds available then we have had an excellent season (though obviously disappointing to be so close). To give Chelski and Manure a run for their money (literally!) has been superb.
There are obviously other mistakes that I think have been made but that is the nature of football, we all have our opinions and are entitled to them.(I would have played Walcott more instead of Eboue for instance).
I still can't emphasize enough though. WHY TELL US FUNDS ARE AVAILABLE WHEN THEY ARE NOT!!!
It can't help Arsene and it has certainly taken the edge off an otherwise enjoyable season.

[GoonerJim]

I read articles like this, and can't help thinking that we're just going round and round in circles!

Can I suggest that people read the article in the general forum regarding our financial position... (see link below)

http://www.onlinegooner.com/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?t=6425

If you're going to write about how moving to the Emirates was supposed to allow us to compete financially, and that Wenger should start spending big...then I think you should become a little acquainted with the facts and the reality of the situation!

Basically...we don't have £69m to spend on actual transfer fees... I'm afraid Keith Edelman was being rather economical with the truth on that one

Nigel Phillips of the Arsenal Supporters Trust concluded:
"Of the near £70m of cash balances, £25m is unavailable as it is used to partially secure future repayments of the debt facilities and one also assumes some is set aside to meet the probable £20m of additional transfer fees payable on existing squad members.

This does however leave maybe £25m for the squad building (transfer plus wages).."

I'm afraid we might just have to be patient for a while.....well, that or go knocking on Usmanov's door...but that's another story

Out of interest didnt Henrys sale pay for our signings last season? if so what happened to last seasons budget which would have surely been added to this seasons one? or have i missed something?

[Belfast Boy]

While there's no doubt it is frustrating, surely everyone should realise that seeing as football is now firmly entrenched in the world of big business and finance it would be commercial suicide to advertise that we are skint, you don't see ManUre advertising the fact that their financial status makes ours look positively glowing, not to mention the negative effects it could have on the team with all the negative press which would surely follow as our friends in the media smelt blood!
Also does no-one remember that last year the club sought and put in place a 50M credit facility because they were finding that selling clubs, were reluctant to deal with us because they were worried, that in fufilling our financial commitments to the banks we would default on our instalments to them for any prospective signings, so that amount was probably factored in to the overall figure of 70M!

[chriscatchpole]

One thing to take from this is to re-employ the skepticism that many of us have had over the last few years regarding anything coming out of the board.

Surely it cant be a coincidence that when Usmanov and Kronke were looking to buy the club (and Dein was already dong his vulture act) we suddenly had this huge pile of wonga to splash out. Now that there is voluble criticism from all areas that we didnt spend to reinforce a threadbare squad when and where needed, all of a sudden we barely have enough to cover Matthieu Flamini's Cashley-esque demands.

The truth I suspect is somewhere in the middle. If we announce that we can spend pots of cash on new players then the price the selling clubs ask suddenly goes up. Ditto as mentioned by another poster, if we say we are in the poor house other clubs get anxious that we wont pay our way.

One other factor that has complicated matters is what has happened in the financial markets. Without wanting to get too technical, The clubs debt is guaranteed by an institution called a monoline insurer. This makes the interest payments lower (for a fee). However this is dependent on the strength of the monoline. Normally this is not a problem, but they have been in trouble in recent months and the club will have to put aside extra money in the event of their monoline not being able to continue with their guarantee (due to the subprime crisis, credit crunch etc etc).

And finally, According to the Daily Telegraph (usual health warnings about the veracity of journalism applies) somone in the supporters trust trawled through the clubs accounts and worked out that TH14 was paid a massive signing on fee when he spurned Barca in 2006. Normally these are paid in instalments across the remainder of the players contract - 3 years in TH's case, but this time the whole lot was paid upfront (and not reimbursed when he went a year later)..... all of this would come out of the transfer budget too. According to the article TH trousered £10million that season

(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.j ... nry118.xml)


I would love to know what Flim Flam is looking for (and has been offered) in extras so as to notionally not break the wage structure.

[QuartzGooner]

Thanks Belfast Boy and ChrisCatchpole...you have added to this debate with further financial information that I was not sure about.

This adds to my argument that Wenger has been working the last three seasons with one hand tied behind his back as regards transfers, and has worked miracles.

Unlike many here, I am realistic and know we cannot just go out and spend £50M on players, well not unless there are significant sales.

[olgitgooner]

Top class posts from all of you.

A lot of knowledge and reasoned thinking.

I think it underlines the fact that our club is moving forward in a sensible and sustainable way.

Manchester United and Liverpool are in potential financial meltdown. They are spending huge amounts of borrowed money.

They don't need to go down this road. It's purely a choice. Short term spending for short term gain. It's like buying yourself the car of your dreams, and paying by credit card.

This season, our club came within a whisker of winning the league, without all the extravagant spending.

I think it's the way forward

[26may1989]

Very good posts.

And since I'm both vain and lazy, here's something more or less on point that I posted earlier today on a different thread:

my thread was about prize money and tv money,, fact is spurs are spending the money they hope to earn while we put ours in the bank and rely on wenger to pick up cheap alternatives which now is not good enough if we are to challenge chelsea and man u

Isn't that exactly what Leeds did? And West Ham? And Newcastle? And Bradford? Great examples to follow...

Why is everything such a disaster in your book? Look at the facts:

1. Even with shit luck, poor refereeing decisions and horrendous injuries, we're going to finish 3rd with 80-83 points (about 15 more points than last season and about 34 points more than Spurs) and got to the quarter finals of the Champs' League. And that was without making a net spend last summer. (And as you know, we weren't a million miles off winning the league.)

2. Our long-term debt is large but has been fixed at cheap rates (compare with Liverpool and Man U for examples of how it could be done badly). In the short-term (meaning within the next 2 years), when the property developments have been sold, more than £100m will be released, dealing with the bank facility and other short-term issues, meaning we will be financially competitive again.

3. We have some great young players (Cesc, Clichy, Sagna, Ade, RvP, Hleb, Rosicky, Eduardo, Toure) around whom our future can be built.

Whether you like it or not, finances matter. Arsenal is traditionally a big but not a huge club, compared with the established European elite (Milan, Inter, Juve, Bayern, Liverpool, Man U, Barca and Real), but the strong finances, coupled with Wenger, give us the chance of joining that group. And doing it on solid foundations. It's not a matter of morality, it's a matter of doing what is sensible so we can have sustained success, so the club can become something more than it has been. Without the move to Ashburton, and the investment that required, we would have been stuck in a small and unexpandable ground, and then we really would be vulnerable to Villa, Spurs, Everton etc catching us.

Sure, the club could just spunk all the TV and gate money up the wall now, it might even win a couple of league titles or even a Champions' League title in doing so, but would that be sustainable? And what happens if signing David Villa, Buffon, Ronaldinho doesn't deliver instant success? It took Chelsea a few years to translate their stolen Russian money into silverware - could we afford that sort of delay if we blow the cash now? If you look back in Arsenal's history books, it was also true of the Norris years after WWI - it was about 10 years after the move to Highbury before the "Bank of England" club actually started to win trophies. We're starting from a much better position than we did then, so I hope sustained success comes more quickly (even I'll be fucked off if it doesn't...).

We don't have the established resources that the elite clubs (plus Chelsea) do, and can't run the risks they can, yet. It is clear that we could, in the medium-term, join the elite club but that requires a bit of patience. Isn't that what investment is all about?

There are things the board has done that piss me off (the disinformation about transfer funds being chief amongst them), and Wenger's certainly not perfect (Almunia rather than Lehmann? Please. And Walcott should have been started when he was in form). I would also be pleased if a sensible deal with a sensible investor (like Kroenke) could be done, to lift Arsenal's finances now, so we can improve our competitiveness on the pitch earlier than we would if we just wait for the next two years. But if that doesn't happen, we should be willing to accept that it will be another couple of seasons before we return to competitiveness in the transfer market. For all that the board deserves criticism in some areas, on the big issues they've done well.

The club that should be most concerned about Spurs' spending are those below us, in particular Liverpool (who are 7 points behind us, remember) but also Everton, Villa, Pompey etc. That's what Spurs are competing with first and foremost.

There's nothing inevitable about Arsenal succeeding with what they're doing. But a lack of realism by Arsenal fans may one day lead to the board making really stupid decisions, based on a short-term desire to appease impatient and unrealistic Arsenal fans. The first signs of this impatience are already there, with, as we've seen recently, a few fans at Ashburton jeering Wenger, when they should be applauding him for his achievements this year.

Yes, Arsenal spend less than others, but that (in this phase) is a vital component in the club's project, to take this club from being a big English club into being a big European club. And given that we could well be looking at a European super league within the next ten years, it is crucial we grow over a period of time and not only cave into desires for instant success that undermine the longer term interests of the club.

[Tony.C]

and how long can we keep our 'young stars' when they are being sought by other clubs who will spend more money?

As I've said before, it's a fine line, if you continually don't spend and don't win trophies, then the good players you have will want to leave.

I really do think this coming season is pivotal to Arsenal, the consequences could be huge if there is little or no investement. As the saying goes, you have to speculate to accumulate.