THE WENGER THREAD

[Chippy]

Here we go again, with the "Wenger's always has money to spend....."??!!???!

So he was happy to go up against Fergie and Jose playing the likes of Denilson, Santos, Song, Bentner...etc......, while having loads on money sitting in the bank. He was happy to play second fiddle to those managers. He didn't mind losing at all.

Jesus wept.......

How odd that once the stadium debt was reduced, he went out and spent big money on Ozil and Sanchez.

But hey, let's not get the facts in the way of a good story.......!!??!

Exactly, here we go again, with the "Wenger had no money to spend" rubbish.

The point that you and other Wenger Apologists keep missing here is the WAGES he was paying those rubbish players. This, combined with his egotistical belief that those same players were good enough (all his own signings as part of his much mooted Project) led to massive financial mismanagement by Wenger. The point is the money he repeatedly (season after season) pissed away on contract renewals and pay rises for players proven to be rubbish could have and should have been redirected at signing better players.

Now, before you hysterically misread my post, I'm not for a minute saying he had access to funds on a par with the pimped clubs like the chav and citeh, but he certainly had a large amount of funds at his disposal as demonstrated by the ridiculous wages he was paying often unproven and/or rubbish players. Certainly funds enough to build a better team than he did and to compete more than we did.

The money was there, Wenger mis-spent it badly for over 5 years.

Jesus, did indeed, weep.

I've criticised Wenger in the past for bring far too loyal to the likes of eboue, diaby, song, Denilson, etc, but to claim that paying the wages of these players meant we couldn't compete for top players, is just bizarre.
Every single club has wasted money on players, it's not just arsenal.
His record in the transfer market, while being far from perfect, has been excellent.
Now he has money to spend, he has no excuse.
If he fails to boost the squad this window, I'll be as pissed off as anyone else.

Looks like we'll be welcoming a new member to the dark side on Feb 1st!

[robbo10]

This is an Emirates-attendee speaking here. Simply superb.
And then we wonder why Le Tool continues to do as he please...

http://www.football365.com/news/mails-l ... peacefully

"
Love letter to Arsene
In the last few days it’s dawned on me that although I love Arsenal and support Arsenal and will always look out for their results in the future, I think I am actually more of a Wenger fan than an Arsenal fan. Should Wenger leave Arsenal in the next year and go to, say, Nantes or Lille or Montpellier in the summer of 2017, then I think I’d start supporting his new club to the same degree I support Arsenal.

I’m very fond of Wenger, and I’m very protective of him when he gets ridiculously lampooned in the press or set unrealistic targets or risk further ridicule. It’s already a well-established pattern that the biggest spenders finish, pretty much, in that order every season. Arsenal are the fourth biggest spenders on wages, with the fourth biggest (in terms of personnel) squad, with the fourth largest income and then, generally, spending anything from the 4th to 9th largest amount of money.

To put that in perspective, when he first joined we were second in all of the above categories (to Man Utd), and we usually finished second, and sometimes won the league. When Abramovic took over Chelsea we dropped to third, and largely finished third. When Sheikh Mansour took over Man City we dropped to fourth and, largely, finish fourth. It’s nothing spectacular, but it’s safe to say Arsenal, by the press’ own standards, finish on par. But for the English Press this just isn’t good enough. This season for example, he simply HAS TO win the Premier League otherwise it will cast a shadow over his tenure, and Wenger will forever be remembered as a man who couldn’t get his team over the line. That is, pretty much, what was being spoken on Sunday Supplement this weekend. Contrary to their opinion, it’s Man City who simply HAVE TO finish first, and Man Utd simply HAVE TO finish second, Chelsea simply HAVE TO finish third, and Arsenal fourth. Of course this is Arsenal’s best chance in a long time, and they very well might do it, but no – they don’t HAVE TO, Man City HAVE TO. The pressure’s on them.

I also get very annoyed at people seemingly forgetting the last 10 years of self-imposed “relative” austerity. Very simply put, Arsenal spent an absolute fortune on a new stadium which took ten years to pay off. During those ten years, we had to sell our star player pretty much each summer just to balance the books and reinvest in a substandard player. People often forget, Wenger hasn’t tried to win the league in over 10 years, he’s tried to finish fourth, because that’s what his budget allowed. Of course he came close to winning once or twice, and Arsenal famously implode around March every year. To repeat, he’s built a squad to finish fourth. No wonder they couldn’t get over line, they were could never be expected to. They are players who can finish fourth. He financially could not compete with Chelsea, Man Utd or Man City, and the only way to compete with them is to spend the money they spend, so Wenger – by and large – decided to ignore those three, and targeted finishing fourth. If you finish fourth then you qualify for the Champions League. That generates money. Getting to the knockout stages generates a bit more money. Selling your star player generates a bit more. At the end of that cycle you can pay off a tenth of your stadium debt and then buy a slightly inferior player to the one you’ve just sold. It may now mean that you cannot finish first, but you were only aiming for fourth anyway. Hence the “fourth placed trophy” he was ridiculed for.

If you’re going to lampoon any manager (and to be fair to you F365, you do) then lampoon Kenny Dalglish, Roy Hodgson, Brendan Rodgers, Juande Ramos, Andre Villas Boas, Martin Jol, David Moyes and whoever else was given 6x the Arsenal budget to finish fourth and blew it. Those clubs must be looking at Arsenal’s paid-for stadium, debt-free accounts, gigantic revenue streams, Mesut Ozil and Alexis Sanchez, and wondering firstly how they didn’t finish ahead of Arsenal when we were fielding the likes of Squilachi, Senderos, Silvestre, Eboue, Fabianski, Benayoun, Frimpong and Kim Kallstrom (who signed for us with a broken back), and secondly why they did they wait for Arsenal to get debt-free before deciding to embark on a similar stadium-enlarging exercise of their own. Spurs – for example – are going to have to wait at least eight years before that extra revenue becomes theirs to spend entirely.

The job Arsene Wenger has done at Arsenal has been immense and revolutionary. Not perfect. Very frustrating at times. Stupifying even. But immense. It’s very easy to sit there and take all the plaudits and the job offers from Real Madrid and Barcelona and France the season after you’ve just gone unbeaten with one of the top 5 English club sides ever assembled, but to reject them and stay on, knowing that the best you can hope for is fourth at a scrape whilst selling, over the course of ten years, a collection of players who if he kept them would have probably won the Premier League, is simply staggering. Can you imagine Jose Mourinho doing that? Can you imagine Pep Guardiola doing that? Ancelotti doing that? I can’t. Plenty of managers DO do that of course, but not at Champion’s League level.

So, yeah, to answer the question in the previous mailbox but in a bigger way – yes, Arsene Wenger was indeed right all along. I can’t fault him at all. A giant of the game."
Dale May, Swindon Wengerite

Arsene's mum is quite well written isnt she?

[xisstential]

've criticised Wenger in the past for bring far too loyal to the likes of eboue, diaby, song, Denilson, etc, but to claim that paying the wages of these players meant we couldn't compete for top players, is just bizarre.
Every single club has wasted money on players, it's not just arsenal.
His record in the transfer market, while being far from perfect, has been excellent.
Now he has money to spend, he has no excuse.
If he fails to boost the squad this window, I'll be as pissed off as anyone else.

Well get ready cause he ain't gonna. Got himself a 5M cheapo and that's it. You see he has assembled such a brilliant squad that there is nobody out there who can actually improve on it. And on we sail....start preparing yourself to"be pissed off"

[BFG4]

I've criticised Wenger in the past for bring far too loyal to the likes of eboue, diaby, song, Denilson, etc, but to claim that paying the wages of these players meant we couldn't compete for top players, is just bizarre.
Every single club has wasted money on players, it's not just arsenal.
His record in the transfer market, while being far from perfect, has been excellent.
Now he has money to spend, he has no excuse.
If he fails to boost the squad this window, I'll be as pissed off as anyone else.

LG, So you were quite happy after the summer transfer window when we broke records for signing no outfield players? Or the other shambolic transfer windows in the last few years? You said in an earlier post that the signings of Sanchez and Ozil were proof that when the money was there, Wenger will spend it. Would that not mean that there is reason enough to be pissed off now, I would argue the summer embarrassment would be far worse than Wenger not signing players now.

[Redarmy]

Here we go again, with the "Wenger's always has money to spend....."??!!???!

So he was happy to go up against Fergie and Jose playing the likes of Denilson, Santos, Song, Bentner...etc......, while having loads on money sitting in the bank. He was happy to play second fiddle to those managers. He didn't mind losing at all.

Jesus wept.......

How odd that once the stadium debt was reduced, he went out and spent big money on Ozil and Sanchez.

But hey, let's not get the facts in the way of a good story.......!!??!

Exactly, here we go again, with the "Wenger had no money to spend" rubbish.

The point that you and other Wenger Apologists keep missing here is the WAGES he was paying those rubbish players. This, combined with his egotistical belief that those same players were good enough (all his own signings as part of his much mooted Project) led to massive financial mismanagement by Wenger. The point is the money he repeatedly (season after season) pissed away on contract renewals and pay rises for players proven to be rubbish could have and should have been redirected at signing better players.

Now, before you hysterically misread my post, I'm not for a minute saying he had access to funds on a par with the pimped clubs like the chav and citeh, but he certainly had a large amount of funds at his disposal as demonstrated by the ridiculous wages he was paying often unproven and/or rubbish players. Certainly funds enough to build a better team than he did and to compete more than we did.

The money was there, Wenger mis-spent it badly for over 5 years.

Jesus, did indeed, weep.

I've criticised Wenger in the past for bring far too loyal to the likes of eboue, diaby, song, Denilson, etc, but to claim that paying the wages of these players meant we couldn't compete for top players, is just bizarre.
Every single club has wasted money on players, it's not just arsenal.
His record in the transfer market, while being far from perfect, has been excellent.
Now he has money to spend, he has no excuse.
If he fails to boost the squad this window, I'll be as pissed off as anyone else.

Looks like we'll be welcoming a new member to the dark side on Feb 1st!

Wenger basically said as much today "media will be busy in January with transfers but will not be to do with Arsenal"

As if we could not have guessed that anyway, the guy is certifiable IMO

[GoonerMuzz]

What frustrates me is Wengers line of thinking, it's not always about buying world class players every transfer window but it is about improving the squad. I don't think many people would argue that buying Cech wasn't a good buy and probably a bit of bargain too, i'll admit i was a bit dubious at the time but he has saved us important points in games so far this season. He was however our only squad summer signing.

It also looks as if Elneny will be our only January signing, i'm sorry but that is not the transfer dealings of a manager looking to win the league, it is someone doing the bare minimum to stay in contention.

If AW's transfer policy has changed then why did he fail to improve the outfield squad during the summer and why with so much money available does it look as though only one player is coming this transfer window?

Even if the actual amount available was only £100M and not the reported 200 in the summer, then he had between 85 & 90 left over.

You cannot possibly tell me that that money could not have been used to replace some of the following with more quality or younger players:

Arteta, Flamini, Rosicky, Gibbs and probably even Theo, Ox or Campbell.

The injuries we've had in the squad once again has at times has left us threadbare and has meant players playing more matches than is good for them. I'm fairly sure that Monreal and Bellerin have played almost every match this season and modern wingbacks do a hell of a lot of running and both of them must be feeling it, the potential of losing one or both too injury is not a prospect i relish.

[flash gunner]

Is he still here?

[mcdowell42]

Is he still here?

Yeah but doesn't post when we win

[flash gunner]

Is he still here?

Yeah but doesn't post when we win

still a *word censored* then

[DB10GOONER]

Here we go again, with the "Wenger's always has money to spend....."??!!???!

So he was happy to go up against Fergie and Jose playing the likes of Denilson, Santos, Song, Bentner...etc......, while having loads on money sitting in the bank. He was happy to play second fiddle to those managers. He didn't mind losing at all.

Jesus wept.......

How odd that once the stadium debt was reduced, he went out and spent big money on Ozil and Sanchez.

But hey, let's not get the facts in the way of a good story.......!!??!

Exactly, here we go again, with the "Wenger had no money to spend" rubbish.

The point that you and other Wenger Apologists keep missing here is the WAGES he was paying those rubbish players. This, combined with his egotistical belief that those same players were good enough (all his own signings as part of his much mooted Project) led to massive financial mismanagement by Wenger. The point is the money he repeatedly (season after season) pissed away on contract renewals and pay rises for players proven to be rubbish could have and should have been redirected at signing better players.

Now, before you hysterically misread my post, I'm not for a minute saying he had access to funds on a par with the pimped clubs like the chav and citeh, but he certainly had a large amount of funds at his disposal as demonstrated by the ridiculous wages he was paying often unproven and/or rubbish players. Certainly funds enough to build a better team than he did and to compete more than we did.

The money was there, Wenger mis-spent it badly for over 5 years.

Jesus, did indeed, weep.

I've criticised Wenger in the past for bring far too loyal to the likes of eboue, diaby, song, Denilson, etc, but to claim that paying the wages of these players meant we couldn't compete for top players, is just bizarre.
Every single club has wasted money on players, it's not just arsenal.
His record in the transfer market, while being far from perfect, has been excellent.
Now he has money to spend, he has no excuse.
If he fails to boost the squad this window, I'll be as pissed off as anyone else.

Bizarre how? What I'm saying is that he repeatedly wasted the money by extending the contracts of, and giving pay rises to, those poor quality players when they should have been sold.

You are selectively quoting me. I'm not saying that just paying the wages of these players meant we couldn't compete for top players, it was the retaining of those players on huge wages that meant we had little or no money to spend on better players and that ties into his deluded belief in The Project, the belief he could mold those players into the new Henry/Vieira/Bergkamp etc.

He didn't learn from his own failing.

You mention other clubs that wasted money - the difference is that those other clubs in the top 4 or 5 places (let's say Citeh, the chav, Manure and the Mousers) usually didn't repeatedly extend the contracts with pay rises of the players that turned out to be rubbish - Arsene did and still does.

[Redarmy]

What frustrates me is Wengers line of thinking, it's not always about buying world class players every transfer window but it is about improving the squad. I don't think many people would argue that buying Cech wasn't a good buy and probably a bit of bargain too, i'll admit i was a bit dubious at the time but he has saved us important points in games so far this season. He was however our only squad summer signing.

It also looks as if Elneny will be our only January signing, i'm sorry but that is not the transfer dealings of a manager looking to win the league, it is someone doing the bare minimum to stay in contention.

If AW's transfer policy has changed then why did he fail to improve the outfield squad during the summer and why with so much money available does it look as though only one player is coming this transfer window?

Even if the actual amount available was only £100M and not the reported 200 in the summer, then he had between 85 & 90 left over.

You cannot possibly tell me that that money could not have been used to replace some of the following with more quality or younger players:

Arteta, Flamini, Rosicky, Gibbs and probably even Theo, Ox or Campbell.

The injuries we've had in the squad once again has at times has left us threadbare and has meant players playing more matches than is good for them. I'm fairly sure that Monreal and Bellerin have played almost every match this season and modern wingbacks do a hell of a lot of running and both of them must be feeling it, the potential of losing one or both too injury is not a prospect i relish.

This is the guy who said Ospina is world class, and that you cannot buy a better striker than Wellbeck, he is much too blinkerd when assessing his own players

What the Fuck is Arteta still drawing 80K a week wages, let alone the Diaby fiasco, there is a place for player loyalty but this fella takes it way too far, to the detriment of our club

[GTG]

People have got to stop looking at things at face level - winning the premier league is not just worth the £25m extra in prize money. Winners have a more successful brand. The more success the "business" is, the more the business is worth. Winners can command a higher sponsorship deal. Winners attract more fans worldwide. Winners sell more merchandise. Winners can attract the better players and managers.
This whole situation is like the ticket money situation in that, the money received in ticket sales is dwarfed by all the other income the club receives on matchdays

Agreed.and we all see it. But Stan is not going to splash out that kind of money as there is no guarantee. Or maybe he is prepared to and Wenger is the one who is scared he is going to blow 100m and STILL not win it?? Or maybe he wants to prove to the world he is a genius by winning it with the minimum amount of outlay. Who the hell knows??? The bottom line is, what they are doing now as a business model WORKS. CL every season, minimum outlay, scrape into last 16, still have millions of AKB's around the world and the Emirates is a Saturday/Sunday afternoon goldmine......Wenger is not tearing through money with no return. AND, we have won 2 FA cups in the past 2 seasons as a crowd pleasing bonus. EVERY single season for us is Groundhog Day. 95% of us on here pretty much know exactly what lies ahead over the next 3 months. Winning the PL is not one of them. If Wenger bought 3 strategic position players in the next 2 weeks we would be odds on favourites. SO tell me why he doesn't. It is either because of the fore mentioned reasons or he couldn't care less.I believe, and have for years, that he is absolutely FUCKING determined to show EVERYBODY it can be done without continually splashing out. He knows best. And if he fails.... hey so what, there's always next season. Rinse & repeat.....

Absolutely bang on the money and is exactly the opinion I hold. I always feel the same after a summer transfer window but this one was the worst ive felt because there was absolutely no excuse whatsoever for not strengthening. I can understand that its difficult to get a striker in of the required quality because clubs don't want to sell BUT in defensive midfield position there were players like Kondogbia, who moved for £25m I believe. He tore Coquelin to pieces in the CL and is exactly what we needed at an affordable price but we decided to not even compete for him because Wenger was sat on a beach.

[MrT]

DRINKS ARE ON ME!!

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sp ... senal.html

[rodders999]

If there is any modicum of truth in that article I am going to fucking stab myself in the japs eye with a rusty fucking blade

[Ikechukwu1]

Quick we are top...offer Arsene a new deal!!!


*ignores Guardiola*