"Judge me in May".....OK Arsene, here goes

[Boomer]

Mate it's like arguing to a brick wall sometimes. There's little money, hence why AA23 deal is installments. For those who want Wenger to leave, I'm not asking for names, but I doubt there's anyone in the world who could manage and build a club on a shoe string that is world class for Arsenal.

In a few year the world will be our oyster in terms of finances.

I find that hard to believe seen as members of the board come out with statements like we have £30mill for one player if Arsene wants.
Below you will find 4 different articules but which one are us fans ment to believe

26th of Aug 08 a whole month before the transfer window ended http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footba ... -cash.html

29th Aug 08 http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/ ... 630035.ece

19th Dec 08 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/footba ... ishes.html

and not long after 2 Jan 09 http://www.metro.co.uk/sport/football/a ... page_id=43

So what are we ment to believe, Arsene has money but doesn't want to spend or Arsene has no money and Fiszman is a lieing scum?

Does the AA transfer tell us that we dont have money or our chief exec Ivan took advantage of the fact that Arshavin wanted to live and we waited until the last min for Zenit to see reason (which is they would have got nothing for him come the end of the russian season).

Good work but sadly it hasn't proved anything. It's the way the directors are able to 'spin' what you want to hear.

First artical says we have the funds available to but an experienced international. So what £12-£18M??

2nd is the famous £30M thread.
Doesn't actually say that there is £30M in the bank for Arsene to spend. As Hill-wood said an experianced international, AA23 hit the bill and that was on installment.
So what Fitzmen said is also likley to be true. If Arsene wanted to buy lets say David Villa we have the funds. Providing they're paid installments.

What it doesn't say is how much would be left after that??
At a guess there must be around £15m left after AA23 however I'm guessing that maybe pushing the limit.

The other thing which I haven't mentioned is that the transfer funds also include the wages.

So a player on 50,000k a week on a 3 year contact takes of £7.8M from the budget.
Leaving us with a guess of £7.2m.

On the plus side ST renewals, TV rights and predicted competition money (CL) should top that up a bit.

[augie]

I fully understand where you are coming from with your financial arguements red carpet but let me ask you the following questions -

1. How will our on pitch ineptitude affect our season ticket sales and club level renewals ?

2. How will our on field failures affect the image of the club to potential sponsors ?

3. How will our on field failures reflect the marketing image of the club across the world and in turn how will that affect revenue like merchandising sales ?

4. How will our continued spell without honours affect our standing in the game in general and within the g14 (or whatever they call themselves) ?

5. How will our continued lack of success affect our ability to attract quality players to sign for the club in the future ?

I know I veered off my original points with numbers 4 and 5 but points 1, 2 and 3 will all have serious financial ramifications for the club which could be negated by some investment in the playing squad. Like it or not our off pitch performances are more directly linked to the on pitch performances than some would think and when you are successful you can name your price to sponsors, supporters etc but when you are not then your value is greatly reduced and your income as well

[Number 5]

You have made some valid points there. I said in an earlier post that Wenger had made mistakes, a few of which you mention.
My main point is this though.
There is a difference is between what we COULD have achieved and what we EXPECT to achieve.
For me, in our current situation, the expectations are far to high.
Only ONE team can win the title
Only ONE team can win the CL

Therefore three of Man U, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal will be disappointed come May.
Throw in Barca, Bayern Munich, AC Milan, Inter Milan, Juve and Real Madrid for the CL.

We want to do well .. we shouldn't expect it. Especially now.

At various stages this year each team fighting for the title has done their level best to throw it away.

After the way we played last season and the squad we finished the season with I would have fully expected us to mount a credible assault on the title this year if we had just added a couple of players to bolster the squad. I don't believe that based upon what I saw from the team last season this was an unreasonable expectation.

Now after the fare I have seen this season, have no fear I retain similar expectations for next year. I'll be looking at 4th and 4th alone come August.

We are in our current situation based upon Wenger's mistakes. As I tried to outline, it's not the money, we had a decent squad that was made weaker, not by money but by Wenger.

agree with the rest of your post Number 5 but i'm not sure how you can seriously suggest we got to two semi finals in spite of the players.

I know to look at the teams we played in both cup competitions would suggest we have had an "easy" run, and that we haven't always been convincing in those games however to diminish the achievement of the team in getting that far is not right. Arsenal have produced big results in the Champions League (5-2 in Istanbul, 4-0 against Porto, how we didn't go to Rome with more of an advantage after the first leg i'll never know) and a cliche it might be but you can only beat the teams put in front of you.

I could accept that had we got to just one semi final we may have been very fortunate, but two?

As I said I rigourously will defend this point. As bad as the current team have been I would fully have expected them to beat most of the teams pretty comfortably they came up against in the cup runs. That they laboured through quite a few of the ties is what makes me believe this.

There are many recent teams I can look to and I would shrug them off as fluke appeareances in finals and winning trophies. Millwall FA Cup Finalists, West Ham FA Cup Finalists, Portsmouth FA Cup Winner, Porto CL winners, I'm sure with more thought I could add many more.

Sadly I now see the current Arsenal side as a par with many of those sides. They may have done it one year but are they gonna do it the next year or the year after? Highly doubtful in my mind.

That's not how I want to see Arsenal. Again I don't believe it is lack of money that has got us to this point, but Wenger's mistakes over the last 18 months.

[Boomer]

I fully understand where you are coming from with your financial arguements red carpet but let me ask you the following questions -

1. How will our on pitch ineptitude affect our season ticket sales and club level renewals ?

2. How will our on field failures affect the image of the club to potential sponsors ?

3. How will our on field failures reflect the marketing image of the club across the world and in turn how will that affect revenue like merchandising sales ?

4. How will our continued spell without honours affect our standing in the game in general and within the g14 (or whatever they call themselves) ?

5. How will our continued lack of success affect our ability to attract quality players to sign for the club in the future ?

I know I veered off my original points with numbers 4 and 5 but points 1, 2 and 3 will all have serious financial ramifications for the club which could be negated by some investment in the playing squad. Like it or not our off pitch performances are more directly linked to the on pitch performances than some would think and when you are successful you can name your price to sponsors, supporters etc but when you are not then your value is greatly reduced and your income as well

We've been running since 2004 without sponsors as the money (staduim, Shirt and kit) we're instantly used to fund the staduim.
So new contract deals will be new funds which can be used per season.

Take the shirt sponsorship for example. I don't have the excate figures...
We took around £46M from fly Emirates. Whilst AIG paid £52M to Man U. So a difference of £6M? Wrong! When I say that the Emirates deal is for 6 years and the AIG for 3 it's half a contact lenght. (as I said the contract lengths maybe wrong but it's definatley half the length of Man Us.)

So Man U (the new deal still being worked I think) could go out next year with the new sponsorship of another 3 year to bring in line with our contract lenght. At the same cost they had previously!!! (£52M)
That's a shortfall we have of £17M per season over Man U!!!!! That's in Shirt sponsor alone.

[augie]

I aint sure if you agreeing with me or disagreeing with me there boomer

[GunnerDude]

Good work but sadly it hasn't proved anything. It's the way the directors are able to 'spin' what you want to hear.

First artical says we have the funds available to but an experienced international. So what £12-£18M??

2nd is the famous £30M thread.
Doesn't actually say that there is £30M in the bank for Arsene to spend. As Hill-wood said an experianced international, AA23 hit the bill and that was on installment.
So what Fitzmen said is also likley to be true. If Arsene wanted to buy lets say David Villa we have the funds. Providing they're paid installments.

What it doesn't say is how much would be left after that??
At a guess there must be around £15m left after AA23 however I'm guessing that maybe pushing the limit.

The other thing which I haven't mentioned is that the transfer funds also include the wages.

So a player on 50,000k a week on a 3 year contact takes of £7.8M from the budget.
Leaving us with a guess of £7.2m.

On the plus side ST renewals, TV rights and predicted competition money (CL) should top that up a bit.

We were lucky with the circumstances surrounding the AA deal as am sure you realize not all experienced internationals will be worth £15mill and that could have been the case if we signed AA in the summer.
As for the word Installment, I haven't seen any proof of that.

Zenit claimed that they would receive £15m from Arsenal, and around £1.5m from Arshavin as a part repayment of the bonus monies. A further payment of €500,000 that had been due to the player in bonuses will not be met, with the Russian club building that money into their valuation of the deal at £16.9m. Arsenal have not disclosed the fee paid, but it has undoubtedly eclipsed the previous record transfer, the £13m paid to Bordeaux for Sylvain Wiltord in August 2000

[Red Carpet]

I fully understand where you are coming from with your financial arguements red carpet but let me ask you the following questions -

1. How will our on pitch ineptitude affect our season ticket sales and club level renewals ?

2. How will our on field failures affect the image of the club to potential sponsors ?

3. How will our on field failures reflect the marketing image of the club across the world and in turn how will that affect revenue like merchandising sales ?

4. How will our continued spell without honours affect our standing in the game in general and within the g14 (or whatever they call themselves) ?

5. How will our continued lack of success affect our ability to attract quality players to sign for the club in the future ?

I know I veered off my original points with numbers 4 and 5 but points 1, 2 and 3 will all have serious financial ramifications for the club which could be negated by some investment in the playing squad. Like it or not our off pitch performances are more directly linked to the on pitch performances than some would think and when you are successful you can name your price to sponsors, supporters etc but when you are not then your value is greatly reduced and your income as well

Good questions.
1. In my opinion a clubs ability to succeed is strongly dependant on a solid fan base. gate receipts, merchandising etc are key.
No club can guarentee success (apart from Man U it would now seem!) so all we can hope for is that we compete.
There are levels of competing of course, the league was gone before Christmas and that poor but we have been "there or there abouts" in the FA Cup and CL.
If fans don't want to go because we can't guarentee success then I suggest they watch Arsenal Ladies. We cannot base our model around such attitudes.
2. Unless we drop out of the top four, which is our minimum expectation, I do not think that our ability to attract sponsors etc is an issue.
3. Its a bit similar to question 1 really isn't it. I don't think the continued support of our overseas following is directly lined to silverwear, more the clubs overall appeal.
4. Not sure how relevant that is to be honest .. isn't the G14 breaking up anyway ??.
5. Players will always go to clubs if the price is right .. just look at Spurs and Man City. In time we may be in a position to meet those demands.

I see your point, and its a good one, I just happen to believe that forcing the issue of our lack of silverware financially at a time that we cannot afford to satisfy the unrealistic demands of the fans does not serve the clubs best interests in the long run. Its tough having to wait but lets face it, we've all been there before !.

Clearly the off field activities and off field activities are linked.

[Boomer]

I aint sure if you agreeing with me or disagreeing with me there boomer

Neither - giving your answers to the financial constraints and sponsorship and how it may affect us.

Answer is it already has simply to pay for the AG.
In a few years some of those deals will be up for renewal and I guess the annual payments from these deals will go some way to paying the annual loan back to the bank and the rest on transfers.
Basically it's only gates, TV rights and competition prizes (funds) that are our only income and most of that goes to pay back the annual loan.

[Boomer]

Good work but sadly it hasn't proved anything. It's the way the directors are able to 'spin' what you want to hear.

First artical says we have the funds available to but an experienced international. So what £12-£18M??

2nd is the famous £30M thread.
Doesn't actually say that there is £30M in the bank for Arsene to spend. As Hill-wood said an experianced international, AA23 hit the bill and that was on installment.
So what Fitzmen said is also likley to be true. If Arsene wanted to buy lets say David Villa we have the funds. Providing they're paid installments.

What it doesn't say is how much would be left after that??
At a guess there must be around £15m left after AA23 however I'm guessing that maybe pushing the limit.

The other thing which I haven't mentioned is that the transfer funds also include the wages.

So a player on 50,000k a week on a 3 year contact takes of £7.8M from the budget.
Leaving us with a guess of £7.2m.

On the plus side ST renewals, TV rights and predicted competition money (CL) should top that up a bit.

We were lucky with the circumstances surrounding the AA deal as am sure you realize not all experienced internationals will be worth £15mill and that could have been the case if we signed AA in the summer.
As for the word Installment, I haven't seen any proof of that.

No but it could have been the other way and been £22M!?!
One of the snags was the payment in installments.

[edit] type in "arshavin transfer installments" into google and there are thousands of reports claiming Kiev wanted the money upfront.

We may have only paid £10-12.

[GunnerDude]

Earnings of Premier League clubs in 2005/06 (prize money and TV cash but not gate receipts or merchandise income).

Arsenal £52.7m*
Chelsea £47.5m
Liverpool £43.2m**
Man Utd £39.8m
Tottenham £26.2m
West Ham £24.4m**
Middlesbrough £24.3m
Newcastle £24.0m
Bolton £23.7m
Blackburn £23.6m
Wigan £22.9m
Everton £22.4m
Charlton £21.0m
Man City £20.6m
Fulham £20.3m
Aston Villa £19.6m
Birmingham £19.4m
Portsmouth £18.0m
West Brom £16.9m
Sunderland £16.1m

* Arsenal earn an extra £2m if they win the Champions League
** An extra £1m goes to the FA Cup final winners

Television revenue for 2007-08 season

(2006-07 in brackets)

Manchester United £49.3m (£32m)
Chelsea £45.6m (£30.9m)
Arsenal £47m (£29m)
Liverpool £45.4m (£28.4m)
Everton £42.1m (£25.3m)
Aston Villa £42.3m (£22m)
Blackburn Rovers £40.2m (£22m)
Portsmouth £40.4m (£23m)
Manchester City £39.7m (£21m)
West Ham United £36.8m (£21.1m)
Tottenham Hotspur £36m (£27.3m)
Newcastle United £39.2m (£21.2m)
Middlesbrough £34.2m (£20.5m)
Wigan Athletic £33.4m (£18.4m)
Sunderland £33.6m (£6.5m*)
Bolton Wanderers £32m (£24.6m)
Fulham £31.3m (£20.4m)
Reading £30.6m (£23.6m)
Birmingham City £29.8m (£6.5m*)
Derby County £29.1m (n/a)

LAST night’s Champions League triumph earned Manchester United £5.6m in prize money – but the financial benefit could be as much as 15 times higher.
May 22 2008 by Our Correspondent, Daily Post

Manchester United and Chelsea have each already earned more than £30m this season from Europe’s top club competition.

But Professor Simon Chadwick, director of Coventry University’s Centre of the International Business of Sport, believes the hidden benefits of winning the trophy will mean as much as £85m from increased squad value, bigger sponsorship deals, media rights and growth in value of season ticket sales.

Chadwick said: “The 2008 Uefa Champions League Final is expected to be the biggest yet in economic terms.â€

[Calo]

before i judge I want the truth if he had money to spend or NOT

[selsdon]

I will judge the bloke on one decision and one decision alone:

starting Andrey Arshavin on the bench against Chelsea

smacked of, at best, arrogance and at worst, senile dementia

a scandalous decision and not the first time he's cost us in the domestic trophies with his bizzare selections

[skipper]

I will judge the bloke on one decision and one decision alone:

starting Andrey Arshavin on the bench against Chelsea

smacked of, at best, arrogance and at worst, senile dementia

a scandalous decision and not the first time he's cost us in the domestic trophies with his bizzare selections

Simply unforgivable decision IMO...

[flash gunner]

I think we all realise where our level is currently.

4th in the league, FA Cup semi final are about our level

CL semi final is punching above our weight.

Its peoples reasoning for why that I question ..

Shouldnt we want better? This forum gives us supporters a chance to say how we think things could be better. For that reason everyone has the right to say how they think Wenger has it wrong or not in varying degrees. Wenger and Arsenal dont read this message board so ultimately a Wenger out thread wont make anyones mind up but fuck me if someone wants to let out their feelings then great. If Wenger says judge me at the end of the season then he is being judged in this thread

Personally i think we are 3-4 signings away from challenging and if Wenger pulls his fucking finger out and signs them then he is the right man to lead us if he doesnt make them (money permitting) then maybe he isnt the man for the job anymore

[augie]

Red Carpet I have just a couple of points in response to your last post -

1. I did not mean to imply that us attracting a sponsor is dependent on success but what I did say is that our asking price will surely being dropping after 4 barren seasons ? When we were winning the leagues we were high profile and everybody wanted to be linked with the club so the club could set their own asking prices for any sponsorship deal - now in our current prediciment the demand to sponsor us from companies will not be as high and to attract these sponsors we will have to reduce our demands cos telling them about the great young players, the spirit we have etc etc will not wash

2. Fans have no right to success and you are 100% right when you say this. However I believe what is really galling for the fans is that a lot of us feel we are not doing enough in a bid to be successful and that is unacceptable. That there has been a transfer profit in each of the last 4 seasons (pre arshavin) is testament to the fact that we are simply not investing anywhere near an adequate amount in quality playing staff. That we allowed 3 midfielders to leave a small squad last summer and only bring in one replacement is seen by the fans as the manager and club doing enough to make us competitive. The really big crux of the matter for a lot of fans is that most believe that wenger will not change his transfer policies even if he has an unlimited transfer budget at his disposal I think that fans also have a right to be irked when they look at the clubs wage bill being one of the highest in the league (2nd or 3rd I think?) and you look at the quality of the squad and wonder where is it being spent Then you add the fact that there are way too many players earning way above their ability status and you watch them in matches and it simply has to piss fans off We all have a pop at greedybayor's refusal to earn his wages and rightly so but there are a lot more players in that squad being over-paid for what they are doing for this club