AST vs Gazidis

[Babatunde]

“I don't think for Mr Usmanov and anyone else out there that we should pump money into the football club,” he said. “We don't think that is healthy or for the good of the game.

Yes Ivan. Why on earth would you want to invest lots of money into the football club and sign quality players eh?
What did Abramovich, Real Madrid, Man United and Citeh ever achieve by investing in players?


“When I arrived three-and-half years ago there had been a lot of changes on the board and some degree of conflict. Since then we have worked hard to ensure the board is unified and has a common purpose.

Oh you've all a common purpose alright:

Arsene and his ridiculous salary.
Ivan the 3rd highest paid Sports CEO in Europe is it not?
Kroenke gets to sit back, wait and make a killing when the time is right.

Yep. Common purpose, which is to grow a business and all get rich, whilst screwing the fans and carrying on down a course that will lead this club into the wilderness for years to come. Bunch of c****.

“In terms of any further additions to the board it is important we don't disturb that unity and don't create conflict.

Yes yes Ivan.
Who would want to disturb the nice little unity of the ponzi scheme you have running here? All that gravy from those gormless witless sheep at the Emirates, chucking money at you without you having to invest any of it, property developments...new megastores in Wood Green...everyone at director/board level having bridges named after them and busts, manager with zero accountability, zero ambition, no requirement to maintain the pressure to win...

Yeah. You wouldn't want a new directorial figure coming in and like errr...investing in the team would you? You wouldn't want to be annoyed by tiresome things like competing for big trophies, setting ultimatums and targets for the manager, and most of all, we CERTAINLY would never entertain someone creating conflict with Lord Arsene GOD FORBID!
Imagine someone making him win trophies, and sign quality players, and manage egos, and work on defending, and treat the fans with respect etc...

No no no.

Conclusion: Maintain the Status Quo.

Keep paying your monies please.

Real fans buy hot dogs and overpriced joke kits from the Armoury.

[augie]

Mixed morning for me so far...........sometimes I feel very angry about all this shit whilst other times I feel total and utter despair

Time for all those pro wenger and anti usmanov morons to face facts........this club is fcuked in it's current guise and will be soon christened as the everton of the south - too good for most of the teams over a season but nowhere good enough to really challenge for the big trophies and will be financed by the sale of a top player each season

[flash gunner]

What did everyone expect from this meeting? All questions had to be ok'd before the event and you dont really think AST or any other supporter group would rock the boat, did you? Its a non event and shouldnt even be discussed and no-one should get angry about it....... We all know top 4 is what the club aim for and the majority of fans are happy with that (like it or not we are the minority) while it continues nothing will change so why get angry or feel despair?

[augie]

What did everyone expect from this meeting? All questions had to be ok'd before the event and you dont really think AST or any other supporter group would rock the boat, did you? Its a non event and shouldnt even be discussed and no-one should get angry about it....... We all know top 4 is what the club aim for and the majority of fans are happy with that (like it or not we are the minority) while it continues nothing will change so why get angry or feel despair?

Yes the questions had to be submitted in advance flash but as somebody pointed out the other day, it would be very easy when you get your answer to the usmanov joining the board question (and am only using this as an example) to quickly fire another harder hitting and direct question at him What could gazidas or his cronies do ? Throw the person in question out ? That would be a media disaster cos you know that all the rags would be all over the story and the same thing would apply if he refused to answer the question - like it or not the ast members had a real chance to jam the smarmy american c**t to the wall last night and bottled it for fear of upsetting their cosy relationship with the club
Personally I dont know what is worse....the fact that gazidas is a bullshiting w****r playing a game with the fans or the ast/redaction people who refuse to grasp the mettle and tackle the real issues head on

[flash gunner]

Exactly mate dont rely on AST to put any hard hitting questions forward, i knew they wouldnt therefore we shouldnt even be discussing this as its a non-event. As i said we are the minority the vast majority of fans are happy with top 4 and until that changes or we dont get into the top 4 nothing will change, we're pissing against the wind mate......

[augie]

Exactly mate dont rely on AST to put any hard hitting questions forward, i knew they wouldnt therefore we shouldnt even be discussing this as its a non-event. As i said we are the minority the vast majority of fans are happy with top 4 and until that changes or we dont get into the top 4 nothing will change, we're pissing against the wind mate......

I absolutely refuse to believe that the majority of Gooners are satisfied with top 4 finishes - if that is what being a Gooner is all about nowadays then maybe I should fcuk off and support somebody else

[DB10GOONER]

So another season of scrapping with the Scum for 3rd or 4th place. All the while hoping Rogers doesn't hit the ground running at Liverpool leaving us scrapping for 5th place...

I agree with augie, I've had mood swings from furious to depressed all morning.

It's the fucking futility of it all. Another season of the same old shite and no one with the bollocks to try and change it.

I know our Mackem mate says that many clubs' fans go through this level of mediocrity for decades and whilst that is true, the thing that bugs the shit out of me is that we pay far higher ticket prices than them, we have a Board constantly telling us how well off the club is, we were dragged out of our spiritual home on the promise of being able to compete at the top top level.

We need to see proper return on our investment in the club. Either these bastards that currently run the Arsenal Business Ltd Conglomerate (what we all used to know and love as Arsenal FOOTBALL club) need to fucking step up and turn us back into a winning club or they need to drop the prices and openly admit, yes we are now the London Everton.

And as for the AST? They should just disband now. I'm sure one of the RedAction boys on here will defend them with "But at least they are making the effort to get change, what are you lot doing" etc but I would counter with they actually are NOT making the effort. They are licking the Board's collective arse. If you aren't going to actually fight for change then sit the fuck down and shut up, don't elect yourself as a spokesman and then not speak!

I don't give a fuck if we have nicer toilets, or a better catering, or nice little flags waiting on our seats. Fuck that. I want an ambitious club that addresses its problems and changes what needs to be changed. I don't need us to be winning a trophy every year but I do need us to at least get out of this stagnation that has been dragging on for 6 years or more and at least attempt to do better.

[flash gunner]

Exactly mate dont rely on AST to put any hard hitting questions forward, i knew they wouldnt therefore we shouldnt even be discussing this as its a non-event. As i said we are the minority the vast majority of fans are happy with top 4 and until that changes or we dont get into the top 4 nothing will change, we're pissing against the wind mate......

I absolutely refuse to believe that the majority of Gooners are satisfied with top 4 finishes - if that is what being a Gooner is all about nowadays then maybe I should fcuk off and support somebody else

Many of the Gooners i speak to are happy with the way things are. I used to work with a bloke who is 60 had a season ticket for 40 years, he misses his wedding anniversary if Arsenal are playing the same day, missed virtually no home games in his time as a season ticket holder so a dedicated bloke not a JCL.... and i saw him a few weeks ago we were talking Arsenal and when i said i wanted Wenger out he told me semi angrily dont you dare say that after everything he has done for the club, ive seen things much worse... etc etc etc the old usual shit..... Seriously mate i hear so many Arsenal fans saying now that we play beautiful football (which i think is bollocks also) and that all that matters!!! Which growing up in harlow a scum supporting town is what i used to hear from those *word censored* back in the 80's and 90's

[georgeknows89]

Agree that if we can't get Usmanov on board and we can't get Gazidis then in the first instance we have to dilute the importance and perception of the AST.

They are punching way above their weight and have been allowed to get away with it too long.Their website says that the annual survey 2010/11 which is sent to Gazidis and passed to all the board to give a reflection of fans views was completed by 372 fans-YES THREE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY fuKcin TWO !!

How many members do they actually have ?

How many shares do they actually own under fan share ?

If the individual shareholders in AST believe in the principle of sharing across the fan base then why haven't they been made to sell their shares to the trust so that more can buy them to practice what they are all preaching

They were given the Orphan share by FIszman and no doubt Kroenke paid for the trip to Denver when they went to see the great sports operator over there.

372 -as the saying goes .... Never could so many be influenced by so few.

What about the 1000 away scheme members , the 4500 real fans on the herd site and numerous others, even the 9000 on club level, let alone the poor old 'pub level' fans struggling to renew ever increasing ticket prices.

Same with Dead Action and AISA, how many members do these groups have and are they a true reflection of the real fans ?
If the club are being transparent and communicating then these events should be allocating the 300 guests in a far better way and get a chance for some real people to ask real questions

[richpye]

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story ... -?cc=5739#

Following on from this meeting and the article above which discusses our wage structure.
Does anyone know if this wage structure is purely an unofficial one, or is there a chance it is written into players contracts?
I am totally flabbergasted at the reported wages earned by Almunia (not so much Chamakh as he was a freebie) and wondered if it had been increased on an incremental basis as part of a trigger clause in his contract?

Thoughts?

[Perryashburtongroves]

Same old bollox year after year. The board sit there hiding under this financial fair play nonsense, pretending that IT will save the day. No fucking way it will, they have openly admitted that they don't know how it will take effect and whether it will be enforceable yet still nobody has the nerve to ask any of them why they are pursuing a strategy whose outcome is totally unknown. That is just poor management, bordering on financial and professional mismanagement. Gazidis basically told us that fuck all is going to change for the next three years at least, so we are stuck with this shit until then. Once the rich clubs find ways around the rules of FFP, we will be so far down the wrong avenue that there will be no coming back. The fact that the club think they can piss away the best part of a decade or more because 'we didn't see the Chavseas and Man Citys coming' is actually offensive and cowardly. This is exactly the same as the BBC all those years ago when SKY tv came along and started buying up all the sport and new tv programmes. They turned around and said it would never last, that people wouldn't watch it, that the money would run out and people would still watch their bored old shit channels because they were traditional. 20 years on they have no live sport, no decent films and fuck all money to make anything decent. Year after year they arrogantly sat there, offering awful services and putting in derisory bids thinking that they would get the rights because that had always happened before. They ended up watching live football, cricket, tennis, golf, horse racing and loads more go to other channels who offered more money..... surely that must ring some bells somewhere at Arsenal.

They know they are fucked, they know that the plan to move ground and be a European heavy weight has not worked and that all their plans going back to the late 90s have proved to be useless. Did they really think that it would just be us and Manure challenging each year forever? Did they not factor in changes and new investment at other teams? I think they sat there and thought that Manure would eventually crumble and we would hoover everything up like Rangers or Celtic in Scotland and eventually win the Champions League just by turning up after a few years. The fact that Gazidis seriously thinks we can win that, is another matter entirely and don't even get me started on how many years Wenger has had to win it and still can't.

What gets to me the most is the fact that the club is not even prepared to put a bit of effort into competing or trying something different. The whole world can see that things aren't working that you can not keep nicking 4th spot year in year out or rejoicing when you finish 3rd because everyone else is shit. Arrogance and lunacy have been allowed to hold sway for too long and this patronising crap from the manager and board about how we peasants don't know anything and need to stop being so stroppy has to end. This isn't a football club any more. Football clubs want to win things, no matter what it takes.

[richpye]

Same old bollox year after year. The board sit there hiding under this financial fair play nonsense, pretending that IT will save the day. No fucking way it will, they have openly admitted that they don't know how it will take effect and whether it will be enforceable yet still nobody has the nerve to ask any of them why they are pursuing a strategy whose outcome is totally unknown. That is just poor management, bordering on financial and professional mismanagement. Gazidis basically told us that fuck all is going to change for the next three years at least, so we are stuck with this shit until then. Once the rich clubs find ways around the rules of FFP, we will be so far down the wrong avenue that there will be no coming back. The fact that the club think they can piss away the best part of a decade or more because 'we didn't see the Chavseas and Man Citys coming' is actually offensive and cowardly. This is exactly the same as the BBC all those years ago when SKY tv came along and started buying up all the sport and new tv programmes. They turned around and said it would never last, that people wouldn't watch it, that the money would run out and people would still watch their bored old shit channels because they were traditional. 20 years on they have no live sport, no decent films and fuck all money to make anything decent. Year after year they arrogantly sat there, offering awful services and putting in derisory bids thinking that they would get the rights because that had always happened before. They ended up watching live football, cricket, tennis, golf, horse racing and loads more go to other channels who offered more money..... surely that must ring some bells somewhere at Arsenal.

They know they are fucked, they know that the plan to move ground and be a European heavy weight has not worked and that all their plans going back to the late 90s have proved to be useless. Did they really think that it would just be us and Manure challenging each year forever? Did they not factor in changes and new investment at other teams? I think they sat there and thought that Manure would eventually crumble and we would hoover everything up like Rangers or Celtic in Scotland and eventually win the Champions League just by turning up after a few years. The fact that Gazidis seriously thinks we can win that, is another matter entirely and don't even get me started on how many years Wenger has had to win it and still can't.

What gets to me the most is the fact that the club is not even prepared to put a bit of effort into competing or trying something different. The whole world can see that things aren't working that you can not keep nicking 4th spot year in year out or rejoicing when you finish 3rd because everyone else is shit. Arrogance and lunacy have been allowed to hold sway for too long and this patronising crap from the manager and board about how we peasants don't know anything and need to stop being so stroppy has to end. This isn't a football club any more. Football clubs want to win things, no matter what it takes.

Does this "everyone else is shit" include a team owned by a Russian Billionaire who pumped gazillions into a club and still finished below us in the league?
Whilst I don't want to defend the board, because they are certainly to blame for a lot of the malaise circulating the club, no-one saw the likes of Abramovich coming (or FFP would have been in place years ago or a system similar to the one the Germans have in place). And even if they did see them coming (which they didn't), a club that writes of millions of pounds a year is not a club it's a toy. Self sustaining finances are a priority for all clubs from the lieks or Arsenal down to my local cricket club.

[Babatunde]

Same old bollox year after year. The board sit there hiding under this financial fair play nonsense, pretending that IT will save the day. No fucking way it will, they have openly admitted that they don't know how it will take effect and whether it will be enforceable yet still nobody has the nerve to ask any of them why they are pursuing a strategy whose outcome is totally unknown. That is just poor management, bordering on financial and professional mismanagement. Gazidis basically told us that fuck all is going to change for the next three years at least, so we are stuck with this shit until then. Once the rich clubs find ways around the rules of FFP, we will be so far down the wrong avenue that there will be no coming back. The fact that the club think they can piss away the best part of a decade or more because 'we didn't see the Chavseas and Man Citys coming' is actually offensive and cowardly. This is exactly the same as the BBC all those years ago when SKY tv came along and started buying up all the sport and new tv programmes. They turned around and said it would never last, that people wouldn't watch it, that the money would run out and people would still watch their bored old shit channels because they were traditional. 20 years on they have no live sport, no decent films and fuck all money to make anything decent. Year after year they arrogantly sat there, offering awful services and putting in derisory bids thinking that they would get the rights because that had always happened before. They ended up watching live football, cricket, tennis, golf, horse racing and loads more go to other channels who offered more money..... surely that must ring some bells somewhere at Arsenal.

They know they are fucked, they know that the plan to move ground and be a European heavy weight has not worked and that all their plans going back to the late 90s have proved to be useless. Did they really think that it would just be us and Manure challenging each year forever? Did they not factor in changes and new investment at other teams? I think they sat there and thought that Manure would eventually crumble and we would hoover everything up like Rangers or Celtic in Scotland and eventually win the Champions League just by turning up after a few years. The fact that Gazidis seriously thinks we can win that, is another matter entirely and don't even get me started on how many years Wenger has had to win it and still can't.

What gets to me the most is the fact that the club is not even prepared to put a bit of effort into competing or trying something different. The whole world can see that things aren't working that you can not keep nicking 4th spot year in year out or rejoicing when you finish 3rd because everyone else is shit. Arrogance and lunacy have been allowed to hold sway for too long and this patronising crap from the manager and board about how we peasants don't know anything and need to stop being so stroppy has to end. This isn't a football club any more. Football clubs want to win things, no matter what it takes.

Absolutely fucking SUPERB post sire.
Best pint worth noting is the arrogance in this club from the manager, to chairman, to deluded fans worshipping rubbish players and a mediocre manager and the "Arsenal way".

The total lack of ambition is staggering. Just assuming we and Manure would forever be the only clubs around??
I don't remember Arsenal moaning about financial fair play when we gobbled up years of European cash and raked in the extra SKY money

This club will go nowhere until we get brave, intelligent and combative fans who don't tolerate failure and mangled garbage from retards like Gazidis. The AST, Dead Action and AISA are symptomatic of the spineless, non courageous submissive club we now have.

The Arsenal as we knew it is dead, hijacked by an arrogant French joke, a Yank opportunist and a bunch of clueless easily pleased nouveau fans. The older ones who are happy with the way things are are probs the type of losers who would be contented with a BJ from Pat Butcher, and brag about it.

An unfunny joke of a football club.
Ooops sorry I meant business.

Oh hold on, what kind of a business pays its best employees average wages and pays its biggest liabilities exorbitant money?

Arsene Wenger FC: a joke club on every level, where the manager picks his own boss.
Couldn't make it up.

[flash gunner]

This club will go nowhere until we get brave, intelligent and combative fans who don't tolerate failure and mangled garbage from retards like Gazidis. The AST, Dead Action and AISA are symptomatic of the spineless, non courageous submissive club we now have.

Got to ask Babatunde what are you doing to address the underlined part of your post? and please dont tell me the 'story' of you getting chucked out at half time of our game with sp*rs

[TheCook]

They are punching way above their weight and have been allowed to get away with it too long.Their website says that the annual survey 2010/11 which is sent to Gazidis and passed to all the board to give a reflection of fans views was completed by 372 fans-YES THREE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY fuKcin TWO !!

372 -as the saying goes .... Never could so many be influenced by so few.

What about the 1000 away scheme members , the 4500 real fans on the herd site and numerous others, even the 9000 on club level, let alone the poor old 'pub level' fans struggling to renew ever increasing ticket prices.

Same with Dead Action and AISA, how many members do these groups have and are they a true reflection of the real fans ?
If the club are being transparent and communicating then these events should be allocating the 300 guests in a far better way and get a chance for some real people to ask real questions

Regarding the 372, this is how many people actually bothered to fill in the survey ; As I have said many times, it is very, very difficult to get Arsenal fans to actually get off their arses and actually do anything

AISA have a few thousand members, but not all would want to attend last night. REDaction do not have members, it consists of just the six original blokes, and anyone else who wants to get involved (ie not many)

Gazidis did take questions from the floor at the end of the Q & A ; unfortunately, one of these was taken up by a 'real person' asking 'Why can't silver members get tickets for big away games?' which was a complete waste of a question at such an event ; So having the aforementioned real people there does not solve the problem.

It was a piece of cake to blag your way in there last night ; anyone with the will to do it could have strolled in no problem but other posters want to just moan about those that were there.

It's just moan, moan, moan, but who wants to do something about it?

This is a serious question ; please don't bore me with personal abuse or the inevitable REDaction bashing : Does anyone want to join AST and put yourselves forward as the front man? Join AISA? The same guy has been running it for years, as nobody can be arsed to take it over!

Moaning on a message board gets nothing done ; who wants to make a sacrifice and get off their arse?

The club used to have the motto 'Victoria Concordia Crescit', but so many of the fans seem to have the motto 'Can't someone else do it?'