As we're unlikely to see terraces again at football, this is the virtual equivalent where you can chat to your hearts content about all football matters and, obviously, Arsenal in particular. This forum encourages all Gooners to visit and contribute so please keep it respectful, clean and topical.
afcforever wrote:I personally think they will spend big in the summer, that's why it's important to finish top 4.
I think that as well.
I don't think we'll match the spending of our rivals (it's not in Wenger's DNA) but I think we'll spend far more than we have in recent seasons. Champions league money can only help.
What gives you grounds for that optimism? We have always qualified for the CL and for at least the past 3 years we have consistently heard how there are funds available to the manager even before we flog one of our main assets.
He'll never spend more than £20m net and in terms of where we are right now that can only mean one thing i.e. the usual end of season scramble for 4th
If we are to genuinely compete for the title then he needs to spend in the region of £70m and he will never ever do that.
afcforever wrote:I personally think they will spend big in the summer, that's why it's important to finish top 4.
I think that as well.
I don't think we'll match the spending of our rivals (it's not in Wenger's DNA) but I think we'll spend far more than we have in recent seasons. Champions league money can only help.
What gives you grounds for that optimism? We have always qualified for the CL and for at least the past 3 years we have consistently heard how there are funds available to the manager even before we flog one of our main assets.
He'll never spend more than £20m net and in terms of where we are right now that can only mean one thing i.e. the usual end of season scramble for 4th
If we are to genuinely compete for the title then he needs to spend in the region of £70m and he will never ever do that.
afcforever wrote:I personally think they will spend big in the summer, that's why it's important to finish top 4.
I think that as well.
I don't think we'll match the spending of our rivals (it's not in Wenger's DNA) but I think we'll spend far more than we have in recent seasons. Champions league money can only help.
What gives you grounds for that optimism? We have always qualified for the CL and for at least the past 3 years we have consistently heard how there are funds available to the manager even before we flog one of our main assets.
He'll never spend more than £20m net and in terms of where we are right now that can only mean one thing i.e. the usual end of season scramble for 4th
If we are to genuinely compete for the title then he needs to spend in the region of £70m and he will never ever do that.
Partly hope (something football fans have banked on for years...) but also the fact we're finally seeing an increase in sponsorship revenue (£30m per year?). That, coupled with CL money, gives me a real hope we'll see bigger spending this summer. Not huge spending, but spending all the same.
The main caveat to that is if we finished 5th and miss out on the CL cash cow. If that happens, i'd expect another conservative summer as the sponsorship money is used to cover the loss in CL money.
- strangely, that seems to be the preferred option on here, but - for me - losing out on a large sum of money seems a sure fire way of keeping us in this never-ending cycle of conservatism. We're a club that insists on balancing the books; therefore it stands to reason that £30m+ added income will give you more room to express yourself and being denied that income will result in continued belt tightening...
I'd like to share the same hope but I feel that Wenger is now so entrenched with this 'investment in youth' and has made so many public statements about 'the answer is not always to buy' etc etc, that even with that increased funding available he'd still not gamble enough on bringing in top talent. Secondly, it is not just the fees involved i.e. £20m plus, its more the £100k+ per week wages that I can't see happening. Very, very reluctantly the club has offered those sums to the likes of Henry, Nasri and RvP in desperate hope of them staying but I don't think they've got their heads around spending that on a new signing.
For me, the worst outcome would be to spend £70m on 5-6 players of the quality we have now, which wouldn't improve us one bit. Spend it all on 3 top drawer players and we might not be far off.......but I can't see Wenger doing that. Every year we finish top four and generally end the season in reasonable form and he uses it as a justification to go again with the players he has and 1 or 2 average additions
I'm in agreement with Steve o here - how many transfer windows have been "the one" where we finally splash the cash reserves on quality players ? Maybe as importantly, how many transfer windows have come and gone without wenger realizing that players like diaby, Klingon, Wally and even Giroud will not be the type of players that can lift us back to the top level ? Wenger is nothing if not committed to his ideas and it isn't a lack of finances that have made him this way and for that reason I am hoping that the man will be gone before we get in a new owner (if that ever happens ) - maybe if wenger fcuks off then kroenke will too cos he cash cow will be a big loss to him
afcforever wrote:I personally think they will spend big in the summer, that's why it's important to finish top 4.
I think that as well.
I don't think we'll match the spending of our rivals (it's not in Wenger's DNA) but I think we'll spend far more than we have in recent seasons. Champions league money can only help.
What gives you grounds for that optimism? We have always qualified for the CL and for at least the past 3 years we have consistently heard how there are funds available to the manager even before we flog one of our main assets.
He'll never spend more than £20m net and in terms of where we are right now that can only mean one thing i.e. the usual end of season scramble for 4th
If we are to genuinely compete for the title then he needs to spend in the region of £70m and he will never ever do that.
Partly hope (something football fans have banked on for years...) but also the fact we're finally seeing an increase in sponsorship revenue (£30m per year?). That, coupled with CL money, gives me a real hope we'll see bigger spending this summer. Not huge spending, but spending all the same.
The main caveat to that is if we finished 5th and miss out on the CL cash cow. If that happens, i'd expect another conservative summer as the sponsorship money is used to cover the loss in CL money.
- strangely, that seems to be the preferred option on here, but - for me - losing out on a large sum of money seems a sure fire way of keeping us in this never-ending cycle of conservatism. We're a club that insists on balancing the books; therefore it stands to reason that £30m+ added income will give you more room to express yourself and being denied that income will result in continued belt tightening...
Your not taking into account an unambitious board who are quite happy to finish 4th every season, if we finish 4th again this season everything will be rosy and there will be limited spending to hopefully reinforce the squad.
If we finish 5th Wiggy will have to spend to get us back into the UCL and to protect his investment. I think this may be a case of short tern pain for long term gain.
Brady's left peg wrote:
Your not taking into account an unambitious board who are quite happy to finish 4th every season, if we finish 4th again this season everything will be rosy and there will be limited spending to hopefully reinforce the squad. If we finish 5th Wiggy will have to spend to get us back into the UCL and to protect his investment. I think this may be a case of short tern pain for long term gain.
Yeah, I do accept that's a possibility even if I believe finishing 5th will see us cut our cloth accordingly and invest even less (which hardly seems possible )
My preference is to finish 4th and hope (I use that word a lot ) I'm right that we'll use the sponsorship money to invest in players.
Whichever way you look at it though, there's been so many false dawns that any optimism is quite rightly there to be shot down. But surely this Groundhog Day FC will wake up eventually, won't it?
Preference would be to finish 6th but expect to finish 5th(Everton more or less guaranteed that yesterday), only want 4th just to wind up the scum fams.
I've had it with the champs league. We prioritise it over the domestic cups even though we make no serious attempt to win it bar 2006. I've had enough of sitting on the champions league pot and not even trying to p*ss. We don't buy champions league quality anymore, we only pay champions league quality wages. So it's not like we would miss out on players we never go for anyway.
Sunday away games are ridiculous as trains are sh*te and kick off times ridiculous so unless you can guarantee me Europa league will be treated like the Cpital One cup(i.e play the 'kids'), then I have no time for 5th place trophy either.
Now 6th would be a proper fall from grace. It would sum up what is quite obvious. Our squad needs an overhaul. Less quantity more quality and no more utopian socialist wage structure. Good wages for good players, average wages for squad players and P45s for shite from the academy upwards.
It's the only league position that would guarantee the kind of root and branch overhaul we need.
Then maybe this thread would become less of an inside joke and real sense of excitement at players we are linked with not the usual .
highburyJD wrote:doesn't the idea of CL being prioritised over FACup:
topgoon wrote:I've had it with the champs league. We prioritise it over the domestic cups:
directly contradict not trying to win it:
topgoon wrote:even though we make no serious attempt to win it bar 2006.
what did we do differently in '06 that constituted trying to win it? In the transfer window our main investment was a non-eligible player...
I think that you know what he means JD. Nobody is suggesting that we don't try and win every game we play. But we don't try and win the competition from the sense that we will never invest anywhere near the money it'll take to transform our playing squad into one capable of winning the competition.
franksav63 wrote:Had Keown as a defensive coach who actually drilled the back 4, until of course he got too much credit and Wenger fucked him off in the summer...
never heard any credit given to Keown except on here, long after he left
Dortmund have not made huge investments, they sell their best players
and they have made it to the final, money is not the only way
(and suggesting it is only constitutes a big excuse for our club)
franksav63 wrote:Had Keown as a defensive coach who actually drilled the back 4, until of course he got too much credit and Wenger fucked him off in the summer...
never heard any credit given to Keown except on here, long after he left
Dortmund have not made huge investments, they sell their best players
and they have made it to the final, money is not the only way
(and suggesting it is only constitutes a big excuse for our club)
franksav63 wrote:Had Keown as a defensive coach who actually drilled the back 4, until of course he got too much credit and Wenger fucked him off in the summer...
never heard any credit given to Keown except on here, long after he left
Dortmund have not made huge investments, they sell their best players
and they have made it to the final, money is not the only way
(and suggesting it is only constitutes a big excuse for our club)
So you finally admit AW is not up to the job!
...confused,
can't see any mention of Wenger in my post
franksav63 wrote:Had Keown as a defensive coach who actually drilled the back 4, until of course he got too much credit and Wenger fucked him off in the summer...
never heard any credit given to Keown except on here, long after he left
Dortmund have not made huge investments, they sell their best players
and they have made it to the final, money is not the only way
(and suggesting it is only constitutes a big excuse for our club)
So you finally admit AW is not up to the job!
...confused,
can't see any mention of Wenger in my post
) - maybe if wenger fcuks off then kroenke will too cos he cash cow will be a big loss to him
)
) I'm right that we'll use the sponsorship money to invest in players.
