Ivan Gazidis suggests Gunners won't be looking to spend big this summer

Arsenal chief executive Ivan Gazidis appears to have laid the marker for the rest of the transfer window in an interview with ESPN.

Unfortunately for Arsenal supporters, despite the club's wealth, Gazidis has suggested a frugal approach to the transfer window may be the way forward.

Granit Xhaka is the Gunners' only summer signing to date at a fee of £30m, while Bolton youngster Rob Holing looks set to join for £2m.

Nonetheless, Gazidis said: "The big clubs can't financially bully the smaller clubs in the way they used to, so I think a lot of the differentiators between clubs become more subtle now.

"It's how well you can identify talent. It's how well you can develop talent. It's how strong your club philosophy is. It's how together you are as a football club, what your support services are like in the medical field, fitness, analytics, psychology. All of these things become differentiators."

"Leicester identified players from the French second division, so maybe there's talent that we've been overlooking. They did their talent identification [well], they had great unity within the group, as well as quality.

"It wasn't built on money. It was built on the great fitness work they did. It was built on all of these other elements. I think that's going to be a continuing trend within the Premier League.

"This approach, for us, gives us a very, very powerful balance because it's not just about spending money but about how you spend your money and doing it wisely," said Gazidis. "It's about having a strong core philosophy and values within the club that players buy into and our fans can be proud of.

He added: "We're making progress in what is a fiercely competitive world, against competitors that have the capability to spend far more money than we do. We're doing it by being very, very disciplined; spending money where we believe it makes a difference, but also giving young players a chance and believing in ourselves and our values."

Oh dear, looks like Gazidis is making his excuses early. Rather than reassuring the Arsenal faithful that they are looking for a top CF signing, we get spun a story of balance sheets again...

 

The issue here is his comparison to Leicester City:

Leicester had no pressure whatsoever to become champions; mainly because noone expected them to be; their fans were happy with staying up.

Our fans bring much expectation - as we are a club that really should be winning titles.

Picking up players from the "second division in France" is risky because they wont have time to bed in and actually show their true potential due to the pressures they will face / the groans in the stands.

Conclusion: Ivan Gazidis is an idiot.

 

Gazidis is missing three key points here:

1) As white_gunner has pointed out, Leicester were not trying to win the PL, they were trying to stay IN the PL. No one expected them to win it, but they did, through a combination of ALL their summer signings being FAR better than anyone could have hoped for (which is a one in a million shot), great management tactically from Ranieiri, and all of the other usual contenders having mediocre (Arsenal, City) or catastrophic (Utd, Chelsea) seasons.

2) Leicester didn't spend big because they couldn't, Arsenal has more financial flex in its little finger than Leicester has in entirety, this is no disrespect to Leicester, its just a fact.

3) EVERYONE with half a brain knows where Arsenal needs to improve. You still haven't replaced Van Persie (after selling him to a title rival, rather cheaply I should add).How is it that every Arsenal fan in the country, heck every football fan in the country, knows what Arsenal needs to do to get back to the top, yet this fact escapes Wenger and the Arsenal board? Arsenal have the second biggest stadium in the country and one of the top 10 fanbases worldwide, yet they have been cruising by on the cheap for such a long time. How long can they ride their luck like this? Yes you can say Wenger is great at getting top 4 etc. But football fans want to see their clubs win trophies, they want to see them at least trying to win League titles and competing in the latter stages of the Champions league, and for a club like Arsenal, top 4 and a last 16 CL exit every year is starting to get tiresome. Heck even having a meltdown season like my club Chelsea and finishing tenth once in a while is more exciting than perennial top 4 and not competing, as long as you bounce back and win league titles and a CL title (which Chelsea have been doing the last decade).

I have to second white_Gunner's conclusion: Gazidis is an idiot.
Arsenal is being turned from a football club, into a profitable organisation for a bunch of board members to line their pockets with the hard earned cash of its fans, whilst offering little to no return on that investment in the form of progress on the football pitch. I mean how many ****ing years is it going to take for you to buy a decent ****ing striker? christ almighty! There are names out there that are obtainable, you have the cash, just get it done ffs!

 

Gazidis is not an idiot because of that. I don't think 'it' (our obvious footballing weaknesses) escapes him at all. It's become quite clear that he, and Wenger, don't actually care about addressing 'it' because there's no need to address it in order for them to achieve what they want and/or need to to stay in a job.

However, what does make Gazidis a complete idiot is him spouting this and expecting people to buy it. Of course, some will (*cough cough* could name a few on here) but come on... it's Chemical-Ali-like bullsh!t that doesn't even need dissecting to explain why it's clearly bullsh!t.

Then again, maybe he doesn't expect anyone to buy it and simply doesn't give a flying fcuk, and is merely sitting on a throne of £50 notes made from season ticket renewals laughing smoking a cigar.

 

Also missed this gem on first reading:

"...it's about what your support services are like in the medical field, fitness... "

In which case were also fcuked Ivan!

 

I have always maintained that Arsenal's horrific injury stats are down to Wenger's prehistoric training methods.

 

I think you need to look a little deeper into Leicester's finance's

 

Leicester's turnover for 2014/2015 (When they signed those players) was a little under £100m I believe.
Arsenals was about £380m or thereabouts that year.

 

Depressing reading

 

Yep, but their owners are much richer and could "do a City" if they needed/chose, as in sponsoring the club through other businesses and staying within ffp.

 

Aye but they didn't.
There is always a way, I suppose.

 

You mean the haven't.
As of yet it has all gone better and faster than they expected. If things go tits up and they really want to stay at the top end then they can and probably will.

 

Knew it. I saw this sort of statement coming from a mile off. I mean did anyone truly expect anything different from the past? I'd say it's naivety if anyone genuinely believed things would be any different this summer.

Do Wenger and Gazidis really think the fans are this stupid, though? I mean really? All this nonsense about 'not being able to compete with the rich clubs', despite a new injection of cash from a TV deal, having spent barely anything (relative to the money we have) in the last few seasons, being one of the top 10 richest clubs in Europe and the fact that we don't need to service our debt for the stadium any longer through player sales? Also, isn't our wage budget very close to Chelsea's and City's now?

Bizarrely, I feel Gazidis would get less flack if he was just brutally honest about his expectations for Arsenal, rather than trying to disguise it through bullshit statements like this. Because everyone can see straight through it.

 

Every season, you guys all renew your season tickets.
Only way to stop this bullshit is to speak with your wallets.
Pointless turning up to games with banners, because if you are AT the game, then you have already done the part they care about, handed over your cash.
It's like what Eazy-E said back in the 80's when those Anti-gangsta rap demonstrators would get together thousands of NWA CD's and cassettes and burn them in mass protest to their "dirty" music.
"Hey, as long as they paid for those bitches, I don' give a **** wha' da **** they do wid em!"

 

Never thought I'd say it, but wise words from Easy-E. Well the excuses are starting to roll in and all it takes is Wenger to chip in and confirm a rather ordinary summer transfer. To be honest, the Granite transfer wasn't even a priority, our main one was a CF, CD and then a winger. We did need a CM with the departure of Rosicky and Arteta but we are still fairly well stocked there. But we know how Wenger loves his central midfielders so that is one area that we know he'll always get players in.

 

We'll likely end the transfer window having spent less than some of the mid table clubs, really don;t get where he's coming from with the not being able to compete comments

 

Aye they are talking bollocks.
The way its done these days. with FFP, Arsenal are in a far better situation to compete financially than any other club in the PL bar Man United, who have a monster turnover.

 

Reports today are that we are about to spend £41m on Mahrez.

 

It'd be welcome if we get a striker as well. I think he'd help give us a different dimension in attack, but we'd still need a 30-goal striker. But tbh its probably just bs paper talk

 

You cant take any notice of things like this.

The Club has in the past claimed they were 'ready to spend big' and nothing has happened. Conversely Wenger has claimed he 'didn't need to make signings' then gone out and added.

Best not to read too much into these statements.