Picked this up from Le Grove It would be good to see this come to fruition. An investor and supporter in Alisher Usmanov would return our beloved club to it's glory days. I do hope Mr Kroenke does pick up the phone without delay
If Arsenal drop out of the top four, this WILL happen. In short, we have to have a crap season to have many good ones.
Indeed and sadly, that may be the only way to our return to the winner's circle my friend. I think Alisher Usmanov whose involvement I believe was once championed by David Dein could well take us to greater heights yet since his investment would bring players of quite an extraordinary calibre that would make Barcelona quite envious.
I honestly don't think it would take 100s of millions to take us back to the top, we are already a very profitable club, the one area that we fail is commercially, we get 5 million a season from emirates, whereas man u and Liverpool get 20 million shirt sponsorship, and man u have just signed a deal with DHL to sponsor there training kit. Now I know we had to take a slight hit on that contract to help secure loans for the stadium, but it's still a lot of money we are missing out on. Therefore I would welcome usmanov into the fold, as we could then up the wage cap and buy a couple of truly world class players, we don't need to go out and buy two complete teams like city have. I think the board and manager are reluctant to spend really big because they know it is no guarantee of success, at the moment we are a profitable club playing in the champions league. If we were to have a net spend of 50 to 60 million we might still only end up in the same position (i.e just scraping 4th place) but then the 50 to 60 million debt that we just wasted would probably cripple us for the next 4 or 5 years, and mean we wouldn't be able to spend any substantial money again. I know we spent quite a lot of money this summer but we still made a profit like most transfer windows of the last 5 years. Usmanovs money would mean that if we did spend big and it did not work, we would still be able to compete and not be crippled for years to come, it would allow us to take a chance, and not have to worry too much about the consequences. But we would not need to do a city and waste fortunes on transfer fees and wages, I certainly would not expect or advocate paying stupid wages to players that are not that good, and would not be for us paying more than 150k to our top stars, therefore we would still be financing most of it ourselves, but usmanov would simply be like and insurance policy, or that extra little bit of help that we need. And if we were to do this I still think we would not make a loss, maybe just break even.
Wouldn't be surprised if Usmanov paid the writer to say something like this, it is such a blatant piece of PR. Shame on anyone who wants him in charge of us.
And what exactly has morals got to do with it, and if you have read my post properly I was actually suggesting that he doesn't have to give us loads of money, mealry provided funds if they were needed in the event that spending a reasonable amount lead the club into trouble
Personally I wouldn't want him anywhere near the club. That's nothing to do with the amount of money we'd need at the club, merely because he's got a very dark history and I wouldn't want the club to be associated with it (moreso than it already is).
Its got nothing to do with the amount of money he would give us, the guy is more dodgy than Abramovic.
Before I start a storm here I would just like to say that until the above posts were made I had not looked up the supposed background of Alisher Usmanov. Having searched some of the material and I have to admit not having had the time to read everything out there, while I would definitely agree that his lawyers' approach to requiring the ISP to take down critical blogs of their client, I have not ( as yet ) seen anything which amounts to evidence of the man being party to the acts of which he is accused. I am similarly unaware of the state of play following what I believed to be David Dein's initial support of Mr Usmanov's involvement with Arsenal. Until concrete or persuasive evidence is produced I see Alisher Usmanov as any prospective benefactor of Arsenal and no worse than any of the well-heeled supporters of either of our main rivals. Now, please take this in the light of my declaration of ignorance of the man. Perhaps if we had a majority shareholder that took a more active role in the club and who would come out clearly supporting the future development of Arsenal as opposed to see it drifting at best and at worse sliding into becoming no more than a bit player in the world of football, then the question of looking at support from Mr Usmanov might not arise. Perhaps if the board had the future and success of the club at heart, they might have tried to find a way so that the club would not be in this woeful position and having to rely on the coming of a new set of regulations, the effectiveness of which is yet to be determined.
http://www.forbes.com/profile/alisher-usmanov http://www.forbes.com/profile/roman-abramovich If you check what Forbes writes about Usmanov and Abramovich, there is a striking difference in their lifestyles and business interests. Abramovich spends on his yachts, while Usmanov buys shares of Facebook, Zynga etc. And Usmanov is several billions richer than Roman.
What I can see is the team sliding and not much done to halt this. Is there preference that a solid balance sheet and high share price be attained at the risk of the club's performances go downhill? A sustainable business model is one thing but I wonder if some folk may look towards the maximisation of the share price above all and everything else? WHy is it that our majority shareholder is so silent about matters of the club and indeed his intentions? Why is it too that others have called his role to question and raised the possibility of Mr Usmanov's greater involvement in the club? We are all here to discuss so let's do so
Well we sure need something to help us get back to the top again Cym. The board's insistence of a wages cap doesn't help bring in the big guns we need. I'd really hate to see us sliding into Europa Cup territory. That's a role reserved for the likes of Pool If Manu Utd can get the job done by going into debt and climbing out of it, by buying the right players, paying them what they are worth ( Now I'm not saying any player is worth the crazy money some of them are earning ), raising the commercial profile of the club, then why can't these wonderful money men like Mr Gazidis whom we have employed get this done too?
This is not the case, I do not want usmanov to come in and throw millions at the club and nor do I think it is necessary, but I do think we need a small helping hand or even someone willing to provide a bit of insurance in case the club did get into difficulty, if we went down the route of increasing the wage cap and willingness to buy a few top class players. If kronke is willing to do this then fine, but so far it seems he is not willing to do anything of the sort.
