Yes, this was the decision that had to be made. I can't, so I don't know if it's been properly reinvested. As far as we know it hasn't been reinvested yet, or has been partially (Cazorla maybe? Monreal?). If the club has said directly as to whom the money has gone towards then let me know (I know that Grimandi said Giroud was signed with one eye on Van Persie leaving, for instance). I will say that, if Giroud is the sole replacement for Van Persie and reinvestment in a striker isn't forthcoming this summer then I agree that the initial signs aren't good. I doubt anyone would have come in and contributed at the level Van Persie did in his last 18 months at the club; however that doesn't really let Giroud off the hook as he's been patchy. It's his first season and he may improve, but relying on him alone for another season is a big risk.
Still not entirely clear how it works but it looks like Totsfan gave me some negative rep, I'll take that as a compliment So one person can give -117000 rep points in one go?? Isn't that a bit of a pointless feature?
I'm not sure how the rep is calculated, but it is a bit pointless - especially when you consider this exists: http://www.not606.com/showthread.php/69239-The-Rep-Brothel
Totsfan doesn't have enough rep to do that much damage, Cini. Go to Control Panel and it'll tell you the last 5 pieces of rep that you received.
So United some how managed to get a whole season from Van Persie without injury. I wonder where we would be in the table if the turncoat had stayed with us?
Before anyone suspects me, I don't use the rep very much. I very occasionally give positive rep and I can't remember ever giving negative rep. However it may mean that if you don't use the feature very much, and then give/take rep once, that it counts for a lot. I don't know.
I use the thumbs up/down quite a bit. Not used rep for a while now - at least since it stopped pissing people off
Here we go, you trot out all those reasons that we have answered 50 times before. It is like every three months you have to bring up the conspiricy theories all over again. Enough already! If you are not convinced that everybody at Arsenal wants to win, and is doing all they can do to win with every resource that they have available then I can't convince you of that here, but to me it seems obvious that richer clubs do better. Why do we have to deal with this every single thread? Man United played well this year and got the breaks. I think that they would have won without RVP. They might not have won as easily, but they would still have won. They were that dominant. RVP had a great year, but SAF seems to be able to find a way to win and can afford to slot in a player when he needs one. He would have just paid the money to get someone else, he didn't need RVP specifically.
What conspiracy theories? Everything I named are facts, we are a selling club, selling our best players, to rival teams. Which part of that is wrong? As I said, you're response is bullshit because you come up with nonsense like ohhhh but they wanted to leave, and I addressed that, why did they want to leave? Simple, because they wanted to win stuff, and they saw other top players being sold, which isn't a good sign for a supposed 'elite' club looking to supposedly win things. And no, I'm NOT CONVINCED AT ALL that Arsenal currently want to win every competition, if you seriously believe that this club has a main priority of winning the league, then you truly are deluded. It's been quite clear over the past 2 years, that the priority has been to simple achieve a top 4 spot, that's all, nothing to do with challenging or competing for trophies. Tell me, what part of being 20 points behind United shows a sign of this club wanting or having an ambition to compete for the title? Please stop with your ****ing PR bullshit.
... and Nasri realised that being at a club with bottomless resources allows you to do this. Van Persie went to the club who has won the league 13 times out of the last 20 attempts, who also have far more resources than Arsenal (being the richest club in football and everything). Money is a factor, and a very large one. It can't be ignored. As for ambition, I guess it depends on whether or not you believe Wenger tells his players that 70 points will be fine instead of 90; I doubt he does, though of course neither of us knows what he says to the players on the matter. I seem to remember there being a lot of talk a while back about how the budget of the club is designed to make sure they can fail to qualify for the UCL without making a loss; I can see how this comes across as having less ambition, though I think - like most things in life - the situation is more complex than that.
I don't think money was a factor for RVP, if it was, he would have gone to City, he could've gotten a much fatter paycheque over there. Just put yourself in RVP's shoes. He's 29, he wants to win stuff, he's playing his best football ever, and at Arsenal, what he sees is us selling our best players, not properly replacing them, and obviously getting negatively affected by this on the pitch, which is why rather than compete for the title or other cups, we're fighting until the last day to get into the top 4. RVP looked at it, and saw he had a much better chance of success at United, than Arsenal, and sadly, he's been proven right, he just won the title, while it's the same old story with Arsenal, fighting for top 4, and a failure to properly replace the outgoing players (RVP, Song). As for Wenger telling the players we only need 70 pts, I don't think he does that, but everything at this club, is currently geared towards insuring we get that 70 pts to secure that top 4 spot, that's the main priority, I don't think anyone can honestly say over the past 2 years, that what we've been doing has been to make this club compete and win titles, rather everything we've been doing, has been clearly to simply insure that top 4 spot.
To say money wasn't a factor doesn't bear fruit when you consider that he gets paid far more now than Arsenal could afford to pay. He may well have been happy getting the same wage - or even a wage cut - to go to United, but we don't know how the negotiations panned out. As for going to United over City (did they make a bid?), it makes more sense because United have a much richer tradition of winning things, backed up by that extra financial clout that Arsenal don't have.
Look let's face the harsh facts: Van Persie left us for a BIGGER club. Manchester United are a bigger club...who consistently buy the best and have continually proved they are the best. We have small minded owners, a small minded manager and plenty of small minded fans who are happy to support/justify mediocrity. That goal he scored for United to go 2-0 up proves my point...that kind of quality deserves to secure league titles NOT scrape 4th in order to qualify for a competition we've never won...and certainly do not look like winning in the near future.
