I think everyone understands this. However, the bitterness towards chelski stems from the way the club acts like it 'earned' its recent success, whereas the truth is it didn't earn sod all. It bought it.
What a ridiculous comment. Spending what you earn v spending what someone has earnt elsewhere. There is no honour or glory in someone buying something for me. The honour comes from earning every penny to buy it for myself. Spurs missed Top4 by 1 goal this season. They're a club run as well as Arsenal, but with significantly lower income due to stadium size, sponsorship deals & commercial interests. To finish a so close to Arsenal and the big-money clubs at the end of the season is nothing short of incredible for them.
It's no more or less earned than any of Arsenal's titles. Henry Norris (a Tory MP and businessman) took over and poured vast amounts into Arsenal - who were mediocre at the time with poor attendances - and relocated you to North London in a move that cost not far off £300m in today's money. That allowed your club to grow and along with appointing a brilliant manager like Hebert Chapman, you moved from strength to strength winning titles on the back of huge investment. That was a platform for you to grow and we are no different. The real bitterness towards Chelsea stems from the fact people want to treat football as a business and sport when it can never be both. People are happy for the PL to sell its brand across the world, and when all of a sudden a foreigner takes note and decides he wants in everybody wants to cry wolf and say Russian/Arab money is "killing" the game. The only difference is that pre-Sky it was local millionaires, now thanks to the neo-liberal policies introduced to the sport it's foreign billionaires. Earned is a completely subjective term in itself.
If the "Arab and Russian" billionaires ran the club anything closely resembling a business it would get cause far much less grief. They certainly don't want a piece of the commercial pie - both clubs are run at a tremendous loss. I agree with you that the reason they got involved was because of how big Sky and other sports networks have made the league, but in no way is it a investment - they are playthings at best. You have every right to equate local millionaires being similar to foreign billionaires argument , even though it is an exaggerated example. But equating Sky money to Billionaire money is a terribly false comparison Sky is a business that makes profit and spends the money they do because they get returns on their investment UTD and other teams like Arsenal and because they way the money is divided (unlike La Liga) the tiny clubs have also benefited tremendously. UTD/Arsenal especially have earned rewards for their success in the modern era by winning and dominating football (UTD far more than Arsenal because they have been far more successful) so yes "Sky money" has made a difference but mostly because they were the best. Chelsea have bought success and even after 7-8 yeas have not even managed to break even remotely close to even it is a false success in that sense. So while some part of your arguments do hold your football patriotism does blind you to some of the reality that is "Chelski" FC.
During the half time talk in the Newcastle game one of the pundits commented that Arsenals net spend since (I think it was) since the move to the Emirates is £9m. So that would mean we've been effectively cost neutral on transfers until Monreal was bought and STILL maintained a top 4 finish every year. Imo that is an amazing stat.
I don't know why you assume that I have trouble understanding net spend to be honest, but then you do tend to make a lot of assumptions. As previously stated, Spurs may have had a break even net spend, but they still spent £60m on transfers, the 3rd highest in the league. Out of the players you mention. The only real quality purchases were Lloris and Vertonghen. Both bought as Freidel and King are finished, so they were good replacements. Parker wasn't replaced, he played towards the end of the season. Adebayor looked like he couldn't give a **** as soon as he got his contract (we did tell you he is was a liability) As for Dembele and Bale. Dembele was a good purchase, but more an eventual replacement for Parker than VDV and Bale already played for you, so he wasn't a direct replacement for Modric. The two MF players you did buy to fill the void, Siggurdsen and Holtby look like weak appointments to be honest. Overall £60m was a lot of money to replace a GK, CB and CM with players of modest repute.
No assumptions necessary. You've repeatedly demonstrated that net spending puzzles you, yet I've no idea why. If a team sells all of their players for £100m and replaces them for £50m, then you wouldn't expect them to improve, would you? Players can be replaced from within the squad, Piskie. You don't have to sign a direct replacement for someone. Sandro took Parker's place, then got injured. Dembele took Modric's place in the team, though he fills the role very differently. His style of play complemented the Brazilian's, but doesn't suit the older, less dynamic man, which we saw in the second half of the campaign. Perhaps if you continue to repeat £60m over and over again it might look like you've got some kind of point. As everyone else on this thread seems to disagree with you, I'm guessing that's not going to cut it, though.
No you've made another assumption alright, they are almost becoming 'PNPisms' The salient point of Spurs' transfer spend is that they spent as much as they earned, but finished a place lower. And if it wasn't for the Bale effect masking a multitude of sins (Siggurdson, Holtby, Dempsey, Adebayor) then you would have finished a lot lower.
What assumption did I make? No, the salient points are that all of the teams that finished above us had a higher net spend and much higher wages, as did some of those that finished below us. As I've already pointed out, Sigurdsson and Holtby weren't replacing Modric and van der Vaart. The German only joined in January, too. If anything they were replacing Kranjcar, Pienaar and Dos Santos. Yet again you've failed to understand why spending is irrelevant when it's not net spend. You've also ignored a very simple question, so I'll repeat it: If a team sells all of their players for £100m and replaces them for £50m, then would you expect them to improve? Nobody has voiced their agreement with you on this thread and anyone that has offered an opinion on the subject has disagreed with you. You're spotting assumptions where there are none, again.
Where do you start ? You made an assumption that I didn't know what net spend means. But seeing as you keep asking it makes me wonder if you realise what it means ? So I'll inform you - Net spend is the difference money earned and money spent. You then made an assumption that 'everyone else disagrees' with me that your £60m (3rd highest in the PL) spent on players like Siggurdsen, Dempsey, Holtby and Adebayor represents good value for money. But then watered it down to say that nobody has voiced their agreement with me And again, the salient point is that for the investment you made (regardless of the income you had) the players you bought did not represent good value for £60m - as demonstrated by your failure to improve on your finishing position from the previous season.
Nope. I pointed out that it seems to confuse you, not that you didn't know what it meant. Wrong again. I pointed out that those that offered an opinion on the subject disagreed with you. Some people on this thread have discussed different things altogether. Wrong yet again, despite your editing and failure to answer a simple question. Other clubs spent far more than we did and Chelsea improved quite dramatically because of their enormous spending. Why would you expect us to improve more than sides who vastly outspend us? That makes no sense. City's wage bill is roughly treble ours, for example.
You still haven't shown that I've made a single assumption. Still haven't answered that very simple question, either.
