According to goal.com favours a move to Arsenal over City and Chelski. Now I know it is only goal.com however, if we were indeed his preferred choice of club, where would this leave Arsene Wenger and the board? I think Wenger's contract expires in 2014, and I think the board also need to carefully consider whether they feel Arsene has the hunger and vision to carry us forward if he is to continue beyond that time. http://www.goal.com/en-gb/news/2896...-tells-arsenal-youre-my-top-choice-in-england
Guardiola spent a net £136m (168m EUR) on players while at Barca, including a net £99m in his first two seasons. Fun for the fans maybe, but maybe not too appealing for the board.
I think you need to do your homework, because you obviously haven't. Arsenal have spent over 100 million in the past 3 seasons, in the past 2 seasons alone, we've spent over 90 million pounds. This is the problem with lot's of Arsenal fans, they don't actually know we are spending lot's of money, and have created this myth that Wenger doesn't spend much, the problem is that Wenger does spend, although he could spend more, but what he does spend on, is a lot of players who end up being rubbish for us. So you sir, are wrong, Guardiola's expenditures are more than affordable at this club, especially when the new sponsorship money starts arriving, which will be up to 50 million alone, 25 million from Shirt-Stadium deal, and another 25 million for our kit designer, whether it's Nike or Addidas.
Well that should no longer be the case as our new sponsorship deals should give us 50 million in cash, and we should have at least 15-30 million available from other income sources.
To me the good thing about Guardiola is that he is more demanding than Wenger when is comes to pressing, team defending, playing without the ball and generally working on the pitch. At least he demanded that from his Barca players. And lets face it, Barca work ethics is so much higher than Arsenal. I am not sure about Wenger any more to be honest. Against Bradford a lot of Arsenal players were static without the ball in the first half, actually it was the case all season. Much too often a player on the ball does not have options. Players are just ball gazing. Still Wenger says he can not fault the effort. I guess Guardiola would be surprised by the lack of team/defensive discipline at Arsenal. Whether he is capable to change anything is another question. Anyway for some reason I doubt if Wenger would be very happy for Guardiola to succed him at Arsenal, even though they share the same philosophy. Simply because Guardiola may improve things immediately which will make Wenger look really bad... Arsene has his old pal Stoikovich or whats his name. And the more I think about it the more I like this option - if indeed Guardiola wants to manage Arsenal. It is a rare chance to get him while he is available. Just like Wenger was an expert in French league when there was a lot of quality players, Guardiola knows La Liga. And Spanish players would love to work with the guy. We can do much much worse than Guardiola. Problem is Arsenal never buys top players, why would they buy a top manager?
I have very much noticed this. Support seems to be lacking in an awful lot of occasions, both attacking and defending.
One of the most curious things about our situation is that our manager is probably the most respected manager in the world. Within the business there are very few knowledgeable people who would not consider him one of the very best in the world, and I can't think of very many clubs that wouldn't jump at the chance to have him manage their club. Similarly, most analysts will tell you that the club is a model of how a club should be run, in order to build success. Experts in sports finance will tell you that Arsenal Football club is a shining example of how you build a club for success over the years. The people most critical of Arsenal are journalists looking for a story and Arsenal fans desperately looking for success. Anyone who knows anything seems to be saying that Arsenal have done everything right, it is just that the gods of sport have not been kind to us. I am sure Guardiola is a top manager and like most people he is a fan of Wenger, I'm not sure employing him will lead to any change at the club. I'm surprised that he is emerging as someone who the fans want. His philosophy on football and management seem to me to be virtually identical to Wenger's. I'm just surprised that those calling for the sacking of Wenger want to replace him with someone who is hardly any different. It is almost pagan in the way that some fans are calling for Wenger's head, as if there is no logic in the decision, but maybe a sacrifice will appease the gods.
One of the tactical issues last season was Arsenal over-pressing. If you press too hard you are very suceptable to the long ball. I agree with you that we backed off Bradford too much in the first half, ant that was wrong, but I think that was because we gave them too much respect. I wouldn't draw much from the Bradford game, we don't play against league 2 opposition very often. One of the thing Bould has done with the team is to stop pressing so hard, stop playing a high line. This is one of the things that I think Guardiola will have to learn. In England we play the long ball very well, it is a very effective counter to pressing and short passing. I am not encouraged that you think Guardiola will come in and make that mistake.
I agree with most of what you say. And I am not calling for Wenger's head. Far from it. What I think is that sooner or later Wenger will have to go due to his age. And it may happen that if and when he decides to go there will be no one of Guardiola caliber ( and, what is importatnt to me - philosophy) available or willing to manage Arsenal. What I dread is is what has happened to Spurs or Liverpool - a revolving door at the manager's office. This is why i am saying that Guardiola option this summer would not be a disaster.
I like Guardiola, i think he shares similar ideas to Wenger, i think he'd look to bring in a similar type of player and it would be a good continuation for the club to have him step in when Wenger leaves - but i don't want Wenger to go yet. He inherited a good team at Barca and he spent alot of money on players, but he did improve the team and get them playing to there best. I also think big money transfers are done on purpose by barca as a way for the president of the club to get fans on side. I think he would know soem good players from La Liga to bring over and i think alot of people would like to play for him. If he came to us in a few years and was to stay with us for a long period of time i could see him re-signing Fabregas in his later career. The issue i have with Guardiola is at Barca he had a great setup and a winning team and after 4 years we got bored and wanted to move on. I want a Manager who is going to be with the club for a long period of time and i'd be concerned that Guardiola would want to move on too quickly.
Great post! It is baffling to me why some want to swap a manager who is proven on so many levels in the English game for a manager who would have an awful lot of adjustments to make!
Because some people think that changing the manager would be like waving a magic wand that would create an instant improvement. Personally, I think the people who hold this view haven't really thought the idea through properly about what would actually happen, which would in all likelihood mean a good few years of rebuilding, learning new tactics, players coming in and out new coaching staff and a complete culture shift. If people want Wenger out because of a lack of trophies, I think they are living in cloud cuckoo land to think that a new manager coming in would instantly start winning them again.
