Soldato
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Wenger goes shopping!
The only thing wrong with that is that Wenger would have come back with nothing
Summer Transfer Window 2013/2014 aka Arsenal , we can afford folks and the mancs really want Fellani
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The only thing wrong with that is that Wenger would have come back with nothing
Soldato
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Do Arsenal want Michu? I think it was a mistake for Arsenal to come out and say thay had money to spend, clubs can hold us to ransom and play silly buggers.
Heard that we might turn our attention to him but Swansea will be asking for a stupidly high price now, seeing as the window is almost finishing and they will be looking to replace him if they can.
Wouldnt surprise me if Swansea say sure you can have him but we want £30mill+ for him.
Soldato
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Worst thing is that now Arteta could be out for 6 weeks...huge loss there and we have lost out on Gustavo who would have been more than capable to take over from Arteta. Hes signed for Wolfsburg on a 5 yr contract :/. But unless we sign some players, i can see us struggling with injuries. Only a matter of time before Wilshere gets injured and doesnt play for the rest of the season
LOL
I was so excited about Gustavo, he looked exactly the sort of player we have been needing for years. And he signs for Wolfsburg...
Makes you wonder if we were ever actually trying to sign him or anyone.
At the start of the summer it looked like they had learnt from their mistakes and getting in there early. But as time has dragged on we are now one day before kickoff and only some french kid.
God knows what our bench is going to look like tomorrow
Do you Arsenal fans realise you don't have a sugar daddy like City and Chelsea yeah? Who have Man U signed? What i find hilarious is, if Wenger had spent the 37.5m on Higuain and turned out to be a bit of flop. You'd be all up in arms about spending 15m more than you should have, Wenger can't win, literally. You've finished in the top 4 for the 16 years, your squad is sweet..
And please don't come back with "oh..but Spurs have spent 60mil" ...completely different scenario, it's make or break for them this season. Wenger isn't going to waste 60mil down on players that might not even make the squad that much better. His job certainly would be on the line then if they didn't work out. Fans are so fickle..
And please don't come back with "oh..but Spurs have spent 60mil" ...completely different scenario, it's make or break for them this season. Wenger isn't going to waste 60mil down on players that might not even make the squad that much better. His job certainly would be on the line then if they didn't work out. Fans are so fickle..
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Soldato
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Don't come out with that fans are fickle rubbish. If he signed higuain for £35m and he turned out to be a flop then apart from DM who would have a field day I dont think the rest of us would care. Obviously be a little disappointed but its a gamble as it is with every transfer.
It's not about wasting money its about not having to play midfielders in defence or only having one real striker. Or making Attacking midfielders play as defensive midfielders. We were short on players last season and we have only signed some french kid and let a load go.
The ones left are good but there aren't many that are left that arent prone to injury.
Arsenal were the ones who came out and said they were going to spend big, the fans didnt expect it. Now we are one day from kick off and they havent spent any money. Thats not being fickle, its questioning what is going on at the club.
Questioning what's going on at the club? I thought you lot knew, i don't know how many times i've said it, Stan Kroenke has no interest in winning trophies. The fans can't seem to get that through their skulls though..
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Caporegime
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Because it wasn't remarkable, because we often have good form at the end of the season, because we often blow the start of the season, have good form till the three week window jan/feb where we blow the champs league, blow the carling cup, blow the league and blow the fa cup.... then after we're out of everything we do well till the end of the season. Usually ignored is that the teams above us are still in multiple competitions so have more games, often the teams below us are in more competitions still(varies by year obviously) so more games, and we have a 150mil squad vs the 80-90mil squad that Spurs have so end of season we just have more players than basically any team below us to help us finish strongly.
Lets break down the great end to the season we had, we could say it was from West Ham or after the loss to Spurs. If we take the final 10 games where we moved from 5th to 4th(amazing, and finished 1 entire point above Spurs). We beat Swansea(gave up after the cup), Reading, West Brom(gave up after being safe), Norwich, drew with Everton, beat Fulham, drew with Utd (gave up with 10 games to go pretty much), then beat QPR, Wigan and Newcastle.............
Bad, no, but did I really stretch the truth in terms of Utd playing like turd(and still managing the draw) or West Brom/Swansea giving up, EVERYONE said so before Arsenal beat them because its what happened. Of the more difficult games we failed to beat anyone significant, Everton, Utd, Spurs, Liverpool, Chelsea, City.
Arsenal only won 9 games in the first half of the season and that was with winning the last 4 games in that first half. Those four games were against West Brom, REading, Wigan, Newcastle. That's how football goes, sometimes you get all the tough fixtures at the start, all the easy ones at the end. It doesn't change how uncompetitive we were, how incapable we are of beating the big teams, or fluff big games against small teams in cups. Nothing changed last season, just a kind fixture list at the end of the season against tired smaller teams.
Is Arsenals squad worth as much as Chelsea/City/United???
Edit, oh even Spurs have spent more money than Arsenal in the last 10 years, go look at some facts about transfers in and out please before laying claim to 150mil squads versus 80mil squads.
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Caporegime
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I've said time and time again I don't care about risk, I don't care about buying players and them failing, expensive or cheap. I care about spending money on players we KNOW aren't good enough and stick with them I care about not trying to improve. Trying and failing I'm absolutely okay with, NOT trying AND failing is absolutely unforgivable. Sticking with sick note Diaby who is utterly hopeless when he does play and continuing to pay a player we KNOW will never play a full season or even 1/3 of a season, who we KNOW isn't good enough is utterly utterly unforgivable.
If Higuain cost 60mil and failed, that's life, we could buy Ronaldo tomorrow for 200mil knowing he's a brilliant player, he could get cancer, or his kid could get ill, his mother might die, anything might happen and he might lose all focus or motivation for football and play badly. That's life, a risk, I accept that. You can't predict the future, but making bad decisions on what you actually do know, over and over, isn't forgivable and that is what Wenger has been doing.
As for spending money, again Spurs spend 80-90mil in wages and finish a point behind us, we spend 150mil in wages... and make an extra 20-25mil from the champs league......... Arsenal DO spend and I wish people would learn to do simply math and realise that we do spend. We spend it on wages, other teams spend it on transfers. We have far more financial power than a club like Spurs(due to vasty high stadium income Spurs simply can't match and soon to be sponsorship deals a team not in the champs league can't match), we spend it on wages on crap players we know aren't good enough rather than getting rid of those players, saving the money and having cash to make more buys. This is Wenger's choice, and he's choosing badly. We must have given Diaby upwards of 15mil in wages by now and that money could have been spent on someone helping the team, that is ONE player over 7-8 years who shouldn't have been at the club for the past 5-6 years at least.
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It doesn't matter how good our starting 11 are, given there is no reliable backup for any of them. The fact is we're going into the new season with Vermaelen, Arteta, Monreal, Diaby and possibly Walcott injured. We've let players go (which i don't necessarily disagree with) but have failed to replace them, let alone shore up positions being filled by the injury list or heaven forbid, improving the team.
Whilst i don't think the current team needs to much to be challengers for some kind of trophy, the fact is we've scraped 4th for the last few seasons thanks to Tottenham's ineptitude.
It's not exactly a complicated scenario is it (unless you're Wenger or the board)? You aim to strengthen, however you can in an attempt to improve. Whether that's a few cheaper players who can grow, to augment the existing squad or some marque signings..whatever.
Whilst i don't think the current team needs to much to be challengers for some kind of trophy, the fact is we've scraped 4th for the last few seasons thanks to Tottenham's ineptitude.
It's not exactly a complicated scenario is it (unless you're Wenger or the board)? You aim to strengthen, however you can in an attempt to improve. Whether that's a few cheaper players who can grow, to augment the existing squad or some marque signings..whatever.
Because half the league couldn't care less about the last few games of the season. Plenty of teams are already exactly where they are going to finish the league with 5 games to go. There is no real incentive for them to play hard so when Arsenal need desperately to win all their games to get 4th its easier than earlier in the season.
They did go on a nice run at the end of the season but still scraped 4th by 1pt. I would have thought anyone with half a braincell would call that cutting it fine considering any number of factors would have robbed them of that position.
Draw a game, 5th.
Tottenham pick up an extra win, 5th.
Who has strengthened this window. Tottenham. I would be worried as an Arsenal fan personally.
Caporegime
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Wages, wages, wages. Wages at EVERY club massively outweigh the outgoing on transfers. You can spend 80mil on Ronaldo or get Messi on a free. Transfer are about luck, luck, and more luck, the stupidity of other managers over spending on the likes of Adebayor and the luck of a manager getting say 35mil for Carroll. Buying and selling happens, you can put together the best team ever for absolutely free if you get lucky and sign all the right players at hte right time, or spend 500mil on completely over rated rubbish. Ultimately Arsenal spend 150mil a year in wages, and Spurs spend 80-90mil, that is also not a complete indication of quality, but it is in general a good indication of squad strength, depth and to some degree, quality. Arsenal have a hugely bigger squad of players than the likes of Swansea or West brom.
Are people really surprised that EVERY SINGLE SEASON without fail a bunch of smaller teams with less good first team players and woeful bench/reserve players fall apart towards the end of a season. Swansea partially gave up last season after the cup win as they had smeg all else to play for, but they were also just a very tired team where the main bulk of the team played more games and were simply more tired, less fresh and with less strength to come in and provide some energy.
Spurs are spending 80 mil in wages and often spending 50mil a year in transfers, Arsenal are spending very little overall in transfers and spending the 50mil more in wages....... If Arsenal spend nothing and spend 150mil a year in wages, and Spurs spend 90mil in wages and spend 60mil in transfers.... they'll have spent the same. But I'm not the one saying Arsenal aren't spending while Spurs are... I'm the one saying they are BOTH spending, just CHOOSING to spend in different ways. Wenger CHOOSES to have a huge expensive squad, he CHOOSES to give Djourou, Diaby, Rosicky new contracts, he CHOOSES to spend the budget available to him on a big squad with bigger wages. He could have cut Rosicky/Diaby/many others 6 years ago cut wages down 50mil and been spending 50-60mil in transfers like Spurs, he CHOOSES not to.
What the hell are you on about? You actually write complete carp. If you spent 40million on a player and gave him 100k a week, what is the biggest outgoings for the financial year?
lol about the transfers being complete luck, i agree with you to an extent, you can never really know whether a player will step up to the mark. But are you seriously saying there is no nack to finding players? If that's the case, why the hell do clubs employ scouts? just..lol
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Soldato
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I'd be surprised if we had a big expensive wage bill now after all the exits? Do you have any figures to back it up?
What's hilarious is, DM spouting about Arsenal are the 4th highest wage bill, yet they finished 4th, i'd say thats a pretty good correlation between wage expenditure and performance..no?
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