Yep. The owner’s job is to hire the right people to run the club. This is the first time Kroenke has done that, so let’s hope he has a much better team in place. The jury is still out, but I’m hopeful. At least they realize they need to “outsmart the market.”
Oh dear.
We have two apologists on here defending Mr Kroenke again
One saying that poor Mr Kroenke inherited Mr Gazidis and that he pre-dates Mr Kroenke not the other way around…
Mr Kroenke was on the Board since October 2008. Gazidis joined in January 2009 after Mr Kroenke joined the Board.
I do expect the CEO of a car company to make sure they make good cars. I expect the owner of one of the world’s biggest football clubs to make sure they play good football - I don’t care how they do it or if they appoint someone to do it for them but they must ensure that good football is the result come what may. If they don’t the club starts to rot.
What I do agree is that a lot of money has been wasted and the issue of spend is secondary to the awfulness of the leadership regime since October 2008, which only got worse when Kroenke junior joined the Board 5 years ago.
The issue is now we are in a mess and wasted all that money are we going to do anything to save the club from falling further down the order by rejuvenating the squad and showing ambition to return to being a top team again. I say yes, it’s the only sensible thing to do now we’re in this mess - push the boat out in this window to get us back to at least CL again and extra revenues accordingly. The Kroenke’s seem to say no.
I expect Emery and Sanhelli will be the next fall guys (Emery already heading that way with some) after Gazidis and Wenger. I am going back to the cricket. Much more satisfying than this.
Not defending, but placing the preponderance of the blame where it belongs.
I think Wenger took a lot of bullets for Gazidis. Arsenal bought players that were not at the top of Arsene’s list because StatDNA recommended them (Wenger was openly skeptical of StatDNA in 2015 in relation to the signing of Gabriel Paulista). And contrary to common misconception, Gazidis was solely in charge of Arsenal’s finances, not Wenger. Gazidis was the one who bought StatDNA. As chief executive, he was in charge of the transfer team and wages.
Wenger, of course, had more influence that most managers, but no manager can do it all by himself. In the past he had been able to rely on Dein for so much that was no longer available once Dein left the club (ironically, largely over a dispute with the rest of the board because he favored selling the club to Kroenke and the rest of the board didn’t – until they did).
2 Likes
The statDNA conspiracy that has never been conclusively proven or validated by anybody?
Wenger had full control of all first team affairs and squad management. No player was ever signed without Wenger’s say. You can look back and see Wenger fingerprints in some of the worse deals this club has done.
This isn’t true, Gazidis only ever acted on Wenger’s instructions. Take Wenger’s self proclaimed “socialist” wage structure which saw average players command wages in not line with market value this was his view which became club policy.
The “dithering Wenger” line came from the fact that he was involved in active transfer negotiations and his indecision and reluctance to pay the going rate caused delays which pissed clubs off and invite others to close deals.
Why was Wenger indecisive in summer windows? Because we’d get to preseason and he’d develop too much confidence in below average players until he was forced to enter the market. Summer of 2015 is a prime example of this, the decision not to sign any outfield players was a deluded Wenger retaining too much confidence in a squad that needed improvement. Quite arrogant in hindsight tbh
2 Likes
He deserves plenty, but instinctively I refuse to belive that nobody else in the executive structure deserves close to an equal amount. That cunt Gazidis is about as useful as a chocolate teapot and I hope Stan gets gored by a mentally subnormal bull on his ranch, dying in the least dignified way possible, in a pool of his own piss and shit (plus the piss and shit of the triumphant bull for good measure)
3 Likes
This pretty much reveals Wenger’s skepticism over StatDNA.
It’s also been reported that Wenger wanted Manolas, but StatDNA preferred Mustafi.
1 Like
Yea he was real sceptical of it alright…
But what I mean is that if the numbers confirm the eye, it gives you more.
Pulling out part of a sentence takes the whole thing out of context. Arsene is saying that analytics are a useful tool, but cannot replace the eyes of a scout.
That’s exactly the point I’m making. He’s clear as day saying it was not because of stats that the player was bought.
2 Likes
Nor would it ever be - not ever… seriously, we are talking about football people making huge decisions… the StatDNA signing thing is so overblown. Even f*ing baseball, the game of stats, uses scouting as a primary basis to decide to invest/not invest.
1 Like
Ah, fair enough. I was a little fuzzy on what you were getting at there and that’s on me.
1 Like
What the hell happened to Coentrao… that guy totally fell off
1 Like
Half of them would probably still get into our matchday 18 :laca:
2 Likes
I don’t understand what those numbers in the right column mean
Edit: total trophies won?!
1 Like
Welbeck for sure. We need a squad player of his description.
Vermaelen. We need a CB 
Yup it’s trophies won
2 Likes
Cheers bru. Think it didn’t immediately occur to me because it’s a totally fucking pointless thing to prominently point out. As if Welbeck’s total trophies may an anything when he wasn’t instrumental in any of them
1 Like