Still no arrivals or departures to report so far this week. However a long Q&A with Danny Fiszman, the Arsenal director. He talks about everything; money, transfers, players, the manager, football, Highbury, the board and even Bruce Springsteen.
Here are some selected pieces from that interview.
Now we are in the close season, there is much speculation about player signings. Has the manager sufficient funds to bring in the players he requires to enable us to challenge for trophies next season?
We have never said no to Arsène so I am sure that, whoever he wishes to bring in, he will be fully supported.
Does the manager have a specific budget available? Is there a set amount?
There is no set amount. But as I said we have always supported Arsène, we have never said no to him and have no intention of saying no to him.
There are continual references in the media about the Club’s ‘wage structure’ and the Club not paying the same wages as the other top four sides. Can you explain the ‘wage structure’ and also how we compare with the other top four sides?
Well let’s just go back. You say ‘we don’t pay the wages that other teams do’. If you look at our total wage costs you will see they are virtually the same as Manchester United and substantially more than Liverpool. Of course we are all a little less than Chelsea who are in a world of their own. But compared to Man United and Liverpool we are good payers. We believe it is a team sport and we do well but we don’t want the disparity between the top and bottom earner being too big. It takes 11 people on the pitch to deliver.
The board have always insisted that they’ve never denied Arsene a signing. With the manager being well known for not splashing the cash as much as other sides, some fans have pointed the finger towards the board. I’ve always believed them though; Arsene and his scouts have a knack for unearthing great talent, from nowhere, for a small fee. Wenger is able to spot the ability at a young age and snaps them up on the cheap. It’s no coincidence as we’ve proved it time and time again. Once in a while Arsene does make a big money signing but we’ve learnt now that price paid doesn’t always equal quality of player.
That third question above, about the wages, is one that’s concerned people most recently. With Flamini jumping ship this summer because he can get more money elsewhere has frustrated fans, including me to a degree. However, Fiszman insists that we made Mathieu a good offer, not a ridiculous one, but a good one, and he chose to leave the club. We tried, so you can’t blame them.
Above, Fiszman points out that our wage bill is pretty much equal too all the other top clubs (excluding Chelsea because they’re just, well you know). We don’t have a massive squad either. So it’s not like we’re paying our players badly. However there are a handful of clubs out there that will pay stupid money for players and sometimes that’s too hard to resist.
Fiszman goes on to talk about Keith Edelman’s contribution to Arsenal and explains that there was no fall out or anything like that. He also confirms that we’re still in a lock-down agreement meaning that no takeover can happen for at least 5 years anyway. He also says that we do not need a wealthy backer (eg. Roman Abramovich) to compete in the Premier League and Champions League. Usmanov thought he’d be clever and told people that Arsenal need him so we can make signings but it’s a load of bollocks.
It’s a long but detailed Q&A but I’d recommend reading it. Here’s the link again.
What else is going on? Not a lot. I was watching Sky Sports news today and Sepp Blatter, the FIFA president was explaining about how he wants teams to have a certain minimum of home-grown players in a starting 11. Obviously, at the moment, this would cause us a few problems. However if Arsene gets asked about it this week I’m sure he’ll tell us how that his reserves and U18s are mostly English, and the next generation of Arsenal will be mostly home-grown players. We’ll have to see how that story develops but at the moment I =’m really not bothered by it.
Real Madrid have been talking about how they’ve discovered that Alexander Hleb is available and have added them to their transfer list. Good. Hopefully they and Inter Milan get into a bidding war and we get a bit of money for him.
Thanks for reading, that enough for this Tuesday. Although you’ll probably be reading this on Wednesday. I’m off to bed, hope to speak to you tomorrow but I don’t think I’m going to get a chance. I’ll try anyway. See ya.
