News that Arsenal have a transfer ‘war chest’ is usually one of the staples of the football headlines come the end of the club season.
But after the departure of Arsene Wenger and a new direction for the club, it looks as though things might well be different this time. In terms of the headlines, it certainly is.
A decade ago, a headline proclaiming that the Arsenal board is ready to hand their manager £50m would certainly be seen as a huge chunk of cash. But this year the reports are that the Gunners are limiting their spending to a number that – in the modern world – seems pitifully small for a top six club. Indeed, if they want to compete next season, you get the feeling they’ll need to spend a bit more than that to bring in a solid defensive midfielder, a centre back and perhaps even a goalkeeper.
But if the fact that £50m has now become a small number shows that the game has changed, then perhaps the headlines also show that Arsenal are changing.
Over the last few years, talk of massive transfer kitties may well have sold season tickets to long-suffering Gooners who were undecided about renewing, but the more important consequence of that strategy was really only to drive up the price for the top class talent the club were purportedly chasing; Arsene Wenger simply wouldn’t part with cash to meet the inflated figure.
This time, and given how much the Gunners have been burned in recent years, you wonder if Arsenal have planted reports about limiting their new manager to a certain figure in order to ward off inflation in the transfer market: six times bitten, seventh time shy.
Then again, there is an element of trust when it comes to allowing a new manager to spend money. Sure, Sven Mislintat and Raul Sanllehi are now in place and have a theoretical control over transfers, but Arsenal has been the personal fiefdom of Arsene Wenger for so long that it might take a while for the machine to run smoothly. And even in the most slick, modern football clubs, it’s important that the manager gets to have a say (perhaps the final one) in whether a player ultimately joins or not. In the end, it’s the manager you see getting the sack for poor performances, not the scouts and the “heads of football relations”.
The likelihood is that Arsenal will have to spend some money this summer not just to ensure their their squad is capable of getting back into the Champions League after a two-year absence, but to overhaul the playing staff to fit the needs of a new manager.
If they don’t want to suffer inflated prices and European clubs playing hardball over the sale of their best players, the Gunners might need a better strategy than leaking to the press that they have no money. If, on the other hand, they don’t want to spend much at all, then will things really be any different next season?
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