First, the backdrop of where Arsenal are at the moment. Arsene Wenger retired from management in 2017-2018, after 23 years of management at the North London club. He took over in 1996 boasting an impressive record famously guiding Monaco to Ligue 1 in 87/88, he took over after having managed Japanese Nagoya Grampus for a year and his impact not only on Arsenal but on English football was immense. He won 13 major trophies (20 if you include the charity shield) before finally retiring.
In 2018, Arsenal went through a sea of changes. It started with upper management. For so long, all footballing matters on and off the pitch was handled by Wenger. He was more than just the ‘coach’ at Arsenal, he was a manager in every sense of the word as he managed handlings with player contracts, agents, transfers and had full control of footballing matters at Arsenal. Football in 2018 was different from 1996. Modern football clubs have technical directors or directors of football who essentially run the club while the manager, or in the case of teams today ‘head coach’ coaches the football team. This is not to say, they have no say in player signings, contract negotiations but they don’t have the final say. They negotiate with the technical director and get their point across and it is the job of the technical director to take the message on board.
In 2018, Arsenal modernized like other clubs and decided to hire a new coach, Unai Emery. While Emery was given the job of head coach. Arsenal made a ground breaking move in 2018 to bring in Raul Sanllehi as the director of football at Arsenal. In 2019, Arsenal brought in former player Edu Gaspar as the technical director at Arsenal. They were to work together to try and make Arsenal a more competitive team. They were to work under Josh Kroenke, the son of majority shareholder and leading board member Stan Kroenke. The important thing to note here is unlike his father, Josh was to take a much keener interest in Arsenal in trying to lead them back to stability and consistency both on and off the pitch as there has been many troubling issues both on and off the park at the club in the last days of Arsene Wenger.
One of the major problems was player contracts and transfer fees for departing players. This was exploited by other clubs as often they would turn a player’s head who would either have one year left on his contract or were coming to the end which meant Arsenal had to sell some of their best players for a lot less than their worth. The most recent example of this was Alexis Sanchez, they got Mkhtaryan in a swap deal and this deal was a disaster for both Arsenal and Manchester United. It was the best they could make out of a bad situation but this new direction Arsenal was taking was supposed to stop this from happening. Footballing matters have to be taken care of with a lot more diligence.
Arsenal has changed to an extent but the bad habits remain. Arsenal has been more ambitious in recent years and Josh Kroenke has ensured that there is ambition in the club and money to be spent. But crucially, the money has not been spent in many cases well enough and in departments where the team have not been strengthened enough. Here are some numbers. Amongst the top six in the Premier League.
Arsenal has net spent 249 million in the last five years, and in that time, they have dropped out of the Champions League positions and failed to get back into those positions again. Over the last 2 seasons, the club has spent 72 million pounds in 18/19 on players such as Leno, Torreira, Guendozi, Sokratis while inexplicably losing key players like Sanchez on a swap deal for a player who didn’t improve Arsenal and Aaron Ramey for free to Juventus. This season 19/20 they spent 72 million pounds on Ivorian winger Nicolas Pepe; a statement signing who so far has failed to live up to the billing while ignoring massive issues in other areas of the park which the signings in the previous window did not improve. They also signed an aging David Luiz for 8 million, Tierney for 25 million, and Saliba for 27 million (loaning him out for the rest of the season). While Saliba remains the great hope, Tierney has been injury prone and Luiz although a leader has been a defensive catastrophe, another confusing signing was the loan signing of Cedric Soares in January while he was injured and has yet to play one minute of football at Arsenal while collective his wages rehabbing from injury and is due to leave at the end of month. He will have come to Arsenal, never played for them, earned a fair share and left. Mesut Ozil is on 400k a week and doesn’t feature, is left out of teams and he is priced out so Arsenal cannot even afford to offload him.
Who makes these decisions? One has to ask, it’s inexplicably bad and something Josh Kroenke as to address immediately. If you look at how Chelsea are run just as an example, they spend but they also sell, and they sell a lot of players as they have an extensive loan system which brings in revenue which can then be invested into the team. Their net spent in the same time is 133.2 million pounds and they have won (2 Pl, FA cup, League Cup and Europa League) in that time. The way Chelsea are run as a club seems planets ahead of how Arsenal are run and if Arsenal are to improve, Josh Kroenke’s proposed hands on approach has to be much more hands on, because right now it is bleak and he has to along with his father burden the full responsibility.
How to improve Arsenal?
Get on board with Arteta. Target players who improve the squad and players who are younger and have a sell on value so that when the time comes he can sell for a profit while re investing and improving the squad.
Deal with contracts better. As Aubameyang nears the end of his contract. Arsenal will have to deal with this situation properly. He wants to see ambition from this club and perhaps a pay rise, two things Arsenal and Kroneke will have to show Aubamayang they are willing to do. Arteta wants the player to stay so it is essential the club back him and invest in areas of need.
Cut the deadwood. Arsenal need to bin players who are on extensive contracts and offer no improvement to the squad long term. Players like David Luiz, Cedric Soares are costing a lot of unnecessary money and is not bringing anything to the team on the pitch. They need to make decisions like this better.
Raul and Edu need to accept that so far they have failed so that they can do better moving forward. They have failed, no question. You cannot be honest and say they have improved Arsenal. Ask yourself is Arsenal today any better than the last season under Arsene Wenger? The honest answer is no. they have time on their hands and with the pandemic it will be interesting to see how they improve the team and how they deal with the market.
The present is bleak for Arsenal and it is up to these key figures to improve Arsenal and take them back to some form of stability. The football word will be closely observing Arsenal in the next few years and it is up to Josh Kroenke, Raul Sanlehi, Edu Gaspar and Mikel Arteta to take them back to winning ways both on and off the pitch.