Agree with your assessment but remember that selling to Arsenal is only one option for any club- when there are plenty of other suitors out there, the selling party can afford to be picky.
I wish I could give some examples (outside of football in fairness) but all I can say is that I’ve personally seen transactions running well into 9 figures fall apart because of egos or the simple fact that the principals didn’t like each other. Reputation is everything and I think ours has been tarnished with our past antics. As you rightly say, clubs don’t want to waste their time so they hard-ball us and seek the line of least resistance. Put up or shut up basically. Or to put it another way, pay us a fuck ton of money.
We should move quickly then. Mahrez seems to favour a move to Arsenal. If we’re not going to offer the £50m or whatever it is Monaco want for Lemar and/or they won’t sell, then, aside from Mahrez, how many other players of that ilk are realistically available to us?
Ideally yes. But this is Arsenal we are talking about. There are around 10 players in their last season of contract and we havent offloaded any of them yet. Pre-season is well underway and we are stuck with them because of our stupid wage structure. We always have trouble offloading players for some reason.
Not quite. My point is slightly more nuanced than that… but not much.
I believe that Arsenal has gained a reputation for messing clubs around when it comes to buying players. Quibbling over a few million here and there begs certain questions about how serious a buyer’s interest really is in acquiring a player (asset) in the tens of millions. Believe me when I say that at this level (at least in the business world), egos often get completely out of control meaning cutting one’s nose to spite one’s face is always a viable option.
Some will defend AW’s rigid stance on valuations. Others, like me for instance, believe that we have missed countless targets based on a misguided matter of principle when evidence suggests we could have easily afforded them.
Also why do people keep saying “punishing” when questioning me? I never said that because it’s completely the wrong choice of word. I merely suggested that clubs would rather sell to other destinations based upon their (and our) conduct during past negotiations. Fuck me, I had no idea people would be so defensive over this!
And lastly, I’m not asking for you or anyone else to agree with me. Just my opinion.
I think we have Lemar read somewhere we are waiting on Monaco to replace etc, however should still snap up Mahrez too especially if we can get rid of Walcott !!
The criticism is left over from previous summer windows leaving the team the typical one or two players short from really challenging. The criticism will (likely) subside some IF Wenger really is serious and signs another top player/prospect or two.
Little leeway should be given from the past failures to be content to collect interest on the funds in the bank versus challenging for a title. Wenger/Arsenal overestimated the impact of financial fair play and vastly underestimated the explosion of TV revenue for the EPL clubs. Hoping that the Lacazette acquisition is a turning point, but need to see some follow through, not the ‘ol “we tried line” from summers’ past.
to expand upon this, while I believe Lemar isnt a generational talent, he is fucking good, and he absolutely does have a price Monaco will accept, and I expect us to secure him as a result.
But if it transpires we do something stupid like pay £70m for him, it is going to turn horrific in here. People that havent EVER seen him play, are expecting him to be the new Alexis Sanchez ffs.
A rude awakening approaches for many a gooner, and no doubt it will be Wengers fault for them not managing their expectations.
If he has the qualities he will develop thats all we ask !! Getting a tad fed up of the Sanchez hype train he is not a one man army we need, we need a team pulling together in the right direction - not Sanchezs direction and quite frankly can’t wait for him to leave.
