The pent up desire of some American’s to lambast an Englishman for daring to speak of NFL is one of the most amusing things I’ve seen online all year. It’s like 15 years of being called shit fans by Brexit Twitter has had an impact on them. I can’t tolerate the steady stream of nonsense from people telling me the LA Rams and Arsenal aren’t comparable. If you’re saying that, you aren’t paying attention to a sport you’re trying to claim a knowledge advantage on, so now I am about to school you in with a touchgoal of a post.
My central argument is that the LA Rams has embarked on an innovative strategy to capture the imagination of a city that has plenty of elite pass times. This from the WaPo:
Anywhere else in America, an undefeated NFL team beating teams by 15 points on average would be a dominant civic force. Here, it is different. The Dodgers are in the World Series, LeBron James is on the Lakers, and the box office totals come out every week. All the Rams do is win. But are they winning over Los Angeles?
The output of the strategy is to dazzle. The anxiety driving that approach is that no one will buy a shitty product in LA. Stan has to entertain to make his investment work. Money is on the line.
The Rams were shite in St. Louis. I have worked extensively in that city, listened to cab drivers bemoan his drab leadership, and actually worked with business people who tried to keep the franchise in the city.
When Stan moved them to LA, betraying his hometown, his team went on the record stating they needed an excellent product, because LA folk wouldn’t tolerate substandard sport. Stan had this to say:
Our goal always has been to create an exciting and long-term solution for the NFL, our 31 partners and Los Angeles football fans.
The LA Rams guiding philosophy comes from the very top and drips down into management team, I believe they call it trickle down guiding philosophy, and it works. This is their VP of Operations, Kevin Demoff.
This is actually getting to how you build a fan base brick-by-brick, fan-by-fan, and get people to understand what the Rams are
It is a very crowded landscape we once had a lofty perch in. It’s going to take time to get back to that lofty perch. The way you do it, you play exciting football. You have players who people not only recognize but they like and understand. You have a coach who brings an exciting style of play.
This sort of approach is what I called for in the summer. It’s a business winning idea, especially if like Stan, you consider sport a content game. It’s why Madrid and Barcelona invest so much on the pitch, because the rewards that come back from commercial deals rocket if you’re appealing to a global audience. The below piece in Forbes by Dr. Rishe of the Washington Business school drills into what he calls the hearts and mind strategy the new franchise is adopting.
Well, when the on-field product is abysmally boring and unimaginative, who among us as consumers of sport want to “belong” to a losing brand? Nor do we want to “identify” with a losing brand. Nor do we feel enriched from supporting a losing product.
Thus, the transformation of the Rams organization on the field since Sean McVay’s arrival as head coach plays a crucial role in transforming consumer perceptions of the brand. Now, when we think of Rams football, we think of an electrifying and innovative approach which is both hip and efficient. And these characteristics not only resonate with just about any consumer, but especially the cherished millennial and Gen Z consumers which most companies covet (due to their higher potential lifetime customer value to the company).
In short, winning the hearts and imaginations of fans helps to reinvent a brand, change consumer perceptions, inspire greater brand loyalty, which ultimately leads to a more premium-priced and profitable product.
Chasing Gen Z and Millenials is all I hear about at work, but in Premier League football’s case, it’s especially pertinent as we have an age issue in the stands with the average age of season ticket holders sitting at around 43! Clubs need to fill the pipelines back up, otherwise, there’s going to be an issue further down the line. Playing incredible football feels like a business necessity heading into an era of sport that will be be more global, mobile, easier to access, and more competitive than ever before.
Creating an incredible experience at Arsenal should have been the goal. The club had 6 months to think about who they wanted to be after the Wenger reboot, but they clearly didn’t have a plan (or it was a bit shit). Nothing screams that the club is united around a vision, or has an idea of how they’re going to make it happen. We don’t even have a CEO, opting for a Houllier/Evans power share.
Our objective is a return to the Champions League, we’ve tried to achieve that by blowing money on experience that’s not good enough. Our strategy was a tactic, with a average vision of how to achieve it. We should have been thinking about the bigger picture, clearly defining how to become exceptional within realistic contraints. Riches should have been the byproduct of succeeding with the said vision.
Arsenal do not look like they know how to be exceptional, and rumblings of Denis Suarez and Ever Banega don’t convince me that’s changing anytime soon.
Below are the actions the Rams took to get themselves into the position they’re in right now.
Key personnel decisions have completely transformed the vibe of the entire organization, including:
- The hiring of the innovative and energetic Sean McVay;
- The patience to allow McVay to develop Jared Goff into a successful NFL quarterback;
- The wisdom of extending standouts Todd Gurley and Aaron Donald to long-term deals;
- The aggressiveness during the 2018 off-season to add considerable skill and depth on both sides of the ball (specifically on defense)…not to mention the recent acquisition of Dante Fowler Jr. (though his outbursts in the Seattle game almost cost the team severely). While the defense needs serious refinements and some of the additions have underperformed (Marcus Peters) or not performed due to injury (Aqib Talib), there is still hope that the skill, depth and experience of these veterans will pay dividends in the playoffs.
Collectively, these decisions were strategically shrewd because (1) you could afford to be aggressive financially in the short-term while QB Goff is still under his rookie contract, and (2) you want to create excitement and positive energy about the brand in the build up towards the team’s eventual relocation to the palatial new stadium in Inglewood in 2020.
In short, the Rams rebrand has been accelerated by a series of strategic personnel decisions. Largely because of the play on the field, the Rams brand is now perceived to be hip, innovative, creative, and explosive. These winning traits certainly play anywhere, but especially the case in a market like Los Angeles accustomed to supporting dynamic winners.
There’s a guiding principle at the Rams, and because the goal is set at the top, you can build everything around achieving that with the resources you have at your disposal. They have built buzz from top to bottom, they know the sort of coach they needed to hire, they know the type of players, young and old they need to recruit. They know the expectations of how the game needs to be played. They have built something from nothing and there’s a huge buzz around the place.
Arsenal should be replicating this approach. It’s perfect for us. We can’t win with lavish investments. We can win by having an ambitious goal of being the most exciting young football team in Europe, building our entire club around that idea.
Key learnings from the LA Rams:
- They have a north star: Play scintillating football that captures the hearts and minds of the locals
- They hire the best thinkers in the game
- They have been creative with their approach to player trading
The exact same person that runs Arsenal dismally is pulling up trees in LA, doing ALL the things you’d want him to be doing at Arsenal.
Now, in their 3rd season in Los Angeles and 2nd season under Coach McVay’s leadership, the organization is now perceived as an innovative and electrifying team whose executive leadership isn’t afraid to make big moves both on and off the field.
That concluding point is what you want people to be writing of Arsenal. If the perception of your club reads like that, you become an exciting opportunity for young players who want to grow their careers and develop their talent with coaches that can help them. You win new fans because people want to watch you play. You grow commercials because big brands want to be associated with the most exhilarating team on the planet. You attract the best minds in the game who want to express their ideas at a club like London. You open yourselves up to new uses of technology, cutting edge fitness approaches and even science of the mind. Everything gets better because there is a guiding philosophy of excitement that drives the club.
So why can’t we have that?
You. That’s why. This is Stan on London fans.
Obviously London is a comparable stage to Los Angeles, and Arsenal has one of the most passionate and vocal fan bases in sports. So I don’t see that really impacting us.
We’re noisy, he hears us, but he doesn’t care. Why? Because a shitty Arsenal product doesn’t impact him at all.
Adidas still want to give us £60m a year. Rwanda still wants to advertise on our shirts. You still give over £1500+ for your season ticket without question. You will still attend every week, even if you find it boring. Why? Because there is no correlation between your love for Arsenal and how good they are on the pitch. This is a uniquely Premier League thing. Stan cannot lose with Arsenal unless things go really bad, which they won’t under semi-competent leadership. Premier League football is by default a success machine. The money never stops going up. You can disguise average leadership, because all the charts point upwards.
Stan works in the world of real estate. He’ll buy up property in areas where new Walmarts are going to open up, sit back, and play the long game. Same with Arsenal, he doesn’t need to invest any of his own money and the thing hikes in value like nobodies business.
He is succeeding in the NFL because he knew he had to bring new fans through the doors and he had to get people to tune into the matches. He had to do something radical, he had to entertain, and he had to invest in an idea.
Are we investing in a vision like that? What are our bold moves? What are the club doing to put on an incredible show to bring in new fans into the ‘franchise’? Doesn’t seem like a lot. We are making a lot of safe moves to catch up, but how are we using our resource to move ahead?
Arsenal can have everything the Rams have. But there needs to be a desire from the people installed at the club to push the owners for what they need. Or, it needs the people we hired to be fiercely ambitious and hugely competitive. Do we have disruptors in charge, or an easy life crowd? Outside of the excellent hiring of Sven Mislintat, where is the innovation coming from? Can you see who the club is shaping up to be over the next five years? Can you see a style developing on the pitch that you’d want to buy into if you were a young player?
I can’t.
The point of this post is it’s not all doom and gloom.
Stan has shown the world he can think like a proper owner. He’s shown that when he cares about something – because his money is on the line – he can make really exciting decisions and take risks that drive towards something.
Question is, how do we get some of that LA Rams magic to The Arsenal?
Podcast recording TODAY. Let’s all laugh at Spurs. Lololololol
Another post
No
Big
Deal
Nice one Boomslang
Cheers hombre
Good piece, Pedro, but surely it misses the most important point, namely that all of Kroenke’s interest and energy is in the Rams, not Arsenal? As far as Kroenke is concerned, Arsenal are just an afterthought, which is the last thing they will ever be for a true fan. However, you are almost certainly right that only a fans’ boycott of the club, which will hit profits from his cash-cow, will make Kroenke even remember that he even owns Arsenal…
Arsenal is a product and players and football is its core business that creates the generation of income and thus profits. I cannot fathom why Kroenke would spend over £400 million buying the balance of the shares to 100% own something where the product is failing so badly and not invest in the product to stop the rot.I wonder what Adidas is thinking about their new contract/investment? Who will want to buy Xhaka, Mhiki and Mustafi shirts? What is the shelf life of Auba and Laca going to be for a 6th placed team seemingly heading downwards rather than improving… Read more »
Tony
We need to get TH14 to come back and play a few games.
That would up our “profile” for a short while.
Adidas must be concerned.
Tony
Completely agree. It only makes sense if you consider that he bought the club as a a financial leverage for his deals in the states.
Otherwise why bother? He’s watched us slip away from even the much derided top four trophy slots.
What happened to the Nigerian billionaire who was after us?? Anything but kroenke.
I dont give a monkirs about Stan or his American dream, I care about Arsenal football Club… thats the team he either puts up or shuts up and leaves… draing our club to fund elsewhere does not sit well.
NFL is a diminishing sport over here, Pedro should know that. Attendances are down and so is TV viewership. The same malaise extends the sport at all levels, several colleges and high schools are shuttering their football programs. Major league sports is very different from sports everywhere else in the world. The recruiting, financing and the actual practice is somewhat socialistic and is set up to level out competitive and maximize entertainment value. Pedro misread it, hence all the yammering about appointing a novice manager. In American football, the head coach has certain responsibilities as is the offfensive coordinator and… Read more »
Arsenal isn’t the biggest sporting investment that Kroenke owns, contrary to the bemoaning of many here.
Now that Wenger and Gazidis have left the building, Kroenke has an obligation to clear up this mess.
It won’t take too much more indecisiveness on his part for the fans to voice their concerns and anger as to what is going on.
Come on. No money to spend?!?
Fudging ridiculous.
Cech
Mustafi
Koscielny
Liesteiner(spelling?)
Elneny
Xhaka
Ramsey
Özil
Mkhitaryan
Welbeck
Mehn…. What manager plats with this ffs!
Plays well**
Aliko Dangote worth 10 Billion.
Perhaps some of our African posters can tap him up.
Noted to say the first thing he would change would be the coach.?
It’s also wrong to assume that Kronke bought Arsenal to financially leverage his American business. He bought a profitable club, wth a quaintly successful history, in an international city, with middle class fans FOR PROFIT, same as any business man would do. He bought it because it was well run by the domestic partners. He wouldn’t need to intrude himself in changing nada to make it work. Arsenal was the perfect SAFE investment. We even had a self-sufficiency policy and a world-class skinflint manager in place at the time. He doesn’t need Arsenal to leverage his US business. The NFL… Read more »
Noted to say the first thing he would change would be the coach.?
A quote made when Wenger was manager
Dissenter
Not one Arsenal fan(outside the US) gives a toss about Kroenke’s NFL commitments, although I appreciate and respect your input on this matter.
Arsenal are far bigger than Stan Kroenke and should he bottle his obligations he will/must feel the fans wrath and in no uncertain terms.
Aliko Dangote is not your village idiot
He’s not coming to save Arsenal. Usmanov is richer and even he coudn’t buy out Kroenke.
What is with people expecting handouts and suger daddies?
Loans only.
Mata
Moses
Cahill
Drinkwater
and Sanchez yes Sanchez.
I stress loans.
I feel these players will strengthen
our weak squad just till the end of the season and VITALLY EUROPE.
Guess Ole is a better manager than Pochettino, Mourinho, Sarri, Pep and Klopp seeing as it only took him one match to transform the “worst” United in style in history
RECEDING- I thought that no date on the article i read.
But in some quarters may be relevant at this precise moment.?
What is with people expecting handouts and suger daddies?
Desperation
A lack of patience
Wanting your football team to make your own shortcomings
Inferiority complex
Comparing yourself to teams who got their shit together over time while demanding yours happen in six months
Delusion
Tale your pick
But in some quarters may be relevant at this precise moment.?
If you have something to say go ahead and say it..don’t hide behind Dangote
Graham62 Pedro chose to base his arguments on Kroenke’s American sporting businesss. That’s why this came up if you missed th4e post [scroll up the page] If you were spending as much as 5 billion to establish your American business, all of which you are responsible for because there is no public financing. Your other sporting business in London is supposedly on cruise control, which one would be more dear to you. You say Arsenal,is bigger that Kroenke and I call BS on that. Arsenal is Kroenke and Kroenke is Arsenal. I was 100% behind Usmanov but was in the… Read more »
OK. First time ever posting here, but seems a good time. As an American Arsenal fan and football (soccer) fan in general, it seems that the idea of increasing the value of a sports franchise by way of a winning product on-field is quite the no-brainer. Isn’t the business axiom, ‘you have to spend money to make money’? I think it’s pretty clear that it’s not that Stan does’t understand Arsenal, but doesn’t understand that football is a world sport and not just a local game. Especially with the bigger and bigger TV deals over the past few years, the… Read more »
Do these people know how Dangote made his money?
Do they even care?
The Uzbekh billionaire who advocated infusing money into the club was called a phony and opportunistic because he wasn’t a die-hard on Wenger. He called Wenger out several times with off hand comments and was detested by people who couldn’t stand that.
The ship has sailed. We are stuck with Kroenke, enjoy it people because he’s not going anywhere.
james
man utd are chasing us. they won’t hand over a single player to us. We on the other hand love to sell our best players to our rivals.
Who dat say dey gonna beat dem Saints! You’re precious Rams are fucked in the Superdome. They beat the Cowboys ffs. A team that’s won 3 playoff games in the last 23 years. Start the parade already. Fucking ignorant limey thinks he’s knows the NFL now because he bet on the favorite to win. Fucking hilarious. Almost as funny as some nobody blog writer thinking he has any say on who owns Arsenal.
Yet you log on and continually write your nonsense on this ‘nobody’s blog….
Makes sense don’t it KC dawg
Pedro I know absolutely nothing about American Football apart from the similarities between the game and rugby. My limited knowledge is that American Football is popular in the University System and attracts large attendances at that level and helps to finance other financially strapped sports in those Universities such as Notre Dame where the game is popular. So I have some questions for you? 1. How much revenue does the LA Franchise owned by Kroenke raise annually. 2. How does this franchise compare with other leading clubs in US in attracting best players? 3. I believe that they are building… Read more »
BS? I don’t think so.
This has nothing to do with Kroenke and his billions. You obviously feel it does.
Arsenal Football Club is, and never has been, Kroenke FC.
I know the dollar rules in the US but here in the UK we tend to ignore all that crap because, at the end of the day, we value tradition and culture.
Kroenke may feel, as you do, that he’s here to stay, BUT it doesn’t really work like that over here.
Let’s watch this space.
There is obviously a lot going on at the club at this moment, the identity crises on the pitch and the financial situation off it. We all know that we need to strengthen our defense, and we need to add genuine wide players. But.. we also need a creative player in the middle again, since Santi left the transition between defence and attack has been very poor. There isn’t a player currently at the club fit to lace the mans boots and the team is suffering because of it. What use is £120m worth of strikers when there is no… Read more »
Previous post directed @Dissenter.
Graham 62
In normal circumstances I would agree with your point of view, but the fact is that at the moment Arsenal are owned by Kroenke and I do think that we need
to understand better how he is operating in USA whether we like him or not.
The only plus sofar in his stewardship is that he has not saddled the club with a huge debt as the American owners of Man Utd have done.
PSG looking at doucoure would love him at Arsenal.
American throwball is a classic example, you can’t polish a turd. As for the la sheep, Chelsea has more history.
Since that septic tank owner took over The Arsenal, the Club has gradually slid down the table, & now can’t afford signings.
Graham62 “I know the dollar rules in the US but here in the UK we tend to ignore all that crap because, at the end of the day, we value tradition and culture.” That’s laughable mate You lost that uppity righteous outrage the moment you decided it was okay to sell to foreigners. Besides that crap about “values and tradition” is what Gazidis, Wenger and every one involved have used to hoodwink all of us. That’s how we got to this point. I think the so called ‘values and traditions’ were respected by Kroenke too. ‘Values and traditions’? I’m having… Read more »
I don’t claim to know NFL very well, but the Rams came bottom or second bottom of their division of the conference for something like a decade before the move to LA. No playoffs, no superbowls, nothing like that. In fact, if the NFL wasn’t a closed league, they’d have been somewhere between being a Crystal Palace and being outright relegated. That means you have basically zero expectations, so you can experiment to your heart’s content and better yet, there’s no repercussions! You can’t really do that in the Premier League. Arsenal really need to stay in Europe for financial… Read more »
Dissenter
Sf
What do you make of tulsi gabbard running for 2020? I like her. Gorgeous too. Just gorgeous.
Biggles
Sensible post.
I was going to say what Dissenter has, I don’t think you can compare the NFL and then football over here, just completely different set ups. You need more than one coach on the touchline with real power over their side of the game, a head coach, offensive coordinator, defensive coordinator etc. The players would need to be institutionalised to an extent so that Sancho was playing for the Oxford Wildcats, Foden the Cambridge Titans, Alli the Bristol Bears etc in a system that has sport wrapped up with education and these players are cultured in their college leagues. Then… Read more »
20 years of consecutive European football, with all the money that brought in… what did we do with it? Wasted it, paying and pandering to a manager who didn’t have a clue what he was doing. Left us in such a bad shape so that he lost star player after star player, and the star player he managed to keep now looks like he doesn’t want to play football anymore. However he placed him in such high wage packet we can’t literally give him away. Due to Wenger’s dithering and indecisiveness we have thrown away hundreds of millions of pounds… Read more »
I’m hoping the club are looking at selling both Elneny and Ozil in this window, or at least getting rid of the latter if we can’t sell to permit some moves.
You lost that uppity righteous outrage the moment you decided it was okay to sell to foreigners. Besides that crap about “values and tradition” is what Gazidis, Wenger and every one involved have used to hoodwink all of us. That’s how we got to this point. I think the so called ‘values and traditions’ were respected by Kroenke too. Dissenter Big difference between the elected or non elected elites and the people on heritage, tradition and culture. But I’d agree with you and disagree with Graham The yanks are extremely an extremely patriotic bunch and do indeed value their traditions.… Read more »
*opened
@Charlie George
You keep bragging about Wenger getting European football for 20 concecutive years. It’s just this little problem though.
He had fuck all to show for it. Do you want us to celebrate the “20 concecutive years in CL” trophy?
Pathetic
Boggles
When I was young all the Italian sides and shirts were popular over here.
Juve
Lazio
Inter
Roma
Ac
All their shirts were on the go.
Saying that you never see many non German kids with Bayern tops. Don’t they appeal to the Asian and African markets? If not, why not?
Anyone who knows American football knows all the head coach does is call out a few plays that are already stipulated on a piece of plastic he’s holding.
The guys managing the game are in a booth high up on the stands.
Pedro is wrong to draw all these false analogies from a ‘sport’ that shares very little with football.
That’s one of the reasons he supported Arteta too.
LA rams have a young manager so let’s get one too. Never mind that the average age of super bowl winning coaches is well above 50 y/o.
Dissenter
I might be wrong but wasn’t McVay a shit hot offensive coordinator elsewhere? Which is a really in depth job where the head coach basically relies on you to get the offense in shape and you are held to account if the offense is poor?
We need to start defining our identity and modus operandi rather than just copying the methods of other clubs.
We’re just like a highly excited youngster trying to copy the popular kids in school because he or she wants to liked to.
Sooner or later you have to grow up and become your own person and become happy in your own skin.
*too
The one thing we can all agree on is we love THE CLUB
Second thing we can agree on stan treats THE CLUB with contempt and its his cash cow
Time for the cash cow to kick back
A 100% boycott of the next home game will get everyone’s attention even stan that the fans are sick to death of whats happening at THE CLUB
Un na
Which is why the NFL is on the decline since the whole take a knee fiasco.’
The NFL was on the decline before the Trump generated nonsense about kneeling. That put some off too.
It has more to do with the safety of the game with concussions, the greed of the all arrangement with abuse of public money.
I think people are getting way too angry with Stan Kroenke, and completely refusing to see that the axis of Gazidis and Wenger have been by far the biggest issue at Arsenal. I think Stan was far too ‘in love’ with Wenger for a long time, and likely lied to by Ivan for a long time, but we have seen real significant change in the last 12 months, probably more structural change than any club has undergone in a 12 month period before. I wouldve preferred Usmanov as an owner as he would have been demanding and heavily involved, but… Read more »
Congratulations, Pedro. At last you have focussed on the real villain of the piece. I won’t comment on Stan’s role in LA Rams current success, except to say he probably learned from his experience here. Club owners of Man U, Chelsea, Man C – and now Liverpool – have been doing the same for years. Let’s cut to the chase: as you say, Stan won’t do the same at Arsenal because he doesn’t need to, So let’s make him need to. The only way that will happen is if Arsenal become a money-losing business. Every fan who buys a ticket… Read more »
Cesc
You’re right about McVay
They draw the head coaches from the ranks of assistants who interview every year. The failed head coaches just go back to being assistants.
Most of the phenoms coaches like McVay burn out and just drop back to being assistants. Many return back to college football which pays managers as well as the NFL.
Ultimately, for all times can’t miss the elephant in the room largely for the huge turds
Wenger
Was an astute conman who psychologically played on gullible fans emotions to stay on 10 years beyond the time should have been sacked or given a warm send off
Not sure if Emery’s approach to the lack of funds at the moment was the correct thing to do. Maybe by saying that we cannot afford to buy anyone at the moment added a bit of negativity to the club and the media painting us like a lot is wrong in our club. It probably is but maybe, just maybe, it would have been a more sensible decision to not comment on it that thoroughly and give the media what they want. Makes me think if when he talked loud about it, was his decision or the club’s management decision?… Read more »
gambon
People are mad at Kroenke because he respected the same ‘Arsenal values’ that have been banged in forever.
I think we would have been better off had he run it as a typical cost saving business.
We wouldn’t have been allowed to give excessive wages to average players
We wouldn’t have allowed players to run out contracts
Had Kroenke lived up to the caricature that is used to depict him, we wouldn’t be in this much trouble.
He let the Arsenal people run it before and has now taken a more activist role.
Dissenter
I am not clear why you suggest American Football is in decline. It is the largest
participation sport in US and the NFL has the largest average attendances with
66,000 of any professional sport in the world.
The culture of sport globally is of course changing. Many other team sports
like Rugby and most recently Netball for women are becoming increasingly
popular.
Dissenter Thanks for that. I’m a casual watcher but I’m getting more into it, even watching some college games now. Saw Alabama vs Clemson the other day which was a good watch, Clemson’s QB looks a bit outrageous for a 19 year old. I like the way the NFL is set up but as you say I don’t think you can make a comparison to football over here. It’s night and day. Gambon Completely agree. I’ve said for a long time Kroenke’s biggest crime was being a pro-Wenger fan which is ironic considering the majority of posters who bash him… Read more »
Raptora
I think time will tell if it was smart or not.
Wenger would have bullshitted about finding top quality but Emery came right out and told us all straight.
With his continued stance on Ozil, using Xhaka as a CB previously and having to keep changing his formations together with his statements about transfers I think there’s an argument he’s trying to put pressure on Sanllehi.
He knows he’s fighting for his job so why wouldn’t you?
Arsenal is according to some financial report the 6 richest football club in the world. But Emery can only loan player. In the meantime, we are hiring more background personnel such as loan manager, etc. I feel that Kroenke’s priority is restructuring the club. Emery is only treated as a transitional manager. Emery is fighting for his life. He wants to get his former Sevilla players whom he can trust. But the club allows him only get players on loan, because the owner sees him more like a care taker. I feel sorry for Emery. How a 6 richest football… Read more »
Cesc Appeal
The thing I find strange is all the calls for investment from fans that think our players are shit and overpayed.
Its like they want more Xhakas and more Mustafis, on higher salaries.
Biggles 10:57:10 Very rational post. This rebuild process is going to take years I’m afraid and there’ll be no quick fixes. It will require us to make a number of good and clever signings in key positions over the next transfer windows regardless of who the manager is. Unfortunately, us football fans are more sentimental than rational. Someone even suggested yesterday, probably not for the first time, that Pellegrini would have been a better choice than Emery. Well, maybe but I’d like to see where this Westham team, who obviously have players good enough for Arsenal, end up in the… Read more »
Nelson
Emery spent £70m in the summer, on mainly defensive players, and our defence is worse than ever.
Why do you want him to spend money?
If he wanted £20m for Suarez, he shouldve spent £50m in the summer.
The january window isnt some magic month where the money comes out of thin air.
Anything we spend this month has to come from:
– Last summers budget
– This summers budget
– player sales
Frankly I would much rather we spent all of our budget, every year in the summer, unless an exceptional opportunity arose (Auba)
A felling extract from Arseblog
“ I mean leaving Highbury. I mean breaking up a brilliant team that should have been bolstered with new talent and remained properly competitive at the top of the Premier League and in Europe. We deliberately chose a path which would erode our football potency in the short-term for the long-term gain. And Stan swooped in, saw this shiny new stadium and its wonderful facilities, the corporate boxes, match-day income, and its land-value in North London, but never got what it was for. “
People need to stop repeating this “sixth richest club in the world” mantra
We misused our resources for wages and stifled other sources of income by letting players repeatedly run down their contacts.
The market value of the club has very little to do with it.
Gambon Agreed. The thing people are forgetting as well is that Kroenke is not thinking about this club as a fan or plaything. Sports clubs and land are his business. He will be thinking I trusted 2 people to do a job and they failed, the club is in a shit state, I have now hired a completely new and modern infrastructure and it might take 4 or more years to get things the way I want to after all that damage but I’m in no rush. The fans obviously are in a rush. What pisses me off is the… Read more »
‘Stan swooped in’
He could only swoop because the door was opened for him.
“I feel that Kroenke’s priority is restructuring the club. ”
Breaking news : Stan is CONCERNED by the futur of the AFC!!
(lolz)
Dissenter
I’d say everyday parltriotic Americans and the lifeblood of the NFL took offence at the situation themselves. If you’re blaming trump for the view of every day citizens then I think you’re giving the guy too much credit
Is he a Buffoon or a mind controlling genius?
Anyway. What do you think of Tulsi Gabbard running Democrat 2020?
CA
And the door was only open for him because the board pushed dein out leaving wenger isolated. He was never the same without dein and even worse without pat rice
Un You have to stop trying to make Wenger out to be a victim. He wanted all the power, he loved it. He deliberately stopped anyone equivalent to Dein coming in, see his comments in 2013. Wenger fucked this club up. He wasn’t the only one but he was a massive part in it. He held this club back. The fact we held onto him for 4-6 years too long is why our change is so difficult now, less money, huge wage bill, poor squad the worst in the top 6 and suddenly trying to create infrastructure in 8 months… Read more »
we value tradition and culture
——————————–
That’s why Highbury was turned into a block of flats……..
Wenger was comfortable with being “isolated”. That made him aqcuire all the power and build a messiah complex.
He didn’t want to let go of the power until it was stripped away. Who can forget all his outrage that club even considered a DoF
Seems like several sources stating Emery is trying to get rid of Ozil this month ?
Probably won’t happen but fingers crossed.
Un getting his nFl perspective from Trump is beyond hilarious The NFL is not dying. 100,000 plus at the cowboys and Seahawks game. You can’t buy a Seahawks ticket unless from a scalper at 200 usd a pop Trump likes talk shit about the nfl because they took his arena football league and crushed it under their foot and they don’t let him into the nFl owners club. He’s just a petty pathetic man Take a knee thing ruining the nfl? Please. Everyone I know watches the NFL. Super Bowl weekend is one of the biggest party days of the… Read more »
Pedro Good post. Yes, the Rams are a good story at the moment, and they demonstrate that with a guiding philosophy, the right executives and the right coach, a Kroenke-owned team can do quite well. So what of Arsenal? Do we have a proper guiding philosophy at the moment? Do we have the right executives, the right coach. Maybe, maybe not. Let’s start with the question of guiding philosophy. What did Sanllehi and Emery say when they were hired? How did they speak about the club? How did they speak about the club’s ambitions, their own ambitions? My recollection is… Read more »
“Seems like several sources stating Emery is trying to get rid of Ozil this month ?”
Would be the best possible thing off the pitch that could happen at our club. The best.
It’s also funny that some
Posters think Kronke needs arsenal to headge his nfl stadium.
Him and his wife are worth almost 15 billion dollars!! 15 billion!!
But yes he needs arsenal worth 1 billion to build his stadium.
Ha
Some of you are so clueless
Is the city of LA paying for some of the stadium?
Emirates The NFL has been a commercial juggernaut for some time now but its ratings took a dip in 2016 and 2017, some of which was attributed to the presidential election, some of which was attributed to the Colin Kaepernick controversy, some of which was attributed to other factors. This is partly what Dissenter is referring to. There is also the issue of concussions, head injuries and CTE, an issue that is causing some sections of the population to question the safety of the sport. I’m pretty sure they have had a very good year this year, though, in large… Read more »
Pedro NFL and ‘soccer’ are very different sports off as well as on the field. The way player recruitment is carried out, the way franchises are financed, wage caps and the lack of a threat of relegation make the NFL a far safer option for owners. I’m not sure Kroenke realises just how hard and fast a club can fall in the PL. Also, regarding the Rams: Firstly what he did to st Louis makes him a duplicitous scumbag of the highest order. Secondly, the Rams haven’t won diddly squat yet- they were favourites to win their play off last… Read more »
Joe
Kroenke had to take a loan out to buy out Usmanovs shares.
He is not cash rich as most of his money is tied up in property.
Not only that, it was a short term loan so the interest repayments will be considerable.
He’ll load that on arsenal.
ALex
For some reason, LA has never been a good NfL city. Tried and failed so many times but the nfl is desperate for it work there as it’s one of the biggest markets in the US
They now will have two teams playing there. Rams and chargers. Big gambles by both but they are both doing well on the field lately and that’s what the la fan base need. They love a winner.
Alexander is right about one thing above, and that’s that Kroenke’s LA gambit is a massively risky one. At least to the outside eye, that is. Professional (American) football has failed several times before in LA and for a variety of reasons. Maybe Kroenke knows something the outside world doesn’t. I’m not sure. But it definitely seems a risky venture, which is odd, as he doesn’t strike me as the risk-taking type. It could be a good sign, actually. And who knows, maybe the younger Kroenke is behind it? Maybe he is convincing the old man to be a bit… Read more »
Deutsche Bank AG is advising Kroenke, who plans to pay for Usmanov’s shares with 45.4 million pounds of his own cash and a loan of 557 million pounds from the bank. Interest on the debt will not be funded from the business of Arsenal, according to the statement.
A large part of the LA Rams current success is down to how crap they were before and the high draft picks that let them pick Aaron Donald and Todd Gurley, the best defensive player and (arguably) running back in the NFL respectively. They also had no. 1 pick for Goff. The nearest analogy I can see to them in Prem is Chelsea when Mourinho and Abramovich came in….they already had some excellent players (Terry, Lampard) just needed better coaching and investment. Arsenal haven’t got any top players as a foundation to build on.
“He’ll load that on Arsenal.”
Right, just like he blocked Wenger from spending more than 11m in the summer of 2015.
Complete nonsense. You should try sticking to facts, rather than spreading unfounded, alarmist nonsense.
Dissenter clouding the comments with militant comments that are wrong.
Ratings are up massively this year., the rest is just guess work.
https://deadline.com/2019/01/nfl-playoff-ratings-keep-sizzling-nbc-fox-up-from-2018-1202534371/
Joe
I don’t trust that. It doesn’t have to come out of arsenal directly.
Stan can just cut the transfer budget for example.
Let’s see what happens this summer.
Football is light years behind NFL and has consistently borrowed from it as it looks to improve on and off the pitch.
Pep G a prime candidate for doing this.
All of the things the Rams are up to could be borrowed and implemented at Arsenal.
Bamford, Stan sees LA as the gateway to South American money. From what I read at least.
Alex
Kronke gave wenger all the cash he needed. He never stopped wenger from spending.
Wenger wasted it. Look at how much wenger has wasted the last decade. Give that money to a manager with a clue and we would have been a million x better off
Wenger has handcuffed the new regime with his wasteful spending
“That’s why Highbury was turned into a block of flats”
Robby Pirès was one of the first ones to buy one.
Coincidence ?? lol
Deutsche Bank AG is advising Kroenke, who plans to pay for Usmanov’s shares with 45.4 million pounds of his own cash and a loan of 557 million pounds from the bank. Interest on the debt will not be funded from the business of Arsenal, according to the statement.
Joe
Soooo. He’s paying the interest back himself but using OUR CLUB’s profit to pay back the loan itself
What a saint. We don’t deserve such a benevolent being.