Do you still want Wenger as Arsenal manager?

[She Wore A Yellow Ribbon]

well yeah, you could spin it off as simply an 'ex liverpool player', making it sound like he's a paul merson to arsenal or a dwight yorke to man utd to fit into your argument.

or you could see that he's been a huge part of liverpool throughout his career, has been for a number of years in terms of management too, and clearly still keeps in touch with people at the club. you dont need to know a board member to get info, especially if you have the status phil thompson has at liverpool

and noone ever said he knew our budget, stop making things up.

its common knowledge wenger didnt want to pay £16m for alonso, but if you want to sit there and act or pretend as if he did, or that the reason we didnt want to sign alonso was because of something else, then no problem. but wake up to reality.

[She Wore A Yellow Ribbon]

This talk of Wenger being in full control just doesn't make any sense, not from a real world perspective anyway. A guy like Kroenke does not kick in the hundreds of millions required to pay off the shareholders and then turn to the manager and cede all control. That's just not how things work in the business world. What's the point in basing any argument on the idea that Wenger has full control of the club when that can't possibly be true?

why not? as long as arsenal fc are making a profit, he's happy.

its been the norm of our board for a long time.

[Letters]

This talk of Wenger being in full control just doesn't make any sense, not from a real world perspective anyway. A guy like Kroenke does not kick in the hundreds of millions required to pay off the shareholders and then turn to the manager and cede all control. That's just not how things work in the business world. What's the point in basing any argument on the idea that Wenger has full control of the club when that can't possibly be true?

[Niall_Quinn]

When nothing else makes sense simply look for the tell-tale signs of who has gained and who has lost. The shareholders have gained massively, for very little investment and risk. So they are the big winners. Kroenke stands to gain potentially more if the debts are secure. He's bought a CL club with its own world class stadium, a large fan base and a healthy balance sheet. In football terms the ideal investment EVEN IF THE CLUB BEGINS TO DO BADLY ON THE PITCH. Remember the Channel 4 documentary that exposed the foreign ownership scam. What were they looking for above all else? Clubs on the wane that for a small investment could be turned into cash cows, in the short term at least. We don't know the details of Kroenke's takeover so we can't really speak about the levels of risk he has taken on. But if he's managed to hedge those risks by whatever method we can say that Stan is set to be a big winner too. And face it, why would he even bother if that's not the case? Is it a love of Arsenal?

So who has lost. That's simple to see because it's more in the open. The team has lost, not the individual players but the quality and entertainment value of the team as a whole. With ticket prices up and value for money down, the fans have been the big losers. People getting fucked over by the rich, so what's new there? And there's one other loser. A man who is undergoing the process of seeing his five star reputation transformed into a vehicle for the tabloids to shift their daily rags, Arsene Wenger, the "Wally Without the Brolly". He's mad you know.

If I had to guess, what we're experiencing here is withdrawal symptoms. We've just spent the best part of a half a decade being fucked by the shareholders in preparation for the big sell-off. Now that's happened there's an empty space where PHW and friends used to plant their tools. That space is ready for some American style fresh meat. So get ready because I'm betting what went before was just foreplay.

[Kano]

well yeah if you wanna end it like that to fit your argument then fine. and if you want to be ignorant enough to think wenger has not got full control of our club when it's blatantly obvious he has, then thats fine too.

you honestly believe a man would invest hundreds of millions into a business and leave the company under full control of somebody else? absolutely no way.

[She Wore A Yellow Ribbon]

you honestly believe a man would invest hundreds of millions into a business and the company under full control of somebody else? absolutely no way.

but you're making it sound like arsenal fc are like any run of the mill company on the high street. sure if you buy nandos you can sack the manager for being on his high horse and having too much control.

but we are a football club.
we have been making profit for a number of years and silent stan loves that. why invest hundreds of millions of pounds, then change things and give wenger less control, or go against what he has done so far, when the club has been making $$$. why change things when stan wants to make money, and we are/have been?

[Boss]

Wenger would not stay if all the various nonsense being spouted above was true.

[Kano]

but you're making it sound like arsenal fc are like any run of the mill company on the high street. sure if you buy nandos you can sack the manager for being on his high horse and having too much control.

but we are a football club.
we have been making profit for a number of years and silent stan loves that. why invest hundreds of millions of pounds, then change things and give wenger less control, or go against what he has done so far, when the club has been making $$$. why change things when stan wants to make money, and we are/have been?

the whole point is, the agenda for the club and for any business is set out by the ceo in collaboration with the chairman/owners and everyone falls into place from that. the whole business strategy would not be composed and laid out by a lower level director (equivalent to wenger). the lucky thing is and why the board love wenger so much is because his approach to football is in sync with their business model.

[Niall_Quinn]

why not? as long as arsenal fc are making a profit, he's happy.

its been the norm of our board for a long time.

The manager being allowed to proceed because the board is in agreement with the course of action being taken is not the same thing as the manager having control. But it does raise one important dilemma in terms of the argument put forth that all of our woes are down to Wenger. If that's the case, why does the board sit on its hands or hide out on the other side of the world? It can only be because they are happy we are slipping down the league, happy our players are leaving, happy we collapse at the end of every season. Or at very least they are not concerned enough to act. Or perhaps they are entirely incompetent. Whichever way you look at it the board is in this just as deeply as Wenger. And my whole argument these past few days has been based around the fact there's a definite move to paint Wenger as being solely responsible, the buck stops with him, so to speak. How convenient for all concerned, remove one man and everything is fixed. And how convenient that those equally responsible for our downturn are suddenly in the clear without having paid any penalty either practical or in terms of their reputation. It would be a travesty if this becomes Wenger's reward in return for what he has done for this club. A travesty enacted all so a few newspapers can be shifted, a few rich men can secure their seats on the gravy train and a growing body of fans can be appeased, albeit through misdirection. As fans we need to be very careful which way we jump.

[Olivier's xmas twist]

why not? as long as arsenal fc are making a profit, he's happy.

its been the norm of our board for a long time.

Thats more of the old board then Stan tbh. Until the end of the season we won't really know his objectives tbh.