I feel like we’ve had this dance a few times where we don’t know whether the owners or the coach is primarily responsible for lack of spending, and this was before anyone had even heard of Kroenke. I think in many respects the gamble we took is not that much different to the gamble Liverpool took and the gamble City have taken. If there is a difference it’s that we as a club decided to thin out the squad. Smith Rowe, Nketiah, Vieira and Nelson probably would have been quite helpful to have in terms of them playing the cup games and some of the champions league home games so that players like Havertz and Martinelli weren’t playing constantly.

If you want a particular type of striker and want to wait until you can get that person that’s one thing, making it so there’s no sufficient backup for who you have is another matter entirely.


Ultimately though I’m 41, and at almost no time has it ever felt the club has done sufficient business in the transfer market. This encompasses for me George Graham, Rioch, Wenger, Emery and Arteta.