Earning their corn

50 comments

1. Yeah, the Ozil and Mkhi salaries are a huge problem relative to their contribution. I just don’t see how we can afford both and do the rebuilding we need. Maybe we can’t afford either of them. The problem obviously is that the same reason we need to move them(marginal performance) is the same reason that it’s going to be hard to move them.
   I like Ozil. When he’s on, it’s a pleasure to watch him. I defended his performance for Germany at the last WC when he was basically turned into a scapegoat for the failings of others. And he did have a couple of quite good seasons for us.
   But we need to move at least one of those two, maybe both. And if it takes subsidizing the move to get them off the books, I’d be OK with that too.

2. Junk Ozil and Mikhi. Just not worth it. And deeply unsettling to the camp to have 2 players out earning everyone else in spades and still not making a contribution.
   I’d give them both away: surely they’d be worth it to some club prepared to pay them an upfront signing on fee instead of a transfer fee and then a more ‘normal’ salary.
   And £350k/£550k pw would then to buy a couple of much more reliable assist/goal providers.
   I’m afraid I’m impervious to the Ozil PR machine – he’s a coaster and we need to get rid.

3. If we make CL. Miki and Mustafi should go, if we dont then add Ozil to that . : Then do a rebuilding from within and have EL./top 6 as our goal….yes a step down from Wenger’s CL. / top 4 but thats our ambitions money wise…..

4. Ozil should be sold/loaned by hook or by crook. I seem to remember that even during Wengers reign, that people were arguing about him and that has only gotten louder this year. That means that he isn’t putting in the performances in my view. I agree with Arseblogs synopsis that Ozils camp know that he will be shopped around and he may try and fight to stay. He needs to go. He is ready for Italy where he could extend his career by several years. I can see a two year loan on the cards happening with us subsidizing some of his wages.

   This may go against popular opinion, but I would keep Miki. I would try to sell him, but if I couldn’t, I would keep him and not loan him. He does bust his arse, but we really need depth and he ticks a lot of boxes in the middle and on the flanks.

   I would also consider options for both Xhaka and Mustafi. They would have to be sold, though. No loans. If no suitable option came in, I would keep, but only for depth reasons. I would use Mustafi as a right back option as I think that he is much better out there than in the middle.

   I would let Monreals contract expire. It may have been renewed, but I haven’t read any confirmation yet.

   Sell Elneny. Promote Willock and Nelson. I know that there are other youngsters allegedly on the cusp and too good for U23s (Saka, Smith-Rowe), so perhaps a pre-season will demonstrate why they should be given 1st team action.

   I think that Jenkinsons contract also expires this summer. Also, Ospina isn’t on the list and he has a year remaining (sell or loan him).

   Priority for me would be anywhere on the pitch barring striker and keeper – lol. Seriously, we need midfielders, wide-men, a left-back, and centre-backs.

   Now that I have taken off my fantasy-rimmed shades, I see a long drawn out saga with Ozil and an eventual loan where we are probably paying half of his salary for a small loan fee probably on deadline day. We will buy a centre-back, a midfielder and a wide man. I hope for more ins and outs, but I think that we will not get enough done this summer. There is just too much to do to this squad.

   1. I appreciate your comment and would only add that I think Kroenke will never subsidize wages to get a high earner off the books. I would love to be proved wrong, but my man Steve Bould is still on payroll and literally does nothing more than set out the cones. The only reason they didn’t cut him is because they would have been forced to pay him (like Wenger) to do nothing.

      1. Is this a long-standing Kroenke thing? I’m surprised that subsidizing wages of an older, overpaid player to get him out is something they’d reject out of hand. Sometimes it’s just good business when you have salary issues and need to rebuild.

         1. Kroenke is notorious for holding onto coaches/managers way past their due date, more than likely because they don’t want to pay the severance. No way is KSE subsidizing Ozil’s wages. They will offload him for a pittance transfer before they do that. And that’s what would happen – Ozil will go for a shockingly low price to a club that will agree to hold his salary where it is.

         2. I understand the frustration of Ozil but from a purely business sense, subsidizing his wages to go play elsewhere is a terrible solution. First off, you would probably have to cover 150k of his 350k/week, saving roughly 10m/year, but a capable replacement would probably run in 150k-200k range anyway, not including transfer fee, so not really saving much, if any. Add in a transfer fee which will surely be more than 21m (i am guessing that he has 3 years left on his deal) and you are actually losing money. Second, if he is not replaced, and from a creativity POV losing Ramsey, Ozil, and Micki leaves us with Xhaka as our only source of passing through the lines.

5. I have my doubts about the club’s approach. They want to force a sell before signing a replacement. From a business viewpoint, that’s the conservative approach. But it doesn’t work from a football viewpoint because as long as the club doesn’t have a replacement, the player has no reason to leave: he has a fat contract and the team will still need him. Arsenal should do like Chelsea with Fabregas: they signed Jorginho and Kovacic, basically making Fabregas a third choice. By having Jorginho and Kovacic, Chelsea could isolate Fabregas, that’s why he left for Monaco.

   1. Emery tried to isolate Ozil, didn’t work at all 🙁

      1. It didn’t work because Arsenal had no decent alternative in the squad (Iwobi and Mkhitaryan not consistent or good enough). That’s the big difference with Chelsea, who had Jorginho and Kovacic who could perform at Fabregas’ level.

6. Based on performance and the fact that they are strikers (traditionally higher earners), Auba and Laca deserve to be the top 2 earners.

   I know everyone protests that Ozil doesn’t want to leave but the club can also tell him that he will rot on the reserves if he doesn’t. Maybe that’s OK with Ozil, maybe he’s another Adebayor content to pick up a fat paycheque rather than play week to week. I think that was the plan this past winter until Emery got pragmatic and decided that carrying out Sanhelli’s instructions to bench Ozil was reducing the team’s offensive outputs.

   I can see convincing him to go to another major European city – his concern seems to be he’s a young rich man who likes the female prospects in a city like London. China would hold no appeal for him there. But Milan? Paris? Don’t tell me AC Milan with new owners wouldn’t take Ozil for free. Keep in mind also that footballers get an exemption from top tax rates in Italy so he could get paid slightly less and still come out the same.

   But I agree with the comment above, it’s going to be a drawn out saga, probably right up to the death in mid-August.

   1. He just got married recently. London seems to be where they want to have a life. There’s a big Turkish community in London too.

      1. I refuse to use Twitter or any other social media, so just goes to show how out to lunch I am on some personal details about players … I googled it and yes indeed, he just got married. I had no idea. My apologies to Mesut Ozil for the comment I made above.

   2. “Rot in the reserves” is so 1980s. No club will ever Bogarde a player again. Not even Manchester City. Financially, it’s nut. Footballistically, the player is almost certainly — at least — squad quality. Ozil proved this season that Arsenal are not good enough to have him on their books but not use him. Nose, spite, face.

      1. There are also labor laws which prevent this. Basically, just because Ozil has a contract doesn’t mean he’s a slave and can be punished. And that goes the other way as well – we don’t have to play him. It’s a fine line.

      2. Jack Rodwell, Sunderland.

7. Seeing Welbeck’s salary, it makes sense why we’re not renewing. I like him, but replace him with a young, hungry talent and you’re saving at least 50k a week.

   How in the world does Kos make so little? Get a new agent, man!

   Taking those whose contracts are expiring, that’s almost half a mil weekly, or 20% of the total. Even replacing them with younger, cheaper players (or ‘internal solutions’ like Martinez), you’re probably saving 250k a week.

   I saw a rumor that Inter and Juve were interested in Sanchez. Why would they be interested in him and is wages and not Ozil/Miki, who at least can point to SOME performance over the last 12 months? We need to do better as a club, even if it means letting them go for naught.

8. Let me be a real Gooner and say that we are so f&$ked. It would take PSG, Man City or Monaco type money and another 2-3 seasons to make us truly competitive with the current top European teams.

   That said, it is not impossible to find success next season but it would take the right mix of things to come off all at once:
   – Ozil would need to get back his mojo and play at a consistent level. I’m talking 15+ assists and 6-7 goals.
   – Young players would need to be given a real opportunity to contribute and they would need to take their chance. Nketiah, Smith Rowe, Willock, Reiss Nelson.
   -We would need to spend the majority of the season, 25 games or so, near the bottom of the Premier League injury table.
   -We would need to make a huge improvement defensively.
   -We would need to dramatically increase our shots taken and improve our finishing.
   – Emery would need to get a clue. That Euro semi final was his version of drawing a wolf outline on a chalk board. Or maybe it was a black panther.
   -Finally, and this may have nothing not do with anything but I’d love to see Wenger’s presence at the Emirates once again. He stayed away all season for his reasons but he’d be a sight for sore eyes. His whimsical smile in the stands would be lovely to see again.

9. Wait, we signed Sokratis on a one year deal?

   It’s almost amazing, but even if we cut a lot of costs, we have the foundation of a good team. Leno is a good GK. Kos, Sok and Holding at CB is good. Torreira and Guendouzi are good young players, and the two attackers are quality. If it were up to me, I’d exhaust all my budget getting a top cdm. Promote from within, or get cheap buys for the other positions. Fill 1 position each season with great quality.

   Offload Mustafi, Elneny, Jenkinson, Miki = Ozil’s salary. Which is what we’re going to have to do.

   Emery nearly lost the squad with the insipid displays and complete lack of creativity while trying to force Ozil out this season. Maybe if Juventus want him after they sell Dybala (and Pjanic?) then he would agree to reunite with Cristiano and Ramsey. But I don’t see him going anywhere else.

   Miki’s transfer will be complicated by the fact that Raiola is banned for 3 months. Should still be possible to do it, but you never know. Especially if he’s not keen to move either.

   We need CL football and messing up the top 4 race could really come back to bite us.

   1. I honestly don’t think Juve can afford Ozil, they’re right at the margins with their salary load.

      If we lose Ozil, Ramsey and Mhkyi we need a quality CAM more than CDM where Xhaka is serviceable and that’s more AMN’s natural position. I’d rather we spent our MASSIVE 40m kitty and see if we could get Anderson Talisca out of China or beat United to Bruno Fernandes. Both could still be bought and leave us with enough money for a young CB. Two signings is all I’m expecting this summer, the rest will be internal promotions of the youth.

      1. Yeah, but if they sell Dybala and Pjanic they might have enough room. Especially if we let him go dirt cheap. But that was just by the by.

         I would agree on an CAM except Emery doesn’t seem to either want or know how to use one. I’d settle for some technical control in midfield with youngsters as wide attackers.

10. Now the choices for PL promotion are between a team with John Terry, or the combined forces of Lampard and Ashley Cole. This season just keeps on giving.

11. There’s a lot of hate for Ozil based on him earning money that 2 parties agreed to. We didnt do all that well during the period that Ramsey and Ozil were left out so I am not exactly sure where the optimism that we will be better off without him comes from. Saving £350k wont give you anything on the pitch and unless we make it to the UCL, I dont see anyone but a suarez type coming in.

    1. Having or not having Ozil unfortunately didn’t change much. Ramsey on the other hand was a clear difference in the way we performed, we basically collapsed when Ramsey got injured. Ozil was in the side and his presence didn’t change a thing: Arsenal kept creating chances from the flanks, without being able to penetrate through the middle to get higher quality chances. Which is the only thing Ozil is supposedly good at.

       1. But we were revived when Aubameyang decided to play as more than just a finisher, so it proves that Emery was right, to say the team he chose could do the job. They were not bothered earlier in the season.

    2. There’s zero ‘hate’ for “…Ozil based on him earning money that 2 parties agreed to.”

       There’s 100% strong dislike for the performance that was expected in exchange for the money to which 2 parties agreed.

12. I’m torn about Özil. He seems to be a more delicate guy emotionally than most athletes. I think he’s very susceptible to confidence drops. Wenger tried to cater to that, which sometimes worked. Emery understandably didn’t want to, but Özil has incredible talent, so he needed to try. Maybe with the team more settled next year, he’ll feel more comfortable and play more to his ability.

    1. Wenger tried to accommodate Ozil and in the end we have to admit, he failed. Ozil didn’t perform consistently even with all that freedom that he has been given. Player in that role, free of defensive responsibilities should be a constant threat, like Hazard, Messi, Salah. Ozil cannot dribble through players to upset opposition’s formation(he has enough speed and technique, but lacks balance for that), doesn’t present a goal threat(I am not asking for Auba’s numbers, but at least 10-15 goals) and his passing range isn’t wide enough to be able to directly influence the game from deep(if he is forced to go down collect the ball, he is not gonna create goalscoring chance from there, he is just gonna keep and recycle ball). And in addition to that because he doesn’t make up for the lack necessary qualities with enough of discipline and work rate(Emery cannot assign him to do “Ramsey” on Jorginho for example), as a side we lose more than we gain with him.

       1. I think differently. Ozil was the reason why Sanchez enjoyed Arsenal, someone he could combine with to good effect. Moving to Man United shattered his best combination.

          1. About Sanchez, I think he was kind of player who can play regardless of the setting, because he is solely relies on his individual skills. I remember when he first came, Arsenal had a really horrible start of the season and Sanchez hit his peak form, playing as #10. So, yes maybe Ozil helped Sanchez to enjoy playing, but for a player with that amount of tactical freedom and lack of defensive skills(I think he is not lazy, I think he is just a horrible tackler), what brings us in return is really not enough. In fact I would have preferred Sanchez playing as #10, sad that after situation stabilized, this position was just kinda given to Ozil(though Santi could play there as good as Ozil, if not better) and never allowed to anybody else. I love watching Ozil enjoying his football, but Arsene and Emery didn’t find the way to utilize him, so it is reasonable to ask maybe problem is in the player?

13. We keep forgetting Ozil is tuned to making skilful, pacy players better. He did so with C.Ronaldo, and with Sanchez while at Arsenal. You can’t really blame him when the team is not set up to maximise his strengths.

    1. Why not? Flexibility is an attribute too! I love tippy-tappy football and have banged the Ozil drum for a long time; he was more or less my dream signing when he arrived. But the last season in particular was a woeful return for the outlay, and if our star player and lynchpin requires everything to be juuuuust right for him to contribute, well he probably shouldn’t be our star player any more.

       Is he likely to regain his mojo next season? He’s getting on a bit and was never a physical specimen to begin with, and sad to say our £40M summer budget is unlikely to extend to C. Ronaldo. Even if I had faith in Raul discovering an unheralded reincarnation of Alexis circa 2014 (spoiler alert, I’m not) Ornstein is reporting that our priorities are at CB and CM with WF on the b-list alongside new fullbacks. With that in mind I sadly struggle to see a scenario where Ozil flourishes again, though I expect we’ll have to try and find one, as whatever I might pontificate here there are no obvious suitors for him and he’s clearly not keen to move on. He was supposed to herald a new era of ambition, but unfortunately he may have become a millstone. ;-(

    2. Ozil with Auba, Laca, Iwobi, Miki, and Nketiah with Ramsey joining in, should have been a sight to behold. Instead we have a coach who wants to attack exclusively from the wings because he’s terrified of losing the ball in the middle.

       The team was built around Ozil then we brought Emery who likes to be an underdog. So used to fighting against the odds that he doesn’t know what to do when they’re in his favour. He stacked the deck against himself to feel more at home.

       It’s also interesting to me that this whole ruthless cutting the wage bill business didn’t start till Gazidis left. We were happy to offer Ozil the money (and I maintain image rights and the Adidas connection was part of what made it reasonable), we had agreed a deal with Ramsey. We likely would have kept Welbeck too. We’d even agreed to honour Wilshere’s deal. Whatever you may think about the wastefulness of all this, the club was ok with it. Until Sanllehi got his mitts on it.

       If Ozil finds a club which plays a more suitable game, in a city and situation he’s happy in, he should move. But he’s under no obligation to do Arsenal any favours. I suspect he’ll be staying and Emery will continue using him badly.

    3. I always felt like “if only Ozil had good strikers to play with…” I felt like Ozil was not delivering because he had Giroud/Welbeck as strikers. But I don’t know anymore, Laca and Auba are arguably our best assets, especially Auba’s game should fit well with Ozil, but yet it didn’t happen, so I am not sure issue is with strikers. Arsene tried his best to get the most out of Ozil, he clearly adored the guy, but even he couldn’t.

14. i’ve tried multiple times, with little success, to encourage a discussion about why a club like arsenal are in this predicament.

    the whole idea of arsenal moving to the emirates was to create more revenue so that the club could compete, fiscally, with the biggest clubs in the world. over the past few seasons, they’ve spent a ton in transfers on the likes of mesut, alexis, lacazette, aubameyang, and the xhaka/mustafi deals. clearly they had money to spend on top talent.

    last summer, the sole ownership of the club was assumed by stan kronke who bought up the last 33% of the club’s shares. the club was worth $2.3 billion so that roughly equates to $759 million. no problem for the american billionaire, right? wrong. WRONG!

    kronke is a billionaire but he’s not rich. his value is in his assets; he owns several sports franchises. he doesn’t have tremendous amounts of liquid capital that you would equate to many billionaires having. as a result, kronke put up $58 million but borrowed the rest to take over the club. subtracting $58 million from $759 million equals $701 million he borrowed. at 2% interest, he’ll owe the bank $714.02 million. no problem, right? wrong. WRONG! this is where the problems begin.

    kronke is not paying this loan, directly. he’s using the club’s revenue to repay the loan. the revenue that’s supposed to allow arsenal to pays their bills and compete, fiscally, with the top teams in the world is now being burdened with nearly 3/4 of a billion dollars in fees imposed by the owner who didn’t have the money to be a proper owner. in short, arsenal are broke.

    what explanation did the club give for pulling the ramsey contract? what explanation did they give for not giving emery funds for players in january? why are arsenal desperate to sell the top earners? arsenal can’t just come out and say, “we pulled the ramsey contract because we can’t afford to honor it because we’re f*cking broke”. however, that’s is the case. arsenal are broke. kronke is broke. wenger’s dream of arsenal being able to compete with the top teams in the world is gone as well. arsenal are no longer a top team.

    1. gazidis was smart to bail when he did.

    2. think, that’s more $700 million that arsenal have to spend and have nothing to show for it. all because arsenal had a majority share holder take over the club that he was ill-suited to take over. how long will it take to repay that loan?

       i cringe when i think what could happen to arsenal in the meantime; emery is no arsene wenger. that ugly football we saw when ramsey and ozil were out of the team is likely a sign of things to come. playing football of that stature is likely to see arsenal fall down the premier league table. how far down? we’ll see.

       1. Emery is such a weird choice of coach for this team. Doesn’t play attacking football which the team was set up to do. And as far as I can tell, is not at all interested in developing youth, which would be a legitimate way to cut costs and rebuild.

          If we win the CL, we’ll maybe stave off further relegation and stay in the top 6 next season. Otherwise we’re going to drop down to between 8th and 12th.

          That’s how I feel about this club after learning about the Lbo to support Kroenke’s takeover. Still not sure if they will produce evidence of Arsenal’s money being used to fund this, but as they aren’t listed anymore, maybe they don’t have to?

          1. Win the EL*

          2. Yes, I think that’s the main issue with Unai: he failed to enable the team to maximize its attacking potential. Arsenal became so unbearable to watch, because we lack control and cannot penetrate the opposition through the center. Players look clearly lost for ideas when they get to the final 3rd. He tried to patch up the defense, but that was never going to work. You can do whatever you want, but when your defenders commit individual errors, there isn’t much that can be done in that department. What he could do is to improve the attack, out shoot the opposition, get the ball to Laca& Auba as often as possible.

    3. Oh I forgot to read that link you’d posted.

       You know, that is the most logical explanation of all of this. I’m inclined to believe you.

       Hmm. So let’s see. Kroenke took over complete ownership in August last year, just after Emery (Raul’s man) got here. There were even some reports Arteta turned us down rather than us rejecting him. Gazidis announced he was leaving in September. Club appointed Raul, who pushed out Sven, officially in January, but probably before that in practice.

       Makes sense. Gazidis and Sven hadn’t signed up for more austerity, or at least not artificially imposed austerity.

       One question though, do/will the Arsenal accounts reflect the money being pulled out?

       1. Could you repost that link, Shard?

          I’ve missed it and it seems an important topic. I have long thought that Kroenke’s involvement and now outright ownership of the club would be thoroughly detrimental. But I hadn’t heard about the specifics of his loan to purchase Usmanov’s shares and the possible consequences.

    4. That is a chilling but very plausible analysis of Arsenal’s current financial situation. It fits the evidence and I do recall Kroenke saying publicly that he admired what the Glazers had done at Manchester United. The sudden exit of Gazidis and then Mislintat did suggest that the earth had moved under feet that had seemed rooted in Arsenal for at least the medium if not the long term only a few short weeks earlier. If the club is paying back that loan or even just the interest on the loan and having to live with the ‘self-sufficiency’ philosophy without the massive commercial income of Man U then its future is very gloomy. We will be lucky to end up like Everton but a decline to the state of Aston Villa or even Leeds is a distinct possibility. Winter is coming.

    5. a) you’ve understated what he owes… It would be 2% per annum – at a minimum. We don’t know what the payment structure is for the loan and how much principle remains at the end of each year/month. Likely you could add another $100m to that figure for what he owes;
       b) he’s also leveraged to the t*ts on the Los Angeles stadium that is primarily self-financed. Granted, the projections for real estate development spin-offs from that stadium should make it a lucrative investment long term, but it may be years before it’s realized.
       c) what he’s done is no different than what the Glazers did, but Man Utd seem able to spend big amounts of money (acknowledging of course that they are a bigger club than ours)

       The reality is that all of his sports franchises are asset plays – buy, hold, leverage, then possibly sell. I have strong belief that we peaked this year and it’s down the table for us… but the longer we stay mired in mediocrity the lower our revenues will go and the more fan anger/hatred will grow until Kroenke will bail at great profit. I give it 7-8 years. That sounds like an eternity and it will feel like it, but it will be the silver lining to our short-term demise.

       As you say, this is 100% on the owner. There’s no way one of the ten richest clubs in Europe should be working on a 40 million transfer/salary budget.

15. Laca and Auba have been our best players this season and they were signed from other clubs. It makes sense for their salary to be highest. But from another viewpoint:
    Ozil was a free transfer which makes him command a really high salary. Micki was paid by United and we kind of let them move him off their wages and onto ours. I don’t think Micki has been a bad signing. He has played a good amount of minutes. Has come up with a few good games as well. Also, rather than lose Sanchez for nothing in the summer we managed to get Micki for free. Having said all this, these 2 players have not deserved their wages. Micki if sold would result in good business for the club. Ozil, I don’t think will be sold, the only way he is leaving is if Arsenal clearly tell him that despite of what happens he will not play for Arsenal again. I don’t think Arsenal have the guts to make this decision. This is sad because Ozil needs to go. Arsenal are no longer a team that can afford him, financially and on the field. He does not win a single header. He even ducks. He does not defend. We are not that good a team anymore to defend without a CAM. Also, if we keep laca and auba, which we should, we already have 2 strikers. We need to build the team around them. Playing Ozil with them leaves us short in midfield. Playing with a three at the back is unbecoming of a team like Arsenal. Style of play is something that influences who you watch and the 4231 or the 4411 is what I want to see. Good fullbacks who can both defend and attach, good CAM who can dribble past player. Essentially Arsenal under Emery needs to have a player that is not brilliant but functional in the position they are in. Wenger was too much of an artist to follow this rule but Emery is not. Emery is a functional manager. I have a feeling that he and the club will sign the right players, fire the right players and will be successful in improving the squad value for a second year running. If Arsenal would have kept Ramsey, the additions of Torreira, Leno, Sokratis and Gendouzi, would have represented a significant increase in squad value. I would say around 40 million pounds for these 4 players. In Ramsey we lost around 50 🙁 . I ended up typing too much :P. Thanks,

16. The problem with this Arsenal squad is that it lacks coherence. It’s like half of it is built for possession, and half of it is for counterattacking.

    Auba and Laca are a perfect front 2 in a deeplying 4-4-2. Iwobi is a good counterattacker and works hard enough to play on the wing. Torreira can hold his own in a midfield pair, if he’s given the right partner. Sokratis and Koscielny are two hardnosed defenders. Kolasinac is a beast. Bernd Leno is a really good keeper.

    Then we have players like Özil, Xhaka, Monreal, Elneny and Guendouzi, who are much about possession and control. Mkhi is also in that category. They’re not as physical, and want to control the game with their technique instead.

    I’d love to see what Auba and Laca could in front of a defensively solid 4-4-2 over a season. That would be a very dangerous cup team. Unfortunately, Emery has never produced a defensively solid side, so I don’t think we will see it happen.

    1. Thé problème is that the possession players listed are not really aggressive enough to make a difference, with the exception of Guendouzi.

17. Hi Limestone.
    Here’s the link josh posted.

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/mikeozanian/2018/08/07/kroenke-buying-usmanovs-arsenal-stake-in-2-2-billion-lbo/#5906dc024130

    I would like to say that someone on Twitter who apparently knows about this stuff (GiantGooner) says that it is not an LBO. That it was a 364 day bridge loan, allowing Kroenke time to shift cash from his other assets to pay for the shares. And that it would have no effect on Arsenal at all. Apparently, Forbes is fake news.

    Still worth a discussion, but for now, I’m back to blaming Raul instead of Kroenke directly.

    1. Thanks, Shard. In blaming Raul, you have my company.

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