The player market is bullshit though.

In what sense Burnsy?

In the sense that for several years now it would have been challenging for us to (a) recruit and maintain a competitive squad (b) retain our best players - on the principle that whatever we have offered, our rivals have always been able to trump us.

That's regardless of the bell curve of expenditure.

But even Newcastle and Swansea are getting better players than us recently.....

Michu going to Swansea for 2 million while we paid 12 for Giroud is indeed pretty damning for our scouts/transfer negotiators. Fucking ridiculous.

Nobody else wanted Michu either, so whatever the reason, he just fell off the radar. Bayern were going to sign Giroud instead of Mandzukic...

Michaud was an exception because of his ties with laud rip, But there is no doubt we have been under performing in the transfer market. I can understand players going to Chelsea, city, Manu over us, but there is no excuse for the lesser teams consistently getting the best of the rest right under our noses. Recently Arsenic gave the excuse of unfair competition, is it Newcastle who is unfairly competing with us? What unfair competition when you willingly sell your best players to your rivals, what unfair competition when you were never in for the same players? We just heard the highest player at Swansea earns 35k, it's not that dissimilar in most premiership teams contrary to the belief that 100k wages is the norm. Yet we pay 70k to players who barely play 5 games a season and the nitwit talks of unfair competition.

If you can't compete with the top 3 ok, then make sure you get the best of the rest.......we aren't. Instead we pay top money for gervinho ,giroud and chamakh in transfers, wages or both. Wenger needs to get his house in order before he starts pointing fingers.

The highest paid players at the teams around us earn the same as the highest paid players here. Our squad players earn more and achieve more.

Why are you mentioning Newcastle? What have they done? Only Liverpool (despite their current position) are comparable to us.

Problem isn't the transfer fees. It's the wages.
I've been saying for 4 or 5 years now. We overpay the mid-tier guys, and keep non-performing high-earners too long. Look at the wages that teams like Spurs and Newcastle pay their squad players who are equivalent to our own. Much less.

As Kami said, you break the bank for Wilshere and one or two others. The others, you keep on a diet.

Yes Capi you are right, to everyone else, as I said..........

Great answer. It's a simple question: what have Newcastle done to even warrant being mentioned in the same breath as Arsenal? Absolutely nothing.

What do tottenham's top players earn? Everton's? what have they accomplished?

The problem is that Arsenal live in the real football world and for some reason many of you guys can't or won't accept that reality.

But yeah, as you said... 😆

Capi, we are talking about individual players here.
How much does Gareth Bale earn? How much do the other top players at Spurs earn?
How much do Cabaye, Ben Arfa, Cisse etc., earn?
How much do players of equivalent quality earn at Arsenal.

You can, rightly, say that these teams have done nothing? But does that then mean that we should pay more in wages for equivalent players just because we are a bigger club? What am I missing?

No point talking about individual players because nobody here is privy to what they earn.

Why do we pay more? Because we slog through 50 odd games a season, every season. Because we need the quality of player who can achieve top four at a bare minimum, not as the holy grail. Because in order to achieve that in those circumstances, the quality from top to bottom of the squad has to be significantly better than those other teams. Quality costs money.

Those teams aren't on our level and don't have "equivalent" players. Our needs are entirely different.

Capi, how do you think we'd fare if we fell out the top 4 this season?

I think we'd be ok - few additions, no need to sell and next year we'd be able to focus primarily on the league

Agreed. A season out of it would probably make little difference on the football side of things, at this point.

Would have an impact on whatever emirates are giving us and (one would imagine) the new kit deal, but who knows how severe that would be.

think it could have a really bad impact.. not because of the decrease in revenue or effect on the team but the main problem is that the attitude of this board is extremly small time, they will always plan on worse case scenario, in other word always looking down instead of up.. Emergance of sugar daddys at Chelsea & City was always going to be a big factor of why we have slipped behind but our lack of ambition has has also contributed significatly towards it aswell... If we drop out of the top 4 i dont think it will change our tight arse strategy. We'll be relying on Wenger to work his diminishing magic.

Captain wrote:

It's a simple question: what have Newcastle done to even warrant being mentioned in the same breath as Arsenal?

Neither side has won anything in the last 8 years and both are mid table selling clubs.
Granted, I can't mention Swansea in the same breath as us now

Captain wrote:

Those teams aren't on our level and don't have "equivalent" players. Our needs are entirely different.

This is what some people refuse to accept. Our players are actually quite good. Our wage structure should be adjusted to better reward players that are more important on the pitch, but we still won't be able to retain our best players when someone comes with a 200k p/week offer.

Our players and finances are not the problem here. We could do with a MF and a ST, but the rest should be easily making top four if not challenging for the title in the right circumstances (its not all in our hands, rivals have to slip up to some extent). We should have 1 League win, 2 League Cups and probably an FA Cup in the past 8 years. It hasn't been due to lack of playing staff.