The Ozil Money Pit: Page 84 - The Arsenal discussion forum and community: One More in the Tolly

The Ozil Money Pit

Klaus

What good is anything really, Coombs? Either we continue to watch football or we lay down and die just because we aren't successful. It strikes me as downright stupid to destroy more good things about the club just because there are so few around. I've never understood the question "We're not good so what's the point of having good players?"

I don't want to let go of Auba any more than I want to let go of Martinelli. I do think it matters that we have them, for different yet similar reasons. One's exciting now, the other makes me excited about the future. I'm trying to picture the last two years without Aubameyang and all I see is even more heartbreak and frustration. It matters to me that we have quality somewhere, are good at something, still have standards, are capable of entertaining. It's also one less piece that has to be in place. Maybe a really motivated defender and midfielder could help transform the rest of the team. Who honestly knows what it'll take to win when fucking Leicester go out and bring home the league?

speedy

While I'd love to see him here long term. Hes consistently liking posts that are negative about arsenal for years. The guy resents being here but knows the only way to get a move is to play out of his sink. If we massively bribe him to be here. It's hard to imagine him continuing the kind of form he's in now. It'd be horrendous for the changing room to have another CBA player making x3 the wages of everyone else. Similarly were massively lacking in quality and top four is a wishful dream if he leaves and we don't have a big transfer window.

When newcastle went down a couple of players who loved the club forced all the talented but uninterested players out and they instantly were much better for it. Arteta knows it's a running problem that guys don't want to be here he has mentioned it a ton. You get a negative atmosphere and it spreads and sucks thr life out of everyone. At some point if we want to build something that's better than the sum of its parts we need a core of players that get on and are desperate for it to work. Hence the return of a focus towards youth.

Leicester have had a lot of players who want to be there.

Coombs

I still don't see how clinging to ageing stars as their value tanks is exciting. Goals aside, don't we want to see new players coming in? How do we do that without converting value? We aren't going to get where we want to go with Auba, and when we advocate for selling him we don't mean we want to see this same team just without Aubameyang. That's not the choice. It's to see development, change, and potential growth. I want a new experience watching Arsenal, not to be served the same flaming turd with an Aubameyang tap in on top every week.

Mirth

Sounds good in theory but the past decade has shown that the club is incapable of offering development, change and potential for growth and it's overwhelming more likely that losing Aubameyang will cause a further decline. At least keeping Aubamyang prevents the floor from crumbling- for another season or two.

It's not like Aubameyang has been around long enough anyway and somehow holding us back, he's only been here a little over two seasons.

Klaus

Coombs wrote:
I still don't see how clinging to ageing stars as their value tanks is exciting. Goals aside, don't we want to see new players coming in? How do we do that without converting value?

What value though? We're talking about a 31 year old player with 12 months left on his deal. What kind of offers do you think we're going to receive that haven't already been tabled? You're currently arguing against selling Pepé in another thread, but I guarantee you he'd fetch a bigger fee despite being a current flop, and that's before you even factor in the unlikelihood of him ever producing a season as good as anything Aubameyang gives us. If it's about selling players to get money to reinvest there are a bunch of other, more logical choices than Auba in this squad.

Claudius

Coombs is absolutely right that you need to refresh the team. But I am a bit in two minds regarding Aubameyang.

As much as I want to build a young and competitive team, and realise that a lot of value is stuck in the top end of the squad, you need to have some quality veterans to hold it all together. We saw that with Fabregas and company. So there is a much stronger case for getting rid of all non-value adding veterans first: Ozil, Lacazette, Mustafi, Sokratis, Luiz, Kolasinac etc. and then reinvesting that money into some really high quality pieces that can create a firm framework for the kids. If we dumped those guys, kept Aubameyang, and then brought in guys like Partey and Upamecano. Upamecano is young but he is top 3 on so many statistical measures in his league and mature. That would give you a great structure without the poison of our useles veterans. Plus you have Leno.

And then you can keep developing so Saka, Pépé, Saliba, Upamecano, Martinelli, Guendouzi, Bellerin, Nelson etc all mature together. And keep adding other veterans / mid career pieces each season. Given the state of this league, well-coached that group is good enough to make top 4 next week. And with good buying we are in a title race within 2-3 seasons.

You need to be competitive during transitions, and Arteta has raved about Aubameyang’s work ethic. We can use it to set the tone for the rebuild

Coombs

For the record, I'm not against selling Pepe, I'm just in favor of playing him. In fact, I want to sell him as I said, but for a profit rather than a loss. This is the same argument that resulted in tragedy when it was about Sanchez and Ozil. We have to sell.

Coombs

Unless we renew and sell next year. We can't carry him into retirement.

Claudius

I’m not against selling any of them. But you want to sell them when they’re peak value. You can’t keep buying players, destroying their value in a dysfunctional system and selling them at a loss. You’re basically like Time Warner buying AOL and mucking about. Always be creating value by having the right systems in place. We are going to kill Pépé and Guendouzi. I’m half happy for Malen, Reine-Adelaide, and Gnabry cos they escaped the asylum. Look at them now, jointly worth over £110m probably

Coombs

Exactly. The takeaway is that we should have sold them for 110 million, not that they should be playing in our first team.

Ray

Just let him run down his contract, he’s going to be 32 by the end of it, and on the decline.

Klaus

Coombs wrote:
For the record, I'm not against selling Pepe, I'm just in favor of playing him. In fact, I want to sell him as I said, but for a profit rather than a loss. This is the same argument that resulted in tragedy when it was about Sanchez and Ozil. We have to sell.

This might well be Pepé's peak value for us though. I reckon Speedy is right in that thread: If he has another underwhelming season we'll have no chance of getting a big fee for him next year. Right now the narrative is that he had a bad season at an Arsenal in turmoil. I'm not saying we should sell him, but if we're looking for value in the transfer market that's where I'd start. Sell the flop and reinvest. What we paid for him is irrelevant; it's a sunk cost. That money is gone. If the issue is that we need to raise a certain sum so we can reinvest money in new players then he's as good an asset to sell as anyone, and better than any player who's actually performing. Let's sell Pepé, Lacazette and Guendouzi. The net impact would be zero on the starting eleven and we'd have an additional £100 million or so to throw elsewhere. Add Bellerin and we would have enough to buy three or four high-quality starters without losing anyone whose departure would be felt in any way in the first team. If we're so obsessed about getting value then let's actually talk about this, because we have a lot of potential value tied up in bang average footballers.

Auba has no real transfer value on the market by contrast (due to his age and contract situation), and people are arguing about how we shouldn't be paying big wages for proven quality, and when you push them on it they just say that we're trash anyway so why bother having anything to be proud of. I really don't get that. There's nothing stopping us from rebuilding while he's still here. It's the mediocrity holding us back, not the class.

Coombs

He's too old, Klaus. We can't risk this kind of shit for no reason. He won't get us the results we need to move forward, so we have to cut him loose. Paying Auba 300k a week only puts us in a worse position than selling him. Letting him leave on a free puts us in a worse position than selling him.

It's not sell Auba or sell Lacazette, Pepe, and Guendouzi. It's that we're going to have to sell all of them whether we like it or not. When you can't sell a player, and you aren't winning titles with them or at least qualifying for the top competition in the world, then you're getting fucked. It just doesn't matter how good they are.

The right leadership would get Pepe scoring goals so they could sell him for a profit or at least recoup the fee. Selling him right now in a transfer market slump makes absolutely no sense at all.

We should give Auba a one-year extension with more big performance-related bonuses and sell him next summer for whatever we can get, or we should sell him right now. A 3-year contract at 300k/week is basically club suicide.

Daz

Ozil is such a non-event he barely even registers a mention in his own thread these days.

Burnwinter

Özil is an enigma no more. He's a talented prick who won't work on the field, won't work for the manager whoever he is, and won't fuck off.

Claudius

Burnwinter wrote:
Özil is an enigma no more. He's a talented prick who won't work on the field, won't work for the manager whoever he is, and won't fuck off.

Most functioning environments fire those people. I’m sure we’ve tried to find contract violations to get out, but with one year left, now is the time to get out. Either take £5m for a loan in Turkey or buy him out completely. And keep a photocopy of his contract in Edu’s office wall as a reminder.

Daz

I was thinking about that too. Now I know fuck all about football contracts, but surely there has to be some kind of protection for the club in situations where the player has basically no intention to show up? Can't we performance manage his lazy ass?

Clrnc

He is not just irrelevant, he is the butt of all jokes.

Claudius

Clrnc wrote:

He is not just irrelevant, he is the butt of all jokes.

He’s cashing checks. Makes enough to buy a Ferrari after tax every week and get you a Beemer as a gift. Joke’s on us.

goon

He’s done an interview with Orny for the Athletic, which for some reason I still have access to despite not renewing.

Says he’s not going anywhere under any circumstances, the rest is PR fluff.

I don’t really begrudge Ozil to be honest, but no matter what he says he’s clearly in retirement mode and his comments reinforce what Arteta said about him not being ‘in the boat’.

It’s all so boring now.

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