Arsenal dwarf us in practically every financial category. I would be interested to see some figures to test neymar's assertion that their budget is much smaller than all their main rivals in Europe.
Of course Wenger’s budget is much smaller than his rivals. Those numbers from the guardian are almost irrelevant when considering Wenger’s budget against his rivals.
Arsenal are profit maximisers. Practically all their rivals are trophy maximisers.
Most clubs try to maximise revenue sources in order to re-invest those funds into their playing squad to maximise their chances of footballing success. Arsenal on the other hand will only spend on their playing squad if it directly or indirectly means that it is financially profitable for the club as a business. Hence, not all of the money made by Arsenal is available as part of Wenger’s “budget”.
However, this “problem” for Wenger is compounded even more by the fact that the likes of Abramovic are willing to take on massive losses to ensure that they can dwarf whatever Wenger can spend on his squad.
So to summarise, it doesn’t matter how Arsenal perform as a business, as this has very little relation to what Wenger’s budget will be. As this is set arbitrarily.
Anyways, since you asked for some numbers, here they are:
This graph from the Swissramble shows Arsenal’s pre-tax profits (up to 2012, I couldn’t find an up to date one). The following table shows arsenal’s net transfer spend (as well as everyone else’s) over the past 5 years (up to date).
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/fo...elsea-Manchester-United-net-spend-charts.html
You can clearly see even if Arsenal decided to break even, as opposed to making small profits year on year, they still need to spend an exponential amount more to match the spending of the other top 4 sides.
Another source:
Arsenal net spend = £11.1 million.
Chelsea net spend = £328.7 million.
Emirates Marketing Project net spend = £509.6 million.
To be honest Wenger would not have made it at any of the other big clubs as he seems to to put profit and income before footballing success. Who would have given him 9 years to get it right? Wenger has had them qualify for champions league every season but surely that is to be expected especially a head of us when comparing the finances. Yet they have only done it by a point for the last 2 seasons despite all the upheaval in our club. Yet Levy still comes in for criticism.
Firstly, I’m a massive fan of what Levy has achieved. I can’t understand why he gets the level of criticism that he does. Levy, like Wenger has performed absolute miracles to get us to where we are.
You say Wenger would not have “made it” at other big clubs. I totally disagree. I suspect he would probably have gone from club to club like most other top managers. i.e. Capello, Mourinho, Guardiola. He would’ve won titles some years and in the year’s where he didn’t, he probably would’ve got sacked and moved onto another top job.
Wenger hasn’t won anything in almost a decade, yet the likes of PSG and Real Madrid always seem to be chasing him. That for me is a testament to the fact that the top clubs know that he is right up there with the best manager’s in the world. Can you think of another manager that has gone so long without winning something, who is still as highly demanded as Wenger is? It just shows, the people in the know (ie. Those who hire and fire managers, a la Alan Sugar) still massively rate Wenger.
Your next point is that it is “expected” that Arsenal should finish above us in a top 4 spot. I agree with this, but only to a certain extent. It is correct that they spend more on footballing personnel than us. However our overall spend in the past few years is closing that gap and I expect us to finish above them at least a couple of times over the next few years. It is a credit to Wenger that he has beaten us in the league every time over the past few years.
On the other hand, Liverpool have outspent Arsenal overall throughout the 2000’s, yet Arsenal have performed significantly better than them. Liverpool’s wage bill vs Arsenal’s is shown in the graph below. When you combine this with the transfer spend table from above, you can see just how well Wenger has performed.
That they have not won anything in 9 years is IMO inexcusable and it is as much a reflection of the choices they have made over the years. They choose to only play for the lucrative tournaments while dispensing the less lucrative domestic cups. A huge income which they do not invest in either keeping their world class stars or replacing with similar quality players while Wenger (on 7.5m a year) and the board coin it in.
Being a spurs fan may be hard but at least our club and board have ambition. Being an arsenal fan must be so frustrating.
You may say it is “inexcusable”, but the Arsenal board probably disagree. As long as Wenger can maintain the status quo, I suspect the Arsenal board are probably very happy. Also, Arsenal have finished 2nd place in many competitions since 2005; they haven't been that far off from winning something in the past decade.
Re lucrative tournaments vs less lucrative ones, Wenger is not the only manager choosing to go for the more financially beneficial route. It seems a growing trend amongst most clubs to follow this route. Us included.
And your final point is that Arsenal have a huge income level that they do not re-invest. In my opinion, this should probably be one of the biggest debating points in football.
Arsenal are probably valued at around £1 billion. Yet, they make around £20-£25 average pre-tax profits over the past few years (depending on what your source is). Is it really that inexcusable that the Arsenal board take a few million out of their £1 billion business every year? Compared to other businesses of similar value, I suspect this figure isn’t that high.
Finally, Wenger is basically a CEO of a £1 billion company. I’m sure the board probably see it this way too. Hence, his salary. In addition, if Wenger were to suddenly become available, I wouldn’t mind seeing us offer him this kind of money to get him. Such is the genius of the man.