There’s a part of me right now that feels the last bourbon wasn’t entirely necessary. But then that might also be true of the last couple of Moscow Mules, which I drank in tribute to Edward Snowden, and not because they were delicious and limey and gingery and vodka-ey.
It’s still wonderfully hot here which is making it easier to cope with the fact that there’s nothing going on. The entire club is away on the Asia Tour. Everyone has gone. The manager, the coaching staff, the players, the web team, the video team, the stewards, Ivan Gazidis, Doris the tea lady. The whole lot.
Highbury House is a ghost-town, tumbleweeds blow down the corridors, eerie sounds emanate from offices but that’s just Dick Law keening, hoping somebody answers.
Nobody ever answers.
Dick shuffles mournfully on.
The main story this Saturday morning is that Arsene Wenger has held talks with Ivan Gazidis about staying on. He says:
I am committed to staying longer at this club. I’ve already had a chat with Ivan. It went very well, not a problem. The link with PSG is there because I’m French and I know the owners. But if that was the case then I would be there already. I’m not at PSG because my heart is with Arsenal.
He clarified it somewhat by saying:
Would my decision depend on how well next season goes. I am like anybody else, of course, it is important to see how well we do. I don’t automatically assume that I will be here.
Which all sounds a bit odd because if he and Gazidis have spoken about an extension it’s clearly something that’s on the agenda now, and not dependent on how the season goes. Personally, I think there’s a lot to be said for stability at any football club, but I’d be reluctant to say he should get a new deal at this point.
There’s the argument that new signings might not come if they feel the manager only has a year left and might leave at the end of that, but then to counter that there’s the question: what new signings? I feel like Arsene has to prove something this summer. It might sound strange after so many years in the job, but he himself admits the circumstances are different now:
I knew when I committed to my last contract and the contract before that the club were going through a very sensitive period, because we had less financial resources and the challenge was to stay at the top and in the Champions League during that period. We are coming out of that period and I hope in the next two or three years the club will be competing for the Premier League.
But despite the changes at other clubs, we simply cannot compete for the Premier League without a better team, without new players. A new contract for Arsene Wenger won’t be the thing that wins us the title, it’ll be a deeper squad, one with more quality and better options than we have now. That requires us to spend the money we have available to us, and while I accept there’s difficulty in many transfer deals, I’m not entirely convinced that our focus is on making the team better right now.
Ivan Gazidis is away on the tour and there’s a good case to be made for him to be present. This is a commercial/marketing operation, with a bit of fitness and conditioning thrown in, but you also have to wonder if it sends the right message regarding the more important work we have to do this summer. Commercial income is great, we have to accept that tours like this, new sponsors and so on, are part of the game these days. We either get involved or get left behind.
Yet we’re half a world away from anyone we might want to bring into the club. Yes, email, phone, fax, Snapchat, whatever, but I worry that everything is being left in the hands of Dick Law who doesn’t come with the same gravitas as a Chief Executive or a manager. Are we entrusting him to deal with the sharks at Real Madrid when he’s been given the runaround by lesser opponents in the past?
Perhaps I’m doing him, and all of them, a disservice. Maybe there’s loads going on from a hi-tech Indonesian control room. The Transfer Hub. But it doesn’t feel like it and it doesn’t look like it. And yes, I know there’s still a good month until the first game of the season, and there are loads of reasons why deals haven’t been done just yet, but still. As optimistic as I am about this summer, it’s hard not to feel worried simply because of the way things have gone in summers past.
If things are different, if the stability and finances have changed, then it’s time to prove it. When that’s been done, and we have a team that looks pretty awesome on paper as well as on the pitch, then I think there’s a discussion to be had about a new contract for Arsene Wenger, but not right now.
Till tomorrow.
