New deal for Wenger won’t dilute his motivation
September 13, 2012
Big news this morning as Ivan Gazidis has given an interview to The Mirror and The Telegraph revealing that the club are ready to sit down with Arsene Wenger and begin discussing a new deal.
I mean, maybe it’s not big news that that’s something the board want to do. They’ve been nothing if not consistent in their backing and praise for the manager over the years even during his toughest times and I was never in any doubt that they’d want to extend. But the fact that they’ve decided to come out and start talking about it suggests that they must be pretty confident this is something that Le Boss himself wants to do and that an agreement will be reached. Gazidis said:
It’s not a sense of sentimentalism, not a reward for services, it’s a belief that we have an incredible manager who loves this club and is the best man to lead us forward.
We’re really confident about the direction that the club is heading. I feel he can keep going for a long time. He’s in fantastic shape and he’s as driven as he’s ever been and excited as ever.
I’d be surprised if Wenger didn’t want to extend. For a start he’s just completely rebuilt his entire squad over the last couple of years. He’s rebalanced the age of the squad, there appears to be an improvement in the mental attitude of the players that we’ve targeted and he’s got exciting young players coming through with the likes of Wilshere, Oxlade, Coquelin et al. You’d expect him to be anxious to at least see that project through.
Secondly, as Gazidis also talks about in his interview, in two years time we get to renegotiate the big shirt sponsorship deals that have held us back since we signed them to push through the stadium financing. Ivan says:
In terms of the financial impact, it will be as significant a step forward as the stadium was in 2005. It does kick us into the top five clubs in the world with separation from the rest. The overall journey that the club embarked on was to make it one of the leading clubs in the world and to do it in a way that would be sustainable.
I suppose you could argue that comparing the financial impact to what happened with the stadium move might not be the most encouraging to fans who remember what it was like when we weren’t burdened with huge debts and forced to rely overly on young players coming through but I get what he means. 2014 has long been held as the promised land in terms of our finances and Gazidis knows what an impact those extra tens of millions a year could have. Arsene Wenger must be desperate to finally reap the rewards of all of his financial conservatism and at last properly compete with the big boys.
Or at least that’s what you’d think. I suppose it’s entirely possible that he genuinely is a bit scared of spending £30 million on a single player. And if you thought he gets a lot of stick for his transfer policy now, imagine how frenzied the criticism would become if we were actually making huge profits every year.
Some fans might be questioning the wisdom of being so up front in our admiration and determination to re-sign a manager who they would argue still has a lot to prove at the moment. Or as The Mirror’s clumsy headline this morning put it: ‘It’s Arsene wonga! Seven seasons + zero trophies = new deal for Arsenal boss’
Why are we rewarding failure? Why aren’t we motivating the man to work for his contract? To earn it?
To those fans I would say you clearly haven’t paid that much attention to Arsene Wenger over the years. This is not a man who’s happy to take home his (admittedly very chunky) pay cheque each week and leave what’s on the field behind him. As far as I can see, whether you agree with all of his decisions or not (and I don’t) this is still a man who’s desperately driven to succeed for Arsenal Football Club. This is a man who still thinks of nothing else but his team and his squad and winning football matches. Ask the fourth officials that he berates every game. Ask the opposition managers that he’s too aggro to have a drink with. Ask the UEFA disciplinary commission. Or just ask one of his touchline water bottles. Arsene Wenger is nothing if not driven and the fact that he’s being offered a new contract is not going to change that.
Gazidis talked a bit about succession plans for when Arsene does retire and it’s only when you think about what a tough task that would be that you realise quite what an impact he’s had on the club:
He is written into our DNA, he’s incredibly fit, has played in some staff games recently.
I’ve watched him on the sidelines in his brogues and he doesn’t look too good, but when you put him out on the football field, he is still fit, quick and a good footballer.
At the same time, as a club, we have to make sure that all of the things that Arsene has brought to the club are enshrined in our DNA to make sure that when the day comes when Arsene decides it’s time to hang up his boots – I don’t know what the expression is as a manager – that we are in a position to take his ideas and work forward.
It’s a brilliant if unintentional riposte to the ‘Cesc has Barca DNA’ type crap that was peddled two years ago which provided Wenger with one of his most trying times as Arsenal boss. Arsene doesn’t have Arsenal DNA. It’s the other way around. Arsenal have Arsene DNA.
And as Gazidis points out he still looks strong and healthy. I’ve not been able to play my regular five-a-side for about three months because of a thigh strain I can’t seem to shift. I’m in my thirties. Arsene Wenger is 62. And could probably run rings around me even in his brogues.
I’m not going to deny that the man faces a testing time. His achievements in allowing us to keep competing at the top level despite the stadium move and financial doping elsewhere shouldn’t be overlooked. But this club’s fanbase rightly demands more and with two years still to run on his current deal Arsene Wenger still has plenty to do reassure us that despite certain recent high profile outgoings we’re still on the right track.
But I’ve no doubt that he’ll give everything to the cause and I still can’t think of anyone else in world football that I’d rather have kicking water bottles in our name.
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8 Responses to “New deal for Wenger won’t dilute his motivation”
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I’ve heard he wants to concentrate on the football until the Summer and renegotiate when there’s only a year left…
Really Dick? did he also say no matter what decision he makes he’ll always be a gooner?
I want Wenger to stay, of course – in his first period at the club he revolutionised how the players were managed down to the finest details and won an impressive haul of trophies, including leading the team through a season unbeaten, a feat even Fergie hasn’t managed.
In his second period he oversaw and managed the clubs move into a new stadium, including other new infrastructure like training and health centre creation & improvement. He’s helped completely reorganise the club and has put us onto a new stage while managing the limited funds for players over that period due to the massive investments.
He’s now starting to enter his third period, where we start can take advantage of our new facilities with more financial freedom – he needs at least another 5 years to start reaping the rewards. In 10 years time we might have one of the biggest transfer budgets in the league and all the right facilities to sustain football at the very top and Wenger will have had a large hand in that, all done without the backing of a sugar daddy – incredible.
I just hope we get to have more time appreciating him while he’s here, rather than missing him while he’s gone. I’m not sure of anyone out there who I could see replacing him when the time comes, I hope Wenger and the board have a better idea than I do.
Fine post MH, the part about Water bottles made me chuckle, surely there has to be a ban of water bottles in the stadium, for their own safety of course.
Now to add to todays post, what Zinc said.
Exciting times at Arsenal tho, the potential for success is absolutely massive. We have a manager capable of turning average players into World class ones while playing the kind of football that 99.9 percent of clubs can only dream of, a fantastic blend of yute and players approaching their, state of the art training facilities coupled with an outstanding stadium *breaths* soon to be free of any debts, renewed sponsorships that will bring in a minimum of £50M added revenue, an academy bristling with top class talent *sips water* and last but not least the possibility of FFP rules adding to a more level playing field.
Some people may prefer to point out our lack of trophies in recent seasons but that is in the past now with so many factors to take into consideration before jumping to conclusions and laying all the blame on ONE man, there is no better person to take this club forward than AW in MY opinion.
Corr *approaching their peak
Wtf, passing by and guess what i see, brain freeze on my part at 5:47, *brimming with talent
I think you’ve nailed AW’s personality, MH. I’m a bit less confident that he will re-sign, though. It seemed to me that he was saying that he will see how far he can take the club this season, and if this time next year he isn’t happy with his own performance, or doesn’t think he can drive us any further forward, he will walk away at the end of his contract in 2014. For him, it all hangs on this season.