Q: In the past, Arsene Wenger has called the wage policy a "socialist wage structure."

[Brentwood]

While we may smile about that in football, is it time for it to change?


IG: "Our biggest expense is our wage bill. It's not something that we simply stumble upon by accident. There is a massive amount of thought that goes into it by some very very smart and thoughtful people at the club including Harvard analysts and Arsene Wenger himself is a pretty smart mathematical guy. I have been doing that myself for 14 years at Major League Soccer, where I was responsible for the management of the player pool within a budget. This is something we think about deeply and we know a lot about. We have outperformed our spend, in virtually any metric you can look at, consistently for the last 15 years. It's an extraordinary record. So we are doing something right in the way that we spend although it may frustrate some people. We are doing something right and we are very thoughtful about it.

"It's not something that happens by accident. As we develop new financial capabilities, clearly, that wage bounds will change. It's under review all the time. It's never been fixed in stone. It really depends on what the circumstances are as you move forward, what the market looks like, where you see the opportunities, where you think the value is. That will change and if we - which we do - want to attract and also keep the very best talent then we have to pay them the market rate. There is a complete understanding of that at the club. So yes, our wage structure will evolve, as it has over the last five years. It will continue to evolve with a new financial capability behind it, which means we can do some things perhaps that we haven't been able to do while we have had one hand tied behind our back."



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[Brentwood]

limitations

Talking about how we now have financial firepower to compete, we have a strict wage budget model that we stick to etc

But this comment is interesting....


Q: Let's stop beating around the bush, are you going to sign Wayne Rooney? Could you afford it?

IG: "I would think you've got the ability to put that together. There are restrictions on what I'm able to announce and the numbers I'm allowed to put out with the media before they are known to shareholders."

Q: Well, for example, £25million and £200,000 a week?

IG: "Of course we could do that. We could do more than that. We have a certain amount which we've held in reserve. We also have new revenue streams coming on board and all of these things mean we can do some things which would excite you. What excites Arsene isn't necessarily what excites you. We can think about all kinds of things. The important thing for us as a club, and it may frustrate everybody but we don't think about what's going to excite our fans for the next couple of weeks, we think about what's going to excite them when we start playing in August and hopefully when we're in March and April and competing. That's what we're focusing on. For Arsene, it's a question of getting the right players, the ones he believes in, not necessarily the players the fans want. He's very disciplined about his beliefs and how he wants to structure a team. And he's done a fantastic job at that over a long period. He has new tools available to him financially and I think he'll make good use of them."


If we don't make a few big name signings after he has said this, he's either lying or Wenger is at fault


This is a good point he makes as well:

IG: The way to assess whether a club is doing it well or not? I don't know any other measure to see whether a club does that well or does it poorly, than to look at their overall spending and compare it against their performance and when we do that with Arsenal, every single year, we outperform our spend.

If we carry on spending money wisely on the right players and show the correct level of ambition, we should be capable of challenging for the league

[Bergkamp's Brain]

[Nicosia Gooner]

[Nicosia Gooner]

[Brentwood]

My only issue is that for years he's been saying that we have "warchests" and money to spend, but now is the first time he's admitted we have been operating under financial constraints

I understand that he can't always be fully honest as it is a big PR game. If he had said, "yeah we are a bit skint and will be for the next 8 years" it would make it difficult to attract or keep any players at all, fans would resent paying for their STs etc

The true test will be after the summer when we see what our squad will line up like

[Mo Britain less Europe]

[Nicosia Gooner]

[Mo Britain less Europe]

from season to season.

[Nicosia Gooner]

[Mo Britain less Europe]

worse. If as you say you don't reveal what you have so other clubs will have to second guess why actually state a figure you don't have? So you will be asked for more money? Totally illogical.

Gazidis has single-handedly created much of the existing antipathy for Wenger by hiding behind him.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

History suggests that he is making **** up because it is season ticket renewal time, again.

Of course the new TV deal and the possibility of a new kit and stadium deal does suggest that there is more income.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

first time, during the season. Maybe the light is there at the end of the tunnel, maybe?

[Brentwood]

It just didn't help at all when the board kept repeating that we had 70m quid to spend. It made Wenger look stupid and stubborn and put him under unnecessary pressure

[Nicosia Gooner]

[Bergkamp's Brain]