Good read... from football365
Arsenal`s Success Is Bad News For Chelski
On Friday, the headline on Martin Samuel's piece in the Times read: "Grant appointment makes Chelsea no more than a rich man's plaything". To some of us the first three words of that article were unnecessary: regular readers will know I've been pointing that out for a while - if you type "Philip Cornwall" and "plaything" into Google then the first answer is a Chelsea fan calling me a "Gooner hack" in December 2004 for using the term, among other things.
Now I know a few "Gooner hacks", though I'm not one of them. But something else I have been saying for a while is that Arsenal's investment in Ashburton Grove was sound, the only problem being that the sudden unexpected influx of money at Stamford Bridge meant that there was an awkward price to pay while that money came on stream.
Arsenal have reported their first financial results since the move from Highbury. They are especially significant at a time when the board are under pressure from other shareholders. The figures can, as Mediawatch showed yesterday, be interpreted in more than one way.
There was a drop in pre-tax profits from £15.9m to £5.6m, which was the bad news. On the other, a 45 per cent rise in turnover - to you and me, income - to just over £200m, which was the good news. There's also confusion. Reuters reported that the pre-tax profits would have been worse but for the sale of Thierry Henry - yet that move happened in late June and these were supposed to be the figures for the year ending 31 May. Odd. And, despite misleading headlines, they are not the richest club, just the one with the biggest income.
Whatever, Arsenal are in profit. They make more than £3m a match at the Emirates. The much maligned corporate tier brings in more at each game than the whole of Highbury did. And, though it is early days, the team are top of the league this season - with a wage bill that Deloitte estimated to be perhaps the second highest in the division, paid for by that new ground. The margins, thanks to the interest charge, are small. It will be years before the debts are paid off in full. But none the less the Gunners are getting an excellent return on their investment and they have cash in the bank, too.
A trophyless season was still a massive financial success story given interest payments and one-off charges, and if the team now start to deliver then next year's results will make even more pleasant reading. Unless you are, say, Peter Kenyon.
And I wonder to what extent the crisis at Chelsea should be seen as a product of success elsewhere. At the beginning of August, research was published by Hitwise on a like-for-like basis of the UK traffic for the websites of the 20 Premier League clubs. And Arsenal came in third, with a 10.9 per cent share, headed by Manchester United (15.4 per cent) and Liverpool (17.3 per cent). When you look at global traffic, the top two positions are reversed, but Arsenal stay third.
What is fascinating is what happens to Chelsea. With international traffic, they rank fourth. But in UK numbers, they are an astonishing 11th. After four years of Abramovich, two Premiership titles, hundreds of millions of pounds, more Britons wanted the official view on Spurs, Newcastle, West Ham, Man City, Everton, Sunderland and Aston Villa than wished to read ChelseaPravda.com in the week ending 4th August.
In October 2005, Kenyon told the Independent: "The importance of London is critical in our strategy. London today is one of the top three cities in the world. The first objective is to own London." In part he was talking about being associated globally with the city in a way that Arsenal, Spurs and West Ham are not. But if you want to know why there were only 25,000 at the Bridge last Tuesday, then the suggestion that the Blues are only the capital's fourth biggest side may play a part.
Peter Hill-Wood, the Arsenal chairman, was quick to use his club's results - a turnover £47m more than Chelsea's figures for 2005-06 - to stomp all over Kenyon's ambitions. "I don't want to run Chelsea down," he began, before running Chelsea down. "One has to concede Manchester United and Liverpool are probably the biggest names in UK football and probably throughout the world. For Chelsea to think they are suddenly going to dominate United and Liverpool is fantasy."
Of course a strong Arsenal is bad news for the other two big red clubs. But it's worse for Chelsea - United have increased income at their ground and Liverpool are building a new one, while Chelsea cannot sell the capacity they have. Despite their success and global presence, they have not attracted new paying supporters in sufficient numbers. They are losing huge sums each year. A change of strategy was needed if they were to cut their losses.
Diehard Chelsea fans may have been delighted by recent success and outraged by Jose Mourinho's dismissal. But Kenyon and co take the diehards for granted as they bid to bring in new paying customers at a greater rate. Perhaps a more attractive playing style would be the answer and for that a change of coach was needed. Mourinho's departure was a lot about a billionaire's ego. But, as Arsenal's business plan reaps reward, it may also have been about the problems Chelsea's has run into.
