We really don't get each other that is evident, because the points I am making you are totally missing.
The point about the tickets, which I have made over and over again is I' not disputing that we have the most expensive ticket, its the fact we have resonable priced tickets as well, we have a state of the art Stadium (One of the newest in the world), etc. I object to the fact you use the 'most expensive ticket' thing every time you have a rant. When there are many reasons why we have the most expensive ticket.
It's the point about the 5-6 players, you exaggerate it to make it sound worse. In my opinion 5-6 players is more than 4 which makes it sound worse. When you only get in a few players every season then adding another couple of Mysteriously failed players to the mix is quite a big difference imo and misleads people.
I don't need to know the exact reason why Richard Law spent 10 days on the Campbell transfer saga, nor I need to know the consequences of that. But you do. Before you post something with outrage, you should really know if it really is having the effect you think it is and not just posting it because Arseblog mentioned it. My point was you are just assuming that it caused a problem? tell me what it actually did? I'm interested, tell me what players we missed out on because of it? etc etc
What did you here on Arseblog first? I would be interested to know? because he reads through reports and blogs etc before he writes his blog. You say the word 'Probably' "he probably hears a lot of true things beforehand" so you don't know, you are assuming because he has a successful blog and he talks to Journalists, the same way you are assuming that Journalists know a great deal more than everybody else about Arsenal and how they would secretly tell Arseblog rather than the whole world. Because their jobs are to find information and then not tell the public, but in secret tell bloggers all that they know?
I get my information from many sources and then I form an opinion based on that. I read things and then I look into them and don't take a lot of things at face value and think about things a bit more rationally.
I get the impression you really don't, you think Journalists opinions and bloggers opinions are gospal and you are highly influenced by them in what you say.
My optimism comes from using my eyes and seeing the team at different stages and I use my knowledge to look at the club and ascertain where we need improvements. I don't just mark everything as shit like you do, because that is too simplistic to me, I can see we have a good set of players that can play much much better than they are doing and need help from a few more quality players so that they are not left tired and we have different options.
If you read my posts, I don't think everything is great, I just don't think the problems lie with the ticket prices and the scouts. I think it does have a lot to do with Wenger and the mentality he instills in players at the club, this is our foremost and major problem. If he doesn't sort it out then I agree that we need a change.
The funny thing is I agree on most things with you, I just don't agree with how you put things across and add things to your argument to prove your points.
The points you brought up recently, Why are Newcastle finding better players in ligue 1 than Arsenal? Demba Ba and Cisse played for German and English clubs before moving to Newcastle and Gervinho and Chamakh were star players when they were signed. These things are two major flaws in your argument imo.
The ticket pricing, you dismiss the fact that although we have the most expensive tickets there are many reasons behind this. New Stadium, facilities, season ticket holders get 7 cup games in that price, plus we have many 10's thousands of tickets between £25-35 for the majority of games. We charge much less for League Cup games etc It isn't as simple as we have the highest tickets. Again I don't agree with how high the tickets can be, I just disagree with how you use it in your arguments/points.
Scouting, Again we have also bought in many players that are doing well, but you concentrate on the 4 that haven't. Two of those players again, were two of the best players around at that moment in time in Europe, Chamakh was also doing well in European competition and Gervinho's scoring and assist stats were very good and comparable to other top players in Europe. But because they are not doing well now, our scouts are shit? Just doesn't make sense to me what you are saying.
These are just some of the things I disagree with you recently.
But I agree something needs to change soon, otherwise Arsene will have to go.
What I said about 5-6 players wasn't deliberate to make it sound worse. Believe me, I don't have to do this in here.
I didn't think of each individual before saying that. Now that we have mentioned Chamakh, Squilaci, Park and Gervinho we can say 4. If Giroud doesn't pick up his scoring boots it could be 5. Chamakh started out really well, remember? But let's hope he doesn't end up like that.
Richard Law getting the run around from Campbell's people and taking 10 days to sign a kid who hasn't got a work permit and will complete his 2nd season on loan? At the very least this makes a mockery of Arsenal.
But other than that, having our chief contract negotiator stuck in the Caribbean
may have contributed to us missing out on some of our targets indeed.
I don't know if you recall this, but Juan Mata was a target of ours during that summer. Now this would have been a high profile signing, we needed our best senior people on the case. But as we all know, Chelsea (who were probably not even scouting him) hijacked the deal right from under Wenger's nose.
At the time I read the news about Law being stood up to sign the kid and I thought 'WTF'. I kept it to myself, but this is not a good sign at all.
You said we brought in a lot of people that summer, making it look less bad. But let's have a look at the guys we brought in that deadline day: Mertesacker (good signing), Arteta (signed without a medical! Thank Lord for him though, but what a crazy thing to do), Park and Santos (I think I don't need to write much about those).
And those signings only came on the back of that 8-2 mauling, it must be said.
So it's fair to say the way we handled ourselves during that transfer window was a big mess, wasn't it?
As for Arseblog, I'm not here to defend it, I have nothing to do with them.
What we read there is mostly reaction, but the issue about Theo's contract was raised there first before it came to the fore at newspapers. I also remember reading about the possibility of Bould becoming assistant there first. And then it was everywhere else.
Those are the ones from the top of my head.
You're contradicting yourself if you're diminishing the role of journalists. If they know fuck all about the things they are supposed to cover, then why do people need them? Why read newspapers?
And most importantly, from which sources do you get your information from? If not from journalists, then what?
What I read on Arseblog or the Guardian or BBC is not dogma to me. I just happen to relate a lot to what was vented at Arseblog lately.
The thing about Demba Ba and Cisse, that was my bad. They didn't come from the French league. But if they're 'major flaws' in my argument it doesn't make it less true that other teams with less resources are outsmarting us in the transfer market. Anyways Arseblog's post had it covered, saying that we have scouts in Germany who deemed some players 'not good enough' for the Premier League.
You will probably say that we signed Podolski and Mertesacker from the Bundesliga
But let's not forget those guys are renowned internationals, both with a long standing career in the German National Team. So, where are those 'hidden gems'? Who else without a higher profile did we sign from the Bundesliga? Erm.... Amaury Bischoff
The same way you say I'm distorting facts about the ticket prices, I say you are doing the same, suggesting they are cheaper than they actually are. First of all there are no Premier League games costing £25. You may catch FA and Capital One fixtures for that price.
For £35 you can watch tier C games like I did (Sunderland for example) in some of the worst seats.
If you want decent seats you'd be looking at £50 (which is still ok) but for the top matches you can expect to spend up to 100 quid.
Which would be fine if we saw signs of investment in the footballing part of the product.
Arsenal moved to the Emirates in 2006. That will be 6 years and a half now. Since then the ticket prices rised exponentially. Fans put up with star players leaving and weaker sides at the expense of paying debts from the stadium.
But now we are over 6 years down the line. Where is this money going to? If it is still covering for stadium debt, it would have been said. But what does our board say? Gazidis said there is money available for the manager to spend. Really? Then why does the club breaks even in the transfer windows? Why are we unable to offer more than £100k a week to our star players? I'm not saying I agree with players salaries nowadays, but that's the market for you.
Are our scouts shit? Well, are you telling me our scouts are doing a great job? Are they as good as Everton's and Newcastle's and Fulham's? I have my doubts.
Arsenal does not put their money where their mouth is. Saying we can compete for major titles is becoming more clearly than ever a big lie. I'm angry because I see things falling apart really fast.
