Published: 17 February, 2009, 00:00
Edited: 17 February, 2009, 00:00
Now that Arsenal have finally acquired the inconsistent genius that is Russia’s Andrey Arshavin, there is some advice due to the Gunners’ manager: be careful, Arsène, be very careful.
Mid-season buys reveal the real face of a club. It’s a time when things like prestige, development strategy or perspective are put aside in favour of the club’s short-term future. When merry tales of flying to Mars for investors are abandoned and the club clings to one- goal victories seen as indispensable, both its real intentions and capabilities can be seen.
Manchester United, for instance, see themselves repeating the Ronaldo-Nani move – this time with two Serb players.
English FA Cup winners Portsmouth are already out of Europe and struggling on the home front, so Pompey are making their squad more modest.
Stoke have added to their of Championship stars by taking on the long-forgotten James Beattie in a bid to stay in the Premiership for another season.
Tottenham are set for some weird déjà vu getting back all of their big names, the question being whether they’ll bring back the lost chemistry.
Middlesbrough are in danger of relegation, and are evidently okay with it, so virtually no incoming player traffic; Everton are looking to capitalise on others’ mistakes, with ex-CSKA striker Jo signed on loan from Manchester City – a big relief to City manager Mark Hughes. City themselves are the early Chelsea of today – paying first-rate money for an array of second-rate talent, which gives its squad certain depth.
The kind of depth the squad actually doesn’t need, unless of course it intends to quit football activities and become a book by Slavoj Žižek.
But Chelsea’s example shows that this attitude works, it just takes a little time. Stars of Michael Ballack’s calibre would never have come to the Chelsea of 2003/04. First the club had to prove it could seriously fight for silverware with the likes of lesser names like Glen Johnson, Damien Duff, Scott Parker and high-profile big-club-rejects Gérémi, Juan Verón, Claude Makeléle, Hernán Crespo and former coke-addict Adrian Mutu.
Now it’s Man City’s time to do the same. The sci-fi Kaká move had it become reality, could have cut some corners for City, but ‘there are no sheikh’s roads in professional football’.
Still the money is there and City’s financial clout puts any club struggling to maintain its place in the Premiership’s big four in serious danger.
And the Gunners just happen to be the one struggling.
After making a massive breakthrough into the Champions League final in 2006, Arsène Wenger’s thirteenth year at Arsenal sees the club in a state of stagnation.
Out of the League Cup courtesy of Burnley, Arsenal have a replay of the FA Cup tie with Cardiff, victory in which will bring the Gunners to a quarter-final against… Burnley. Champions League prospects for Wenger’s side are as yet unclear.
In the Premiership, the Gunners are a safe six points above Everton, but five points below Aston Villa. With 13 weeks remaining this is a perfect position to miss the next Champions League.
So in the 2009 winter moves list Arsenal is the underachiever, who’ve turned to gambling. And this gambling may not end with only football betting, but possibly involve larger things.
Many will turn to Tottenham’s autumn signing Roman Pavluchenko to give them a clue how successive will Arshavin will be.
When Turkish football was on its first rise, with Galatasaray of Istanbul taking the UEFA Cup (ironically defeating none other then Arsenal in the final Inter Milan took its chances with signing Hakan Sükür for some €8.5 million. The move was such a failure in Milan that Inter let him go to Parma for free.
Pavyluchenko’s move looked similar at first beginning, but now it’s definitely better then Sükür’s. In fact many Russians are convinced that Pavlyuchenko rocks White Hart Lane. He has scored a massive nine goals in two cup tournaments.
However, in the Premiership his tally is more modest with the last of his three goals scored back in November. And the returns of Defoe and Keane are hardly an indication of the management’s confidence in Pavlyuchenko.
Anyway he’s still getting his playing time and still has chances to prove his worth in the eyes of Tottenham’s coach Harry Redknapp.
Another massive factor to be noted is the schedule. Pavlychenko debuted for Tottenham in September, basically without a vacation, Arshavin is presumably well-rested, despite his seemingly stressful transfer negotiations.
Officially in the fiscal year of 2007/08 Arsenal made some €46.2 million profit excluding player transfers, which add up to a further €18.2 milion, but only because they dared to sell the iconic Thierry Henry to Barcelona and, as one might say, are now facing the consequences.
But then, Barcelona have always had that little weakness for Arsenal men. While it might be too early to judge the success or otherwise of their purchase of Aleksandr Hleb, I can still recall Catalans splashing out most of their Luis Figo revenues (€60 mln) on the mediocre Marc Overmars (€40 million) and Emmanuelle Petit (€15 million).
Did it work out? At times the side was just epic, demolishing the opposition, but two fourth places in a row, then sixth, and then second in 2003/04, when Overmars was in the massive shadow of the rising Ronaldinho, with Petit long gone to Chelsea.
In times of a crisis profitable clubs like Arsenal are scarce, but investments are even scarcer.
The agreement between current members of Arsenal’s board of directors “not to dispose of any of their interests in the Club” – in plainer words not to sell it to Russian tycoon and 24% shareholder Alisher Usmanov – expires in April 2009.
If the Gunners lose their Champions League ticket and find themselves in need of serious investment they might remember Usmanov’s bid.
What may come in handy at this point is the fact that Usmanov is quite close to the United Russia party, a major member of which is… Andrey Arshavin.
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