Beware Of Greeks Bearing Gifts & Money

It seems somewhat appropriate that the club announced its financial results in the run-up to the second match in this season’s Champions League. For all of the mithering that comes out of UEFA about the debt levels in English football, they actually have handed to them on a plate, the template for a financially sound club. Platini and his mob will not use it though, for to do so will put them in a spin since they firmly believe that all clubs should be debt-free.

More on that later though. The matter of the visit of Olympiacos takes precedence over this. Injury news once more to the forefront of the team selection. Nicklas Bendtner met with Q and believed that his Aston Martin had been fitted out with the latest Bond Gadgetry, an elaborate wind-up courtesy of Emmanuel Adebayor who realised that he had not continued his feud on the pitch a couple of weeks ago.

The momentum picked up in the games since the return from the last international break is slowly building. A win tonight and that continues in much the same way that the twenty-one game unbeaten run sparked into life earlier this year. The difference is that this time wins are replacing draws.

As it is a home game, an attacking line-up could be the order of the day with Eduardo, Arshavin and van Persie the forward trio. An alternative would be the introduction of Tomas Rosicky instead of Arshavin. It seems unlikely that Wenger would go into such a match without at least two strikers.

For the rest of the team, there should not be too much tinkering. Perhaps Diaby will make way for Ramsey but with four days to recover before the Blackburn fixture, there seems little reason to make that many changes to the line-up. I would expect Wenger to go with:

Mannone; Sagna, Gallas, Vermaelen, Clichy; Diaby, Song, Fabregas; Eduardo, van Persie, Arshavin

A win this evening is emminently achievable and would set the double-headers with AZ67 nicely. Two more wins in those clashes would see qualification surely achieved and let the team have ambitions to win every game. That is, however, to get ahead of myself – three points tonight is all that counts.

So to the finances. The property development is dominating thoughts and does not necessarily provide the solace that some have sought. The report mentions that profits from the redevelopment may be transferred into the football club but there is no guarantee that it will do so. Too much is read into this statement. It is covering themselves, reassuring the lenders that they have no intention of using the cash from the property side until the debt is cleared.

Crucially, the loans on this project are a relatively minimal level One of the biggest criticisms is that this development has prevented Wenger from spending. What is apparent that having replaced the buyer of the biggest tranche of flats, the club can move the prices to market levels and return a profit, albeit smaller than the original forecasts.

Frequently, the board has spoken of the need to retain the services of the existing squad. Taking into consideration the increase in the valuations of the players registrations on the balance sheet, the extent of this policy can be realised. Removing the purchases of Vermaelen, Arshavin and the minor deals last summer, it is not unreasonable to estimate that of the £41.3m increase, £10m of that is due to contract renegotiations. That is a sizeable commitment on the part of the board, equally so of Wenger’s faith in those players.

The subject of wages continues to perplex some, failing to grasp that the figures relate to every employee. Trying to guess what portion relates to the squad is futile. We simply do not know and every attempt at calculating it will be based on false assumptions and therefore produce falsehoods as answers. Is there an argument for knowing what the club spends on it’s playing staff’s salaries? To a degree yet the commercial sensitivities of that information far outweigh any righteous indignation felt by supporters that the information is not in the public domain.

And still the media proclaims that there is a huge transfer pot awaiting the opening of the cheque book. Surprisingly, the highest valuation I have seen this morning is from a journalist who is normally sane regarding football finances. In this morning’s Guardian, David Conn added the profit of £23m on player trading to the £42m received (not the profit) for the sales of Adebayor and Toure. Apparently, this total of £65m is ‘nearly £80m‘. So not only is the £80m wrong, the £65m is calculated by adding apples to pears, the outcome being bananas.

Enjoy the match wherever you are watching it. ’til Tomorrow.

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