Arsenal chief executive Ivan Gazidis insists his club have the
financial firepower to sign a player of Wayne Rooney’s stature, hinting
the Gunners are finally willing to revamp their much-maligned wage
structure this summer.
Cynics scoffed at reports earlier this week that
manager Arsene Wenger was lining up an audacious bid to sign Rooney from
Manchester United, with the wage policy followed by the north London
club in recent years making the stories seem implausible.
Yet Gazidis has fuelled the hope of Arsenal
supporters that the club are about to deliver on the promises of Wenger
and enter the financial big league in a bid to compete with their
Premier League and European rivals for top talent.
When asked whether Arsenal would now consider
sanctioning a bid for Rooney if it involved a £25 million fee and
£200,000-per-week wages, Gazidis was emphatic in his positive response.
“Of course we could do that, we could do more than
that,” he told reporters. “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 things which would excite you.
“We can think about all kinds of things, 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.
“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. He has new tools available to him financially and I
think he’ll make good use of them.
“What you will see is certainly an Arsenal team
that is getting better over the next couple of years unless we make big
mistakes, but historically we have got a manager who has got a proven of
doing this extremely well over a long period of time.
“I think we deserve a little more credit than
we’ve been given. Having said that, we’ve got more financial capability
now and I’m sure that will help us to be able to secure the targets that
Arsene wants.”
Gazidis admitted Arsenal are unable to compete
with club who are being backed by owners providing “unlimited
resources”, but he is convinced they can end their eight-year wait for
silverware next season if they get their planning right this summer.
“My own view is we are moving into a new phase
where if we make our decisions well, if we get the right chemistry, and
if we do a variety of other things as well, not just the new players
that come in but the right kind of things on the football side, that we
can compete with any club in the world,” he added.
“We’ve seen two clubs this year in the Champions
League final and both of whom run responsible financial models. They are
pretty fantastic teams and very exciting to watch. There’s no reason
why we can’t do that.” (AFP)
