When Arsene Wenger decided to have an old-fashioned 'player fire sale' after last season, many critics predicted Arsenal's era at the sharp end of the English Premier League was coming to an end.
The reasoning was that there was no way a club could keep on selling high-quality players such as Mathieu Flamini and Alexander Hleb and remain competitive with the other clubs in the big four.
This was only enhanced by Wenger's comments in May that the club's 360 million-pound debt on its new Emirates Stadium meant that the Frenchman had to exercise common sense when negotiating his players' wages and transfer fees. Common sense and football wages have never been further apart than in the current era.
The fear from Gunners fans is that their team cannot compete for the best players in the world, and that means it is harder to compete with Chelsea and Manchester United on the field.
Three matches into a new EPL season, a 'cut-price' Gunners side is surely not lacking quality. While there has been an unexpected loss to Fulham, there have also been wins over West Brom and Newcastle. The win over the Magpies last weekend demonstrated all the qualities of Wenger's great sides of the past: expansive football, deft touches and crisp finishes. Add two comprehensive Champions League qualification wins over Dutch outfit Twente Enchede and it has been a very solid start to the season.
So will the Gunners really suffer from the financial limitations imposed by the new stadium?
The almighty Arsenal sides of earlier this century were not built on massive cash reserves. Thierry Henry, if not the greatest Gunner of all time, surely one of the most influential, came to the club for just over 10 million pounds in 1999. He took Arsenal to unmatched heights, culminating in the famous unbeaten season of 2003-04.
In every season at the club he led the Gunners' goalscorers and had five seasons of more than 30 goals.
From a financial point of view, not only did he bring millions of pounds in merchandise and sponsorship, he then departed seven years after his arrival for more than he cost. Barcelona paid 16 million pounds, and the Gunners had knocked a few million off the builders' bills.
It's a story repeated many times over at Arsenal. Dennis Bergkamp arrived for 7.5 million pounds in 1995 and went on to become another legend of the club. Marc Overmars didn't quite turn out to be the equal of Bergkamp, but he arrived for 5.5 million, and then left for 25 million three years later. But perhaps the best on the balance sheet was Nicolas Anelka, who arrived for 500,000 pounds in 1997 and then departed two years later for 22.3 million pounds.
Intriguingly, of the list of the 50 most expensive players in history in terms of transfer fees, there is not one Arsenal purchase. In contrast, Chelsea features six times and Manchester United four times.
So Wenger's thrifty approach to the finances is nothing new to a side which has refused to become part of the obscene culture of buying success. Wenger has always been about building, not buying, the best sides, and, with talent such as Cesc Fabregas, Robin Van Persie, Theo Walcott, Denilson, Eduardo and Emmanuel Adebayor on the books, you'd be silly to think the Gunners can't challenge Chelsea and Manchester United for the title this season.
Email a friend
Favourites
Del.icio.us
Facebook
Digg
StumbleUpon
MySpace
Reddit
Newsvine
LinkedIn
Kwoff