By Nitram
… and how was it even allowed to happen
Now that is a question. It is a question that is very difficult to answer. In fact it has many different answers, depending on how you look at. The truth is it’s way too complex for me as a laymen to delve that deeply into, but I can take a look at one very crude parameter. Where would Arsenal have finished in the table if you took both those cheats out of the equation?
But, even that isn’t that straight forward because even though ‘Financial Doping’ has been going on since Abramovich arrived in 2003, what he was doing was not actually illegal at first, which was mainly down to the fact that it was so unprecedented. Nobody had seen such enormous amounts of money being pumped in to one club. Yes, both Blackburn Rovers and Leeds Utd were the benefactors of large amounts of money invested by their wealthy owners, but it was nothing like to the level we witnessed, firstly with Abramovich and secondly the Mansours.
As such, initially nothing was done to curtail the spending. In fact a lot of people were loving it, especially as it appeared the team suffering the most was Arsenal, which made it all jolly good fun. But then the Mansours arrived in 2008 and upped the ante, and this most certainly changed things. Now of course it has to be said, it was not only Arsenal being toppled from their pedestal, both Man Utd and Liverpool, amongst others, were also being affected. This was affecting everybody. Keeping up with those two was putting enormous financial strain on every club in the league. If you wanted to have any hope at all of challenging for the title, or even the European places, you also had to seriously up the ante with your spending. And that’s where the problems really started. Some just went too far.
Something had to be done. Enter FFP and PSR.
Due to clubs living beyond their means in order to keep up, in the 10 years prior to FFP 30 clubs had either entered insolvency or full administration. That is to say, three a year. Since the introduction of FFP in 2010, followed by PSR, only nine clubs have experienced such a fate. 0.6 per year. That is what both FFP and PSR were implemented to do, and not, as many would have you believe, to be a mechanism to protect Arsenal, Man Utd and Liverpool.
These regulations were all voted in by the Premier League Clubs. A democratic vote. Just because you don’t like them, that is no excuse to break them.
So here’s an analogy:
I may not agree with the 70 mph motorway speed limit but I have to abide by it. If I don’t and I get caught doing 80 mph I will get a slap on the wrist. Some points on my licence. If I get caught doing over 100 mph I may get a massive fine and a driving ban. If I am doing over 100 MPH and crash into somebody, and heaven forbid kill them, I am going to jail for a long time.
So, a very simple rule that I guess a lot of people in big powerful cars hate. They think that rule is wrong and unfair and I understand that. You’ve got a big car. You think you’re a great driver. The road is pretty empty at 1am in the morning. But here’s the thing. IT’S NOT ABOUT YOU. It’s about keeping EVERYBODY SAFE. Because as good a driver as you think you are, things happen. Things go wrong. A puncture, and the next thing you know you’ve leapt the central reservation and smashed into the only car on the other carriageway. That is Chelsea and Man City. Reckless. Couldn’t give a shit about anyone else. Okay yes, everyone else can get a big car but that doesn’t make it any safer, it just makes it worse.
So that’s a bit of simplistic background as to how we have arrived at where we are today. Now to the point. How did all this financial doping affect Arsenal? And by that I mean in the most simplistic way. Assuming that neither Chelsea or Man City had received any financial doping and remained the mid-table fodder they generally were prior to the billionaires arrival, where would Arsenal, amongst others, have finished?
I’m looking at four teams, Arsenal, Man Utd, Liverpool and Tottenham H. And I’m looking at three different scenarios. Under each scenario I’m looking at how many more titles they would of won, without Chelsea or Man City in the picture.
Scenario One:
SINCE 2003 WITHOUT CHELSEA AND MAN CITY IN THE PICTURE
Arsenal would of won four more titles.
- 04/05 we finished 2nd behind Chelsea
- 14/15 we finished 3rd behind Chelsea and Man City
- 22/23 we finished 2nd behind Man City
- 23/24 we finished 2nd behind Man City
- Man Utd: 5
- Liverpool: 2
- Tottenham: 2
Just as amatter of interest, without those two teams we would of also made the CL in seasons 2016/17, 2017/18, 2018/19 and 2021/22
So FOUR more titles and FOUR more CL qualifications.
Scenario two
SINCE 2008 AND JUST TAKING MAN CITY OUT OF THE EQUATION
Extra titles won
- Arsenal 2
- Man Utd 2
- Liverpool 2
Scenario three
THE PERIOD DIRECTLY RELATING TO THE CURRENT MAN CITY CHARGES 09/10 TO 17/18
WITH ONLY MAN CITY EXCLUDED
- Man Utd 2
- Liverpool 1
So as you can see, if you just look at the period the charges relate to, the damage, to league titles at least, isn’t enormous. But if you go back to when the Mansours first arrived and starting spending what would of been illegal amounts of money had the rules already been in place, the damage to other clubs is much worse. And if you go back even further and include Chelseas enormous, soon to become illegal spending, then the damage is ridiculous.
And this little sample doesn’t even include the knock-on effect to all the other teams robbed of CL and EL qualification if those two teams had not been financially doped.
The reason I have done this is because I just wanted to show just how badly the financial doping, legal or illegal, of both Chelsea and Man City affected Arsenal. I know that if you solely look at the damage it did to us during the period of the Man City charges it doesn’t look so bad for us, The damage had already been done. But it goes way way beyond that, not only for us but for others too. Having said that, I truly believe it was Arsenal that was actually affected the worst once Abramovic arrived.
It was us that Chelsea first, then Man City, targeted for players, showing just how magnificent our teams were, until they were pillaged. We were of course, also very vulnarable because of the new stadium which magnified our player losses because we simply couldn’t afford to replace them like for like.
Then of course came the abuse that the players, the manager and the club started to get from the media, shamefully followed by ex-players then certain sections of fans, branded the AAA (the anti-Arsenal Arsenal) by Untold all those years ago.
I really hope those guys feel the shame, but saddly I don’t beleive they do. In fact the Wenger outers just turned in to Arteta outers. To my disbelief some high profile Arsenal fans are actually backing Man City. But why? I believe simply because they cant bear the thought of Wenger getting the kudos he deserves for how brilliantly he navigated those difficult times. Or indeed how Arteta would already now be a three-times PL champion if it wasn’t for the Mancs financial cheating.
This whole mess is the fault of the Premier League for allowing Abromovich to do what he did in the first place. Anyone with half a brain could see it was wrong. I, and many others, wrote on here years ago how doping and over inflating the Premier Leagues finances was going to end in dissaster.
Saddly many loved it just because they could laugh at Arsenal. Not so funny now is it?
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