Usmanov & Kroenke, RVP & Dein: Who is who, what is what? « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. 800,000 visits last month
By Walter Broeckx
Only 2 days ago I decided to write something that was meant to be funny in a way. Something that I thought was so silly that most people who understand English and certainly those who know me would realise that I was just having a laugh.
I was having a laugh about the ITK people (I had one sharp reader who noticed it – congratulations), having a laugh with Kroenke and Usmanov (a mild one in fact) and having a laugh with “Arry and his dog-account” and his way of buying and selling the same players wherever he went and goes. I all put this in a format and made sure that I used enough stupid words and abbreviations so that people would get the message from the start. Looking at the comments some missed it. But that will be due to my bad English but hey if even Arry can make it to become Spurs manager and not being able to write and read properly there is still hope for me.
But however since then a series of events have brought my wild ramblings in another perspective. What I will try to do is to bring a bit of an Untold perspective to the events. Some thoughts I have on what we have seen happening in the last 48 hours.
The Robin Van Persie statement was the start of a bizarre series of events. To start with: is there anyone out there who really thinks this was the idea of Robin and that he had written this himself? I wonder if it was Vos (one of his managers) or maybe someone else from his management team that had written this. Maybe someone who had connections to a particular group that has an interest in Arsenal?
Because as soon as the statement came out it didn’t take very long before an open letter came from the Red and White Holdings owned by the second biggest hare holder Usmanov. In this letter he made all kinds of critical comments on the current board, owner and Mr. Gazidis.
The only small amount of time between the two statements raised my eyebrows. It just gave an impression that the second letter was already partially written when the first arrived. Because it was critical in both cases for Mr. Gazidis. The RVP statement claiming that he was on a 14 day holiday right now. This has by the way been denied by another board member or director on twitter. And by a picture of Gazidis with one of the torch carriers from Arsenal.
And in the Usmanov letter the R&W holding was critical for Mr. Gazidis for writing a letter to one of the companies owned by Usmanov (the 3rd Russian phone company they claim). Now I thought it was part of the job for Mr. Gazidis to work on better sponsor ships deal. So writing to the 3rd (and maybe 1st and 2nd also) phone company from Russia was not a bad move? So it shows that Gazidis and his team are actually trying to improve the sponsor deals for Arsenal. Yet Usmanov is critical for this? I cannot understand this to be honest.
In fact if I look at this I cannot understand Usmanov at all. He claims he only wants the best for Arsenal. And now his company (he owes more than 50% of them) could become shirt sponsor for Arsenal in the future and instead of jumping on the occasion he write a letter of complaint to the Arsenal board. If he really would only have the best of interest for Arsenal he would tell his company: offer them £100M a year for the next 10 years and double it the year we win something. That would be showing not with words but by doing things that you are a real 100% Arsenal supporter and want the best for the club. Now Mr. Usmanov only complains about the fact that he was asked?
What about FFP rules you ask? Wouldn’t that be a problem if Usmanov would sign such a deal? Well I don’t think so. Because Usmanov is not on the board of Arsenal. So it could not be considered as a trying to avoid the FFP rules. In fact it is well know and documented that Usmanov wants to get Kroenke out himself. So a company who wants to make the current board leave sponsoring the club cannot be seen as a back door to avoid FFP rules. Usmanov is an enemy of the current board so no need to pay over the tops. Unless he just want to sponsor us that much he pays over the top.
And by paying the money Usmanov will show that he only wants best for Arsenal. All I see from that now is words but no actions. Even when he could take action like with the sponsorship deal.
Now Arsenal are in the middle of a mess with two billionaires fighting on the streets and causing unrest and trouble in the club. And as a result some people call for the return of Dein.
Now I don’t have anything personal against Dein and I want to underline that Dein has done some wonderful things for Arsenal in the past. But if we analyse the situation a bit we have 4 big players in the current messy situation.
1 Robin Van Persie and his team of agents : Vos and Darren Dein.
2. Stan Kroenke
3. Alisher Usmanov.
And then if we think on what they all have in common we end up with one person… David Dein.
It was David Dein who helped bringing RVP in and who has his own son acting as one of the agents for RVP.
It was David Dein who brought in Stan Kroenke at first
It was David Dein then who turned to Usmanov.
So in short if there is one person responsible for the mess we face now, by bringing all of them together at Arsenal…it is David Dein. So what would a return of David Dein bring? A solution or even more troubles?
Well I’m not sure but I do know that by bringing in the billionaires David Dein he has brought in, we have the trouble we now face today. So excuse me for not going overly wild of enthusiasm about the thought of him being involved even more in Arsenal. What would he do next? Bring in another billionaire so they can even fight more?
To use the words in my poem earlier I just would say to all of them: Just go then, why don’t you all just go then and let Arsenal in peace. If you don’t want to spend your personal money in Arsenal that is fine for me. We just run it with the money we earn. But why don’t you all stop pretending to be the one and only saviour by talking a lot but not showing any action even when you could. I don’t know if it all is a big coincidence or that people are doing things in order to get some things happening or done. So it all is guessing and trying to figure out what really is happening. But my message is this:
Why don’t you all just leave us alone with your stupid back room fighting. Because if there is one thing bad for our club than it is that back room fight for power.
If I may use the words our chairman once said and this is how I feel right now about all those billionaires around our club: “we don’t need your sort over here.”
Arsenal is a well run and sustainable club without one pound being put in by those billionaires so leave us alone. Just Go and let Arsenal do it their own way: The Arsenal way.