Tag Archives: She Wore

Tottenham stadium builders contracted until November

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As each day goes past, another story hits social media about the major issues at the new Tottenham Stadium.

We blogged at the back end of July that the stadium would not be ready until October at the earliest. The blog got a lot of abuse from Tottenham fans who claimed that we were jealous, bitter, and asked how did we, as Arsenal fans, now more then them about the state of the stadium?

The truth is that it does not matter what club you support to know the state of play of a construction site if you are within the industry.

A Spurs fans at University in Reading, for example, would know less than an Arsenal fan who recruits construction workers to the Tottenham Stadium project, or a Sunderland fan who has been operating a tower crane on site for the last 2 years.

We blogged in July that the stadium would not be ready until October, but it took the club until August to release the information to the fans. Up until that point the company line was “only Fulham will be at Wembley”.

In fact, there were rumours circulating in March that the stadium would not be ready until after the second international break (October) at the earliest.

It is here where Daniel Levy needs to hang his head in shame for the way he has treated Spurs fans – which all club rivalry aside has been a disgrace.

He knew when season ticket payments were due that the stadium would not be completed before the season started. He knew that it would not be ready for Liverpool – their second home game of the season. He knew that there was a chance that the ground would not even be completed this year.

And yet he oversaw the club telling the fans a story, a fallacy, and selling the countries most expensive season tickets based on this. He took money off hard working football fans knowing what he was selling did not exist.

There have been reports that those who bought cooperate boxes are set to be refunded 50% for the 2018/19 season. Normal fans are getting a game by game refund and then having to buy tickets at Wembley. The excitement of returning to the Lane has been diminished.

Fans have been lied to, and Levy is now hiding behind “health and safety” as a justification for the stadium not being completed. To try and avoid points deductions. To prepare his defence against angry fans miss-sold season tickets.

Part of the reason is Health and Safety, but this is not the only issues. The reality is, the stadium is no where near finished.

As every day goes on, you hear more stories from more people involved in the project about problems on the stadium:

  • Slingers (operatives who direct cranes for lifting operations) refused to take work onsite.. Management were demanding slingers to undertake dangerous lifts. After a recent death in London, slingers are refusing to undertake the danger lifts. They are getting sacked. Problem is there is so much work in London, and so few slingers out of work that no one wants to work there. Lifting operations literally ground to a halt at times.
  • There was a well documented problem with the seats where 15,000 of them were injected with the wrong dye. These are still being replaced.
  • The poor weather earlier this year put the project back two weeks as they were unable to get the roof on.
  • When tested, the fire alarm system failed. The entire system requires re-wiring. As it had been plastered over and the walls finished, these need to be ripped out, re-wired and then made good. This was discovered 2 weeks ago. It is expected to take 4 months to complete.
  • The wrong lines were reportedly installed for emergency telephones; fibre optic was used instead of copper.
  • Ultimately, people just do not want to work there – it is a highly pressurised job and operatives are being coerced into working long hours. Its location is also reducing the worker pool as people will not commute. London is so busy at the moment that you can pick up 10-12 hours a day in Central London where the site is more relaxed, slower. Agencies are struggling to find anyone to fill the skills gap.

There have been plenty of reports across social media of electrical companies having their contracts extended to Christmas. Of Northern based tradesman who have been put up in digs being told to expect to still be here in 2019.

Tottenham are reportedly trying to put all the blame on Mace, hiding behind Health and Safety in order to justify playing at two home stadiums this season. But they installed themselves as Project Managers so knew every step of the way of the problems the project faced.

The truth is the stadium was never going to be ready.

When construction began, everyone in the industry knew that they were trying to complete a 30 month job in 18 months. It was always an overly ambitious deadline driven by greed.

Something like the weather early this year is not their fault, but when you are working to such a tight schedule you can not afford a 2 weeks delay.

Spurs should have been honest and realistic 12 months ago. Hired Wembley for 2 years and ensured the new ground was completed on time. Sold season tickets at Wembley and ensure the project was completed, with safety certificates, for 2019.

Instead Levy was driven by the greed – or need – for the stadium to be completed for the start of the 2018/19 season. Spurs needed the income to cover spiralling costs. The problem they now face is they do not have a stadium ready, and costs are still spiralling.

The project will end up costing over £1bn, and I would be surprised if they play at the new ground this season.

Keenos

Goodbye Joel Campbell

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7 years after joining the club, and 5 years after obtaining a work permit enabling him to play in England, Joel Campbell is finally set to leave the club.

The Costa Rican international is set to join Italian side Frosinone Calcio on a 3-year-deal.

Campbell has always divided fans – something which I have never understood.

On one side you have the fans who would defend him, say how talented he was, that he was never given a chance by Arsene Wenger and was essentially ruined. It was agenda driven.

The other side – the majority of Arsenal fans – saw a player who was not really good enough to wear the shirt, and regards of their position on the manager, felt he probably should have been sold in 2014 after a couple of decent World Cup games.

The reality is, those that “rated” him, and still do, only do that to attack Wenger, not because they think he is any good.

Even over the summer, I have people claiming that he had a lot of potential and was still good enough for Arsenal.

Campbell is now 26, so we really should stop talking about him like he is a bright young talent. In 40 appearances for Arsenal, he scored just 4 goals. So those saying he “always impressed for Arsenal” are clearly seeing him through biased glasses.

On loan at Villarreal, Sporting and Betis, he also struggled to break through into the first team.

In the 3 seasons he spent on loan, he started just 25 league games. If he was not good enough for those teams, he is certainly not good enough for The Arsenal.

https://twitter.com/pr_whoru/status/1029812862712270848?s=21

As I said, the support of him by some fans will always baffle me. It seems they rated him purely because the old manager did not. And at the same time they called Theo Walcott “dead wood”.

Campbell follows Chuba Akpom, Lucas Perez & Jeff Reine-Adélaïde out of the club, continuing the process of removing those players who are simply not good enough from the squad.

Still plenty to go…

Keenos

Did Arsenal spend enough in the summer?

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After the defeat against Manchester City, a lot of the post-game talk was just how far behind the Champions we were.

This was a City side with the likes of Kevin de Bruyne, Vincent Kompany & David Silva, but was by no means a B team.

The victory for them showed that even with a few key absentees, they have incredible strength in depth.

Take the missing Leroy Sane for example.

A lot of fuss was made during the summer over him not making the German squad at the World Cup. He was missed by his country, but not missed by his club.

In his place were Riyad Mahrez and Raheem Sterling. Neither are exactly “B team” players; both would start for every side in the Premier League, just like both started for Manchester City at the weekend.

They might not have started Gabriel Jesus, but they did start Sergio Aguero.

And despite Vincent Kompany and Nicolás Otamendi being absent, the centre of their defence cost over £100million, forming the most expensive back four ever assembled in the history of the game.

Kyle Walker John Stones, Aymeric Laporte and Benjamin Mendy costing over £200m between them.

I am a firm believer that it is not what you spend; but who you buy, and Manchester City’s huge expenditure proves this.

They have spent a decade building what they have today. It has cost them over £1billion in transfer fees and they have bought an awful lot of duds.

Whilst most clubs have to buy sensibly, City have been able to chuck money out a player to see if he comes good, and if he doesn’t, discard him,

Think Robinho, Roque Santa Cruz, Stevan Jotevic, Eliaquim Mangala, Wilfried Bony. Nearly £150million spent on tripe.

What they have done over the last decade is filter out the rubbish and what they are left with is a ridiculously strong, expensively assembled squad.

So to Arsenal.

In the summer we spent £70million. The gulf between us and Manchester City was clear to see. So should Arsenal have spent more?

The easy answer is yes, of course we should. We should have gone and signed Lionel Messi, Cristiano Ronaldo and Antoine Griezzman. But this is not Football Manager, it is real life.

Manchester City’s empire was not built overnight.

They did not win their first league title until 3 years of that original investment, and it took Pep Gaurdiola 12 months and £500million to build the team that ran away with the league title last season.

Arsenal’s £70million spend took the total cost of the squad over the £400million mark. In comparison, both Manchester United and Manchester City’s squad cost them £800million.

It is unrealistic to think that Arsenal have – and will spend – £400million in a single summer to bridge that gap.

Arsenal’s average net spend over the last 5 years is £25million. With barely anything coming in this summer from outgoing players, this summers outlay will be one of our biggest “net spending” summers in history.

Only Liverpool, Chelsea and West Ham actually had a largest outlay than us – with Liverpool spending the Philipe Coutinho money.

So Arsenal did make huge outlays in terms of money spent.

You also do not want to buy too many players in a single window.

The problem for Arsenal is we are starting from a long way back.

For the foreseeable future, Manchester City only need to buy 1 or two players a year. This means that they can spend £70m a season on a single player, every year, and continue improving. Bringing in only Riyad Mahrez this summer is a perfect example of this.

Arsenal need to strengthen the entire squad. The first XI and the “B team”. We do not really want to go out every summer buying 10+ players spending £150million. We need to be sensible.

Spending £70million on 5 players was sensible recruitment. Buying too many players in a transfer window leads you to buying players you did not really want, ones lower down the list, perhaps have not been fully scouted properly.

Arsenal can not go out and buy a Riyad Mahrez for £70million, and then make the 5 other transfer we need for another £70million. We can not expect us to be spending £150million in a single window without bringing money in.

Eventually we hope that we can get to a position like Manchester City are in, or where Manchester United were in the late 90s/early 00s. Where you have the basis of a championship winning squad and just need to buy one or 2 top players each summer, improving the top end of the squad.

Until we get to that point, we are going to have to be buying 5 or 6 players every summer, slowly improving the squad.

https://twitter.com/KeenosAFC/status/1027536442099159040

The squad we have today is massively improved from 12 months ago. The majority of those who have come in are superior to those who they have replaced.

The trick is to keep going. Next summer get in a left back better than Nacho Monreal & Saed Kolasinac. A centre back to partner Sokratis (and replace Mustafi).

The squad was left in such a poor shape by Arsene Wenger that it might take 3 summer transfer windows to get rid of the poor players and replace them, and as a self-sufficient club, we will only have a spend of about £70-£100million a summer before sales.

I would have liked to have seen a natural wideman come in over the summer, but that is all I feel we are short at this time.

This is Jurgen Klopp’s 4th season at Liverpool. Mauricio Pochettino is into his 5th at Spurs. And Jose Mourinho has now had 3 summer transfer windows at Manchester United.

These managers with their clubs are still “building” to bridge that gap to Manchester City.

Rome was not built in a day.

Keenos