Arsenal: This is the Stan Kroenke problem, in part

Arsenal slumped to a Europa League final defeat on Wednesday night. It was the pinnacle of a longstanding problem at the club, a Stan Kroenke-shaped problem.

I respect Arsenal for running in a self-sustainable manner. And in the days of increasingly morally murky owners taking over football clubs and injecting morally murky money into flashy new players and high-flying coaches, I am glad that I support a team that does not present me with such dilemmas.

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But sometimes, it is frustrating to see the team attempt to compete with the lavish spending of their direct rivals while they start every season from a lower footing. Sadly, football is largely won and lost by how much and how well you can spend, and Arsenal have done neither well for many years now.

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This culminated in Wednesday night’s Europa League defeat to Chelsea. The club needed a lift. It ‘sacked’ Arsene Wenger a year ago after two successive finishes outside the top four. It turned to Unai Emery in hope of inspiration and new direction, receiving glimpses of both but ultimately falling short in a calamitous capitulation during the closing weeks of the league campaign. A European trophy and a place in next season’s Champions League would have been the perfect kickstart to this new era.

So, in typical Arsenal fashion, they capitulated. A second half with four goals conceded perfectly illustrated all of the footballing and non-footballing problems at the club. The defending was characteristically non-existent, the attitude stunk, there was a lack of athleticism and speed on the pitch, the system was worked out and exploited, the players lacked intensity and desire, there simply was not enough quality on the pitch. Need I go on?

The owner is the overarching presence in all of these things. He is the most important individual at the club, the one who impacts everything that the club does, even if it is extremely indirectly. And Stan Kroenke is not a very good owner, not by any stretch of the imagination. But that does not mean that he should shoulder the blame for all of the crisis points in north London.

The players on the pitch were not good enough because Arsenal have not spent enough money in the transfer market. But that is only partly true. There was a £60 million central midfield partnership, a £100 million strikeforce, a £350,000-a-week superstar all in the starting XI. Yes, Kroenke has not once dipped his hand in his own pocket and invested the sufficient funds to properly supply the team, but there has also been some extremely inefficient spending as well.

Nevertheless, it is Kroenke who should deservedly shoulder much of the blame. He is the man pulling the strings, or his son Josh is, and he is the transcendently distant figure that hangs over the club, forever holding it back. Little progress will be made with him at the helm.

This is what happens when a disinterested owner with little-used pockets takes over a successful club and attempts to turn into a profitable business. Success dwindles, and Arsenal are feeling the full brunt of it.