Arsenal: Put up or shut up time for Stan Kroenke

Stan Kroenke’s tenure as Arsenal owner has been an abject failure. Only he has the power to change it. The question is, does he want to?

Mikel Arteta’s appointment as Arsenal manager means it’s put up or shut up time for Stan Kroenke. The crisis the clubs finds itself mired in is one entirely of his making. After being blown off the pitch by Manchester City, management can no longer gloss over the fact that, on any given day, Arsenal field too many substandard footballers to harbour any realistic hope of finishing in the top four. Righting the sinking ship, then, will require a significantly larger investment than Kroenke has ever shown any willingness to make.

Find the latest episode of the Pain in the Arsenal Podcast here — After Everton, good luck Mikel Arteta

Per Forbes, Arsenal’s matchday revenue is down £30 million from last season and more empty seats pervade the Emirates every game. The speed and ferocity with which fans turned on Unai Emery is illustrative of an even harder truth: the days of ‘Silent Stan’ using the Arsenal manager as a heat shield are over. Fans worldwide have come to the realization that Arsenal’s most glaring deficiency is not on the pitch, but in the boardroom. The fact that the team’s winning percentage has gotten steadily worse as Stan Kroenke has increased his ownership stake gives new meaning to the old adage ‘A fish rots from the head’.

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When Kroenke bought his first stake, the club was a perennial title contender with world-class talent at almost every position. Today, they are closer to being permanent mid-table dwellers than they are to qualifying for the Champions League. Long story short, after almost 15 years of willful neglect he euphemistically called a ‘self-sustaining business model,’ Kroenke is finally getting out of Arsenal what he’s put into it: nothing.

One of the key reasons for Leicester City’s recent success is their proactive owner. Last year, when Leicester City was performing below expectations, they promptly fired Claude Puel and replaced him with Brendan Rodgers. This comes after years of smart recruitment and significant investment in what is now an excellent team and squad. When Arsenal came sniffing around Rodgers a replacement for Emery, the Foxes didn’t dither. They signed Rodgers to a five-year extension with a fat pay raise to boot. Can you imagine Kroenke doing such a thing? Does he even know who Brendan Rodgers is?

Silent Stan’s absenteeism and greed are why Arsenal’s problems are more foundational than tactical. Arteta’s tough talk about shipping out non-hackers is an empty threat unless Kroenke backs those words up with his wallet. Pep Guardiola can ruthlessly enforce his footballing culture because he has the luxury of an ownership group who will replace players who don’t perform with those who will, regardless of the cost. If Kroenke expects Arteta to set a new standard with the ‘limited transfer funds’ that were made available to Emery, Arteta won’t last much longer than his predecessor.

Without a corresponding financial commitment from Kroenke, making Arteta manager is basically shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic. The whole ship is still going down. Arteta isn’t going to wave a magic wand and make Sokratis or David Luiz competent defenders. Nor can he mask the deficiencies of a midfield which is too slow (Granit Xhaka), too small (Lucas Torreira) and too young (Joe Willock and Matteo Guendouzi) to compete with the Premier League’s elite.

Regardless of how tactically astute Arteta is, the fact remains that there isn’t nearly enough talent in the squad. Nothing short of Kroenke making a several hundred million pound investment and showing a genuine commitment to running a world-class football club will fix Arsenal. It’s really that simple.

Kroenke has nowhere left to hide. Everyone knows what Arsenal was before he took over and they know the train wreck the club has become on his watch. This is a pass-fail test. Kroenke, then, can either step up and become the kind of owner Arsenal require, or he can go down in infamy as the man whose shameless greed and gross negligence turned one of the world’s most storied football clubs into a permanent laughing stock. It is put up or shut up time for Kroenke.