Arsenal: Charlie Nicholas does not understand finances

Charlie Nicholas has urged Arsenal to give Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang whatever he wants. I am not sure the Sky Sports pundit understands finances.

The future of Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang is a complicated subject. You have a world-class player at the top of his game. You also have a soon-to-be-31-year-old with just a year remaining on his contract. And then you have an Arsenal team in rebuild in desperate need of elite talent across the pitch that both cannot afford to let such production leave or pay it to stay. The juxtaposition builds.

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This level of complexity and uncertainty makes forming an answer and solution extremely challenging. Unlike in other, more straightforward situations, there is not an obvious answer that the club should pursue. In reality, three or four different avenues could all be the right one to tread down.

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However, there is one that would be disastrous, as recent history tells us. Yet, Charlie Nicholas, who is a former Arsenal centre-forward and speaks passionately and sometimes brutishly about his former club as a pundit, has not seemingly considered its pitfalls.

When asked what his solution to the Aubameyang mess, Nicholas told Sky Sports show, The Debate:

"“While I do believe that Arsenal need to fund a rebuild, my preference would be to offer Aubameyang what he wants. Is it possible Ozil could move on? Could this then help fund wages for Aubameyang and others? If they can get Ozil off the wage bill without getting anything for him, it will not be too much of a detriment. They must give Aubameyang exactly what he wants. There simply aren’t many other players like him at that level.”"

Now, if Nicholas were to have argued in favour of offering a new contract for the right price, that is a line of thinking that many can get on board with. Aubameyang is the club’s top goalscorer for the second consecutive season and has broken several records regarding his scoring pace at the start of his time in north London. But he didn’t. He said that the club should ‘give Aubameyang exactly what he wants’

He even makes mention of the very history that proves this is a bad idea. When Arsenal allowed Mesut Ozil’s contract to run down, after it was accepted that Alexis Sanchez, the other star player in the exact same situation, would depart, the club began their negotiations from the standpoint that Ozil would not leave the club, no matter what. They would ‘give him exactly what he wants’. That decision has since backfired excruciatingly.

This is not to say that the Gunners should not look to keep Aubameyang. There is a very fair argument to be made in favour of that belief. But there are financial restrictions that must be understood, recognised, and ultimately obeyed. The club cannot willy-nilly sign players to new deals with considering the consequences. Giving Aubameyang whatever he wants does precisely that.

Nicholas’ viewpoint, then, not entirely unsurprisingly, lacks nuance and awareness of the entire situation. Yes, Aubameyang is a great player. And yes, Arsenal will find it difficult to replace him. But that does not remove the finances of the situation, and as Ozil proved, they cannot be merely brushed under the carpet and kicked into the future.