1) Low wage structure compared to most of the top 6 EPL: clubs,
2) Haven’t won any silverware or titles in 4 years,
3) Lack the depth and experience to win the tight games but do have the skill and drive to get to the last 4 every year, whether in the EPL or the Champions League,
4) Are the best European farm team for big money clubs, that ever existed. They supplied AC Milan with their best midfielder from 2007 and their best goalscorer and other midfielder went to Barcelona the same year.
5)They refuse to indebt themselves for transfer fees on highly over-valued, average players who will likely not perform any better in their new club.
6) rely on their youth and a careful development program to prepare them for EPL first team football, which doesn’t always work but is the cheapest route to potential success and to high transfer fees.
7) Bring in relative unknowns who can blossom under the skillful management of SAF or Wenger than grow egos the size of the Queen Mary and transfer out for enormously inflated fees to the clubs who are Geese who lay the Golden eggs eternally.

What is the right combination of intelligent transfer strategies and home grown talent? SAF had it and maybe will keep it alive but in today’s ridiculously hyperinflated transfer market and the imminent demise of the financial structures of many clubs relying on private ,rich, boy-toy loving Arabs and Russians, it seems a frugal approach like Wenger’s and others, is the way to go.

Why do you assume Tevez is lower on the depth chart than Santa Cruz or hell, even Adebayor? That’s a bet I’d take, because Tevez will start. Owen will not.

When Voyeur says the same thing, Arsenal are a selling club and he won’t “splash the cash”.

tevez is going to be so happy playing in all those “big matches”

The pound has gotten pretty weak compared to the Euro so its very hard to match the wages of a pro player in GBP without overpaying them significantly compared to the much stronger Euro.

I’m not sure how many players realise that, probably not many as I haven’t heard any player talk about the fluctuations in the currency but their managers and the managers of football clubs will know this.

Right now simply put due to the economic situation the European teams can use the strenght of the Euro to pay much bigger wages and transfer fees without breaking the bank.

In reality Ronaldos transfer in GBP was an enormous amount of money but in Euro’s it was effectively a lot less.

Everything can be tracked back to the economy and the economic situation in the United Kingdom is that the British banks are going through rigorous re-organisation.

Britain, America and the likes of Germany are all restructuring with Chinese loan money while countries like Spain and Italy have nobody to bail them out.

The end result is in about 2 decades the economies like Britain will end up a lot better after this rough expensive patch while countries like Spain will be under such economic stress and be facing problems that could pretty much lead to what happened to the Soviet Union.

Right now any English entity and that includes football clubs musn’t spend too much money. In the longer term of a decade or so these countries will be in significantly better economic situations and over the next decades will go on to become the big purchasers.

This short term fluctuation is causing a lot of rifts but the long term gains are all going to be felt in other countries and Spain won’t be one of them.

In 2 decades I doubt there will be a world class player playing in the whole of La Liga. That country is nearly dead.

An avid hater of Man U, I respect SAF’s decision. He’s not contributing to the overinflating of values for potential transfers. The players are paid what the market will bear. The return on these players is not worth these prices, and as soon as everyone figures that out, the prices will drop.