Arsenal have already committed £286m as ‘gung-ho’ Josh Kroenke sets Mikel Arteta transfer plan

Whether in hope or expectation, Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta has signalled to the Kroenke regime the financial backing he needs to launch another assault on the Premier League summit next season.

The new sporting director, former Atletico Marid operator Andrea Berta, is famously proactive in the transfer market, which most pundits agree is what Arsenal are crying out for following an insipid January.

Heading into the mid-season window, the imperative was clear: Mikel Arteta needs a striker, any striker, though ideally one the calibre of Alexander Isak, Benjamin Sesko or Viktor Gyokeres.

A surprise £40m bid for Ollie Watkins and a half-hearted pursuit of Dusan Vlahovic was the sum total of their efforts, however, with Stan Kroenke seemingly unwilling to bankroll high-risk spending.

With the Premier League title seemingly gone by that point in the season, the logic did track. Clubs are so often held to ransom in January, plus players are more reluctant to leave mid-campaign.

Position	Team	Played MP	Won W	Drawn D	Lost L	For GF	Against GA	Diff GD	Points Pts
1	LiverpoolLiverpool	30	22	7	1	70	27	43	73
2	ArsenalArsenal	30	17	10	3	55	25	30	61

Instead, the plan from Silent Stan – or, perhaps, his son, Josh Kroenke, who is now the public face of the Kroenke Sports & Entertainment regime in N5 – was to sit tight and wait for better value in the summer.

Again, you can see the logic. On the other hand, it did expose what some Arsenal fans might consider a worrying trend.

The Kroenkes aren’t win-now owners. The appointment of Arteta and the resolve to stick with him when things were rough illustrates that. A slow burn, they believe, can bring sustained success.

And in any case, KSE’s main concern is qualification for the Champions League. That’s where the money and, some cynics might argue, the best income-expenses ratio is found.

In layman’s terms, why proportionately way more to win the Premier League title, especially in a high-risk January transfer window, when it only delivers marginally better revenue than finish 2nd-4th?

And Arteta is under no illusions about the calculation being made at Kroenke HQ, which is seven time zones away in Denver and as such is largely immune to noise from the fanbase.

Ahead of the summer, however, there is acceptance from the owners that they can’t afford to stand still.

While the Kroenkes won’t bet the farm to win the league title, they know they are operating in an uber-competitive environment.

A refresh is needed and, if Arteta’s rhetoric is anything to go by, a refresh will happen.

What has Mikel Arteta said about the summer transfer window?

“The way we planned the five first summers, they were going to be very big and they were going to have different objectives,” Arteta said in his press conference ahead of tomorrow’s meeting with Everton.

“In the beginning, there were a lot of players with three, four or five-year contracts, so the turnaround of the squad and how you visualise the next five years was very dependent on that.

“There are certain positions we didn’t expect to have someone like Ethan Nwaneri or Myles Lewis-Skelly contributing to, which has been great.

“The way you start to evolve, you start to master certain things then the changes cannot be that much. That’s where we are.

“The line now is thinner, the margins are smaller. But the cost of that, as well, increases. So it goes a little bit in a different direction.

“We want to increase the depth of the squad, but as well, we want to increase the quality and the skills we need to go to the next step.

“It’s a big summer for many things because first of all we have to maintain the good foundations that we have and then obviously how can we improve and evolve the team.”

• READ MORE: Arsenal owner Stan Kroenke has ‘huge call’ to make as 80,000-seat Emirates ‘mega dome’ plan evolves

Josh Kroenke could bankroll Arsenal’s ‘big summer’, says football finance expert

So, if something tectonic is on the horizon at the Emirates Stadium, where are the funds coming from?

Stan Kroenke does not like to underwrite losses, at Arsenal. Ultimately, he wants the club to be sustainable rather than being run on a benefactor model where external funds are needed.

However, he has departed from that philosophy somewhat in recent years out of necessity, lending over £250m to the Gunners to fund operating costs.

Incidentally, it is that funding model that Man City have objected to across the Premier League.

Their argument is that loans should bare a fair market rate of interest for Profit and Sustainability Rules (PSR) purposes and – in a move that could damage Arsenal – that rate should be applied retrospectively.

Regardless the outcome of City’s challenge to the league’s Associated Party Transaction rules, Arsenal will, University of Liverpool football finance lecturer Kieran Maguire says, need a cash injection in the summer.

“In their most recent set of accounts, they had £67m worth of cash,” he explained in exclusive conversation with TBR Football.

“They owe £268m in outstanding transfer fees. That sounds high but it compares with £441m at Spurs, for example. That’s money they have committed, however, and needs to be considered.

“Given that Arsenal have significantly bigger revenues and are playing in the Champions League next season, they are in a very strong position from a negotiation perspective.

“Whether the need cash funding from Stan Kroenke is a separate issues.

“Josh Kroenke appears to be a bit more gung-ho than his father and more emotionally invested in the club from his father, so I think he is more likely to acquiesce than Stan Kroenke. He knows they need more funds.

“Arsenal borrowed £80m last year and they only repaid £18m. They now appear to be a club that is willing to open the flood gates a bit more – KSE have put more money in that they have done historically.

“The other big decision this summer is what they are going to do with the stadium.”

• READ MORE: Arsenal have decided to promote 19-year-old youngster to Mikel Arteta’s first-team next season

Could Arsenal be base for Stan Kroenke’s next huge sports investment?

Stan Kroenke’s sports empire encompasses six sports teams in total, as well as an adjoined multi-billion dollar property portfolio.

Arsenal, the only KSE investment this side of the Atlantic, are also the only major team in the network to have not won the biggest prize available to them under Kroenke ownership.

The LA Rams, who won the Super Bowl in 2021 and play at the Kroenke-finance SoFi Stadium, which is widely regarded as the best stadium in the world, are the most valuable franchise in the network.

The Denver Nuggets, however, aren’t too far behind. And now, Kroenke Sports & Entertainment could potentially have the opportunity to expand their influence in basketball, this time in Europe.

The NBA has announced its plans to launch a professional league in Europe. Manchester City, Real Madrid and Barcelona have reportedly been invited to badge teams who would compete in the division.

And, although it wouldn’t come cheap – around £400m is the rumoured expansion fee – the NBA are also looking at outposts in London, where Arsenal would surely be canvassed as a potential host club.

Aside from a loose relationship with Kroenke-owned Colorado Mammoth, Arsenal aren’t in the multi-club racket yet. But could they be one of the first English clubs to get in on multi-sport? It’s entirely possible.