Martin Keown has admitted that he’s ‘stunned’ that Arsene Wenger hasn’t won a Premier League title since 2004.
The Arsenal legend had a question and answer session for his weekly Daily Mail column and since it’s been 20 years since Wenger became manager, he did it on the boss.
When asked if Wenger had changed at all over the years, the former defender touched upon his surprise at him not winning a title in so long, as well as how football has changed generally, particularly in terms of money.
“I don’t think he’s changed too much, really,” Keown said.
“Though it has always stunned me that he hasn’t won another Premier League title since 2004.
“That would have been unthinkable after the ‘Invincibles’ season. After trying to snatch away Manchester United’s dominance during the early years, we had started to bring in players of serious quality towards the end of my time at the club.
“But even then Wenger was financially prudent, bringing in the likes of Marc Overmars and Nicolas Anelka on the cheap and selling them both for more than £20million.
“Since then, of course, Chelsea became financially dominant after Roman Abramovich took over, and Jose Mourinho put paid to Wenger’s title aspirations in 2005 and 2006.
“Wenger is a very pragmatic man, and I would love to see him throw his economic principles out of the window for one season and see what happened.
“But this will never happen. For him to spend like Chelsea, Manchester City and Manchester United do, it would have to come as an order from the board.
“One example that sums up Wenger’s approach to money – and the impact he had on Arsenal – came when the club were trying to buy the training facility off London University, having rented there for some time. Seeing a deal to be done, Wenger instead went to the farmer who owned the land next door and bought the lot for half the price!”
It’s easy to forget that the reason the boss was so ‘prudent’ when it came to spending wasn’t necessarily because that’s the sort of manager he is but because of the environment he was in. Having to keep a club financially afloat while building a stadium, as much as we like to bring it up, is no easy achievement but he did it.
Wenger may be no Jose Mourinho when it comes to splashing the cash but I don’t think he’s as tight-fisted as many believe.