Arsene Wenger has agreed a new three-year deal to remain as Arsenal manager until 2017 and is expected to sign it in the next 48 hours.
Winning the FA Cup earlier this month ended a nine year barren spell of winning at the Emirates but that cannot overshadow the job that Wenger has done since arriving at Arsenal. Seventeen consecutive Champions League qualifications s impressive but so is the three Premier League titles and five FA Cup finals.
Wenger’s success came in pre-Emirates days when he when his eight major trophies and led Arsenal to the 2006 Champions League final. While the move from Highbury to the Emirates is now paying off financially for Arsenal, you wonder about that lost decade when Wenger did not have the funds to invest in a squad that was as good as anyone in Europe for six or seven years. Could Wenger had done a Fergie and rebuilt that Invincible’s side and kept winning trophies?
Arsenal have handed Wenger a £100m transfer kitty for the summer as the Gunners try and win the Premier League title for the first time since 2004. After years of shopping at the low end of the market, it will be interesting to see how Wenger reacts shopping at the other end. The signing of Mesut Ozil was over £42 million last summer shows that Wenger can spend the money, but his inability to spend the money also cost Arsenal Karim Benzema and Julian Draxler in the last two transfer windows.
