People on here have complained about threads being diverted off-topic, which is fair enough. This one started as a discussion about investment in the club and why we couldn't have a wealthy owner wiling to invest like Aston Villa's new owner says he will. Instead, we have ended up with yet another discussion about the employment of Huw Jenkins. Shall we go straight to the Trust now or save for that page 2?
Returning to the original point of this thread, I would simply say:
- Clubs who have owners who are willing to give them 'free' money with no strings attached and no expectation of a return on most of it are extremely fortunate and rare to the point of extinction. Most such owners turn out to be fickle friends who leave the club in a worse state that they found it in, or complete charlatans.
- I despise the effect that the owners of Chelsea and Man City have had on football wages and the ability of clubs like Swansea to compete at the top level. I would far prefer to see clubs like Arsenal succeed as they live within their means. I genuinely would prefer that we never get into a situation where we can buy our way to success.
- Under this board - the whole board, including our supporter director and HJ, not just the Americans - I don't see us going into debt to fund player sales. Investment in infrastructure, including one day stadium expansion, yes - because you can get a guaranteed return on that. But 'investing' anything other than your profits in player purchases is madness unless you have a sugar daddy. How would we feel now if we'd gone into debt to buy Borja, Clucas or the bloke with the comedy moustache? If you are going to argue that this is all down to the failings of Jenkins and the old recruitment team, can you also name me a top team that hasn't wasted as much money and more as we did on those players in recent years? Look at Villa - they had to put their car park up for sale just to pay the wages, all thanks to the debt they got into buying players.
I agree that this approach of waiting until every player is out the door before investing in new ones is frustrating. In fact it's driving me up the wall. But I think the alternatives are worse.