Arsenal chief executive Ivan Gazidis has insisted that the club’s financial model does not depend on being in the Champions League. The club made £26m from reaching the Round of 16 last year and has been in the competition for 14 consecutive seasons, but a poor start this season makes qualification next year less certain.
Arsenal chief executive Ivan Gazidis has insisted that the club’s financial model does not depend on being in the Champions League. The club made £26m from reaching the Round of 16 last year and has been in the competition for 14 consecutive seasons, but a poor start this season makes qualification next year less certain.
He told the Leaders in Football Conference, ‘We would rather qualify for it but we have a really sustainable model that can cope. Not just cope, but we can do well and compete. It would be very foolish to build a business model that relied on being in the Champions League for perpetuity and I don’t think any clubs do that, and if they do, they are probably not being run as responsibly as they should be.’
Gazidis also said that the Gunners would be able to compete with Chelsea and the two Manchester clubs in terms of player wages. He denied that Arsenal had a salary ceiling saying ‘I don’t know where that story comes from.’ Well, it has been circulating for a long time before this denial.