Arsenal technical director Edu was presenting to the club’s owners this week. He laid out plans to reorganise the club’s worldwide scouting and recruitment operation and compete for the best young talents, as Arsene Wenger and his chief scout Steve Rowley did, in what now seems a different universe.
The problem is money. When former chief executive Ivan Gazidis spoke in 2013 of Arsenal becoming a spending power like Bayern Munich, the club were in the midst of a 19-season run in the Champions League.
But as the directors congratulated themselves on what a good job they were doing, Arsenal subsided into the second tier of clubs.