Arsenal's poor player trading record has hurt them financially

Following Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang’s move to Barcelona, questions have again been asked about Arsenal’s recruitment policy, as the club has once more left a lot of money on the table after the free transfer of an expensive purchase.    The authoritative Swiss Ramble provides an interesting analysis.

Looking at players that Arsenal have sold in the last 5 years (2017/18 to 2021/22), we can see that the club has lost £163m (in cash terms) in this period with £136m of that coming from just three acquisitions: Aubameyang £57m, Mesut Ozil £42m and Shkodran Mustafi £37m.   In this period Arsenal have rarely made big money on any transfers with only 3 deals generating gains above £20m.

Some of the players recruited are still at the club, which means that the club have over £500m of transfer cost in their squad, including Nicolas Pépé £72m, Alexandre Lacazette £48m and Granit Xhaka £41m. Realistically, it is unlikely that any of these will be sold for a profit.

The question is whether other clubs have fared better than Arsenal in player trading? This can be answered by looking at the rest of the Big Six.   In stark contrast to Arsenal, in the last five years Chelsea have made £199m of gains from player sales.

Liverpool have also managed to make good money from player sales with a £93m gain in the last 5 years, mainly due to the highly lucrative £110m sale of Philippe Coutinho to Barcelona, while Academy product Rhian Brewster also generated £23m.

Manchester City lost £132m from player sales in the last 5 years, though this highlights one of the issues with this analysis, as much is due to players giving some of the best years of their career to City, so having little residual value, e.g. David Silva, Yaya Touré and Sergio Aguero.

Manchester United have lost the most money of the Big Six from player sales in the last 5 years with £192m, though this includes £33m on Wayne Rooney, who provided great service.   Tottenham Hotspur lost £51m from player sales in the last five years, including losses above £20m on 3 players, namely Moussa Sissoko £28m, Erik Lamela £27m and Serge Aurier £23m.

So it is actually not that unusual for major clubs to lose money on player sales with only two of the Big Six managing to generate gains in the last 5 years, namely Chelsea £199m and Liverpool £93m. That said, Arsenal’s £163m loss was one of the largest, only surpassed by Manchester United £192m.

But here’s the thing: Arsenal can ill afford to lose so much money on player trading while others with similar losses can. United’s commercial revenue is much stronger than the Gunners, while City’s finances benefit from success on the pitch plus they have owners with deep pockets.

Football clubs do not buy/develop players purely to generate financial gains, but to help deliver improved performance and hopefully success on the pitch, so a more holistic view would be required to properly assess player recruitment.

Furthermore, from a financial perspective, some players sold at a loss will have still contributed to the club by helping to drive revenue growth, e.g. Champions League qualification, commercial income, broadcasting merit payments (prize money), etc.

In addition, it sometimes makes sense to offload players for free (or a low transfer fee), as it makes space in the wage bill, but it’s fair to say that the club’s poor record on player trading has still hurt Arsenal financially with consequences for the club’s ability to compete.