Chapter 402: Chapter 88: King of Iduna! The Opportunity for Arsenal’s Rise! Battle Atletico Madrid, Seize the Opening! Wang Shuo’s First Long Shot

The morning of the 19th, London North Suburb Colney Training Base.

Lately, Wenger had been arriving at work earlier than usual.

This was especially true after the disastrous 1-4 away loss to Barcelona in the Champions League on the 6th.

The first thing he did every day upon arriving at the training base was read the newspapers.

In the United Kingdom, almost everyone in the football media has their own particular stance.

As the team’s head coach, understanding these stances allowed him to pick up on subtle clues in their reports and commentary, and in doing so, gather more intelligence and information.

For example, there was that heavy-set fellow from the Daily Mail, Martin Samuel. He was originally with The Times before the Daily Mail poached him with an annual salary of 250,000 British Pounds. He had always been in Chelsea’s corner.

He had a great relationship with the likes of Terry and Lampard and knew many of the secrets from inside the Chelsea locker room.

Martin Samuel’s arch-nemesis, Henry Winter, the top columnist for the Daily Telegraph, was a staunch Liverpool fan. He was a die-hard supporter of Gerrard and was incredibly close with Dalglish.

That was why, whenever the England media hyped up the debate about the national team’s midfield duo—Gerrard and Lampard—Martin Samuel and Henry Winter would argue incessantly.

Then there was Alan Hansen, a contracted commentator for the Daily Telegraph, who was also a die-hard Liverpool supporter.

Sean Costis, a portly commentator for the Sun Newspaper, was Ferdinand’s number one stooge. When Ferdinand missed his drug test years ago, Costis was the one who jumped to his vociferous defense.

Sean Costis had an older brother, Neil Costis, who was also a commentator for the Sun Newspaper.

The two brothers were both from Newcastle and had an excellent relationship with the Magpies.

Not all media outlets were so well-connected, however.

Take the Manchester Evening News, for example.

The local paper’s relationship with Manchester United was mediocre at best, particularly with head coach Ferguson.

It mainly stemmed from the whole affair with Beckham back in the day.

’Wenger might question that old bastard Ferguson’s coaching ability, but when it came to his off-field network and resources—especially in football and media circles—the man’s influence was undeniable.’

’One word: Impressed!’

Major papers like The Times also had plenty of commentators on their payroll. Evans was a die-hard Red Army fan, but his relationship with Liverpool had grown strained due to the club’s acquisition by Americans.

He was on great terms with Benitez, however, and had even helped him curse Ferguson, calling him part of the English mafia!

A sentiment with which Wenger wholeheartedly agreed.

’That old son of a bitch Ferguson *is* part of the mafia!’

Every media outlet, and even every journalist, had their own network of contacts, allegiances, and channels.

They often had a web of intricate connections to the clubs.

Take the simplest example.

If Wenger wanted to poach a certain player from Newcastle but wasn’t sure if the club was willing to sell, what should he do?

The answer was to grant an exclusive interview to the two brothers, Neil and Sean Costis.

From them, Wenger could get intelligence about Newcastle.

Of course, you couldn’t just blindly trust a single source of intelligence, so it was crucial to cross-reference information from multiple, different channels.

But that was another matter entirely.

Different media outlets had different stances, and thus, said different things.

After the 1-4 thrashing away at Barça, by early April, Arsenal had already been knocked out of the running for every trophy except the Premier League—and in utterly humiliating fashion.

In the League Cup, Arsenal suffered a crushing 0-3 defeat to Manchester City.

In the fourth round of the FA Cup, they lost 1-3 away to Stoke City.

And now, in the Champions League quarter-finals, they drew 2-2 at home only to be thrashed 1-4 away by Barça.

Even in the Premier League, after 33 matches, Arsenal was only in 3rd place, trailing leaders Chelsea by 3 points and second-place Manchester United by 1 point.

With a string of tough matches ahead, the situation didn’t look particularly optimistic.

Regarding the team’s current situation, Wenger had said something at the post-match press conference in Barcelona.

"Currently, there are no exciting players on the transfer market in the European Football Scene. We will not spend over 50 million British Pounds on a transfer fee. That does not align with our business philosophy at Arsenal." 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝐰𝚎𝕓𝐧𝚘𝘃𝗲𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝕞

What Wenger had meant by this was that there were currently no players in the European Football Scene worthy of Arsenal spending 50 million British Pounds on.

But once the quote got out, it was interpreted in starkly different ways.

For example, some media outlets accused Wenger of being cheap, saying he was simply unwilling to spend over 50 million British Pounds on a transfer.

Others said Wenger was just pleading poverty to the board.

Some even said that Wenger was just a penny-pincher. Arsenal clearly had plenty of money in the bank, so why wasn’t he signing anyone?

Wenger had long grown accustomed to this sort of thing.

What was frightening, however, was that many players within Arsenal were starting to think the same way.

Fabregas, for example.

The Arsenal captain had long been linked with a move to Barça.

With Arsenal’s crushing defeat to Barça, the media in Catalonia once again fanned the flames, arguing that Fabregas would never achieve anything at Arsenal and should quickly return to a Barça team that was at the height of its powers.

The player hadn’t explicitly stated his thoughts, but he kept sending signals that he found Arsenal’s unambitious team-building strategy increasingly hard to accept.

The long trophy drought was causing morale inside Arsenal to crumble.

And that kind of crumbling morale could be fatal during the critical final push for a championship.

At this thought, Wenger let out a resigned sigh.

’The winner is crowned king, the loser is branded a villain.’

’Why was he always at odds with Ferguson?’

’Because it was Ferguson who had crushed Arsenal’s chance to rise to dominance!’