Major shareholder in Arsenal, Stan Kroenke, has made it clear that he wants manager Arsene Wenger to stay at the club beyond 2014.
The Frenchmas has been at the North London club for 17 years, but has not won a trophy since 2005. There has been talks about him stepping down, especially since his current deal runs out next year, but Kroenke in a rare interview pledged his support for Wenger.
The American told the Daily Telegraph: “There’s no-one I feel more strongly about and I think he is doing a great job.
“We have been very supportive, we have never wavered, we are proud of him, proud of the club, the way the club is run and how it holds itself out to the world.
“Arsene knows how we feel, what our philosophy is, what we want to do and I feel like we are totally aligned.
“I think he wants to do it the exact same way as we do.”
He also stated that funds will always be made available for Wenger to strengthen his squad, but rejected the idea that he could influence how the manager works.
“I really enjoy Arsene – very smart, very intelligent. He has an absolute view on how he runs that team and the club. He has earned that right,” he continued.
“Don’t look for me to interfere with that. I have learnt over the years that sometimes owners try do that and it is not so good.
“We’ve always said that there are resources available. There are guys who say that we should push Arsene harder to spend. That’s fair enough – there are always lots of opinions but Arsene is an independent thinker and planner.
“He works very hard at it and has a wonderful record. He was trained in economics, my undergraduate study was in economics.”
Kroenke also spoke about Arsenal’s chase for Luis Suarez in the summer and explained that Liverpool were never interested in selling the Uruguayan.
“Look, Arsene (Wenger) had a view, our team had a view, they had a view and their view was: he wasn’t going anywhere,” Kroenke said.
“I never saw them waver from it. I guess at some level there is a number that gets anybody out of anywhere but there was nothing within the realm of what we knew about that could have got him out of there.”
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