Mikel Arteta has just signed a new contract at Arsenal that will keep him at the club until the summer of 2030.
The Spaniard finally delivered the Premier League title last season, ending the club’s 22-year wait. Arsene Wenger was the last manager to bring the big trophy to North London.
Since then, there have been plenty of comparisons between the legacy of the two managers, one who is already a club legend and another who is on the right track to get there in the coming years.
Both Wenger and Arteta have won the Premier League with Arsenal, but if we are going to compare what the two have achieved, we also have to look at the conditions they were working in – on and off the pitch.
Mikel Arteta and Arsene Wenger
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Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal were completely different to Mikel Arteta’s Gunners
The ownership, money in the game, people at Arsenal and the club’s own finances are night and day if you compare Wenger’s sides to what Mikel Arteta has at the Emirates Stadium right now.
All of those factors need to be taken into consideration when we compare the two managers and their respective legacies.
Wenger had to work with a very different Arsenal, with the biggest difference being at boardroom level. For a large part of his tenure, the Gunners were dealing with the battle between Stan Kroenke and Alisher Usmanov for control of the club.
At the same time, Arsenal were still dealing with the financial consequences of moving from Highbury to the Emirates. The stadium was a huge positive and a step in the right direction, but it also meant that Arsenal had to be extremely careful with their spending.
Wenger was thus often forced to build teams without the transfer budget that other big clubs had. He even had to sell his most important players season after season to balance the books.
The likes of Thierry Henry, Cesc Fabregas, Robin van Persie, Samir Nasri and Emmanuel Adebayor all left, not just for their own ambitions but also because Arsenal needed money from sales.
Arteta does not have those constraints at Arsenal. He hasn’t had to do anything like that since he took charge of the club in December 2019.
Since the Kroenkes took full control of Arsenal, there is a much clearer structure at the top. There is no ownership battle going on behind the scenes, and everyone running the club is working towards the same goal. That has given Arteta a level of stability Wenger did not always have.
Arsene Wenger barely had money to spend but Mikel Arteta has been backed heavily
The transfer market is another area where the two managers cannot really be compared without looking at the numbers.
Arteta has been given a huge amount of money to rebuild Arsenal’s squad since taking over in 2019. The North Londoners have spent over £1.1 billion on transfers in that period, with a net spend of around £780 million. (Planet Football)
That has allowed Arsenal to go out and buy players for enormous fees. Declan Rice alone cost more than £100 million, while other major signings like Kai Havertz, Eberechi Eze and Viktor Gyokeres all cost a fortune as well.
Wenger simply did not have that kind of money available to him for most of his Arsenal career. The legendary Frenchman’s total net spend over his 22 years at the club was around £260 million (The Sun).
What’s even more striking is what happened between 1996 and 2013. During that period, when Chelsea and Manchester City were starting to spend money on a completely different level, Wenger’s net spend was just £26.6 million. (ESPN)
Yes, spending money does not automatically make you a successful manager. Arteta still had to get those signings right and build a team capable of winning the league. He has done that magnificently over the years.
However, there is no point pretending that he has had the same financial restrictions as Wenger did.
Mikel Arteta has a whole team backing him but Arsene Wenger did most things alone
Wenger was basically responsible for almost everything at Arsenal. From scouting players and negotiating their contracts to the academy, training ground matters and medical departments among others, they all fell under his watch.
Football has changed massively since Wenger first arrived at Arsenal, and managers today have all the help they need, with big teams managing every area of the club. Arteta has clearly benefitted in that regard.
There is a sporting director in Andrea Berta to deal with recruitment and contracts, while there are several analysts in charge of data and scouting. The day-to-day running of the club is not solely down to Arteta at all. That has helped him focus much more on what happens on the pitch.
To add to that, Arteta also walked into an Arsenal with much better facilities than the one Wenger inherited. The Emirates Stadium and London Colney both had to be developed during the Frenchman’s time.
Arteta therefore did not have to spend years helping the club build its basic infrastructure. He could focus on improving the squad and getting Arsenal back to the top, which he has done wonderfully.
So how should we judge Mikel Arteta against Arsene Wenger?
Let us make one thing perfectly clear: We are not diminishing any of Arteta’s achievements. What the Spaniard has done since taking charge of the club is nothing short of phenomenal, and he deserves all the praise in the world.
But people must remember how different the conditions have been. Arteta has had a much bigger transfer budget, a united ownership structure, and a significantly bigger team of specialists around him.
Wenger, on the other hand, had to deal with the stadium debt, the ownership battle and a much smaller transfer budget while still trying to keep Arsenal competing with clubs that had started spending ridiculous amounts of money.
That doesn’t mean Wenger was better simply because he had fewer resources, but it does mean that trophy numbers alone do not tell us the whole story. Even if Arteta wins five more Premier League titles, it doesn’t guarantee that his legacy will be bigger.
However, as several fans have opined on TalkingPoints, if the Arsenal boss manages to add a Champions League title, which is something Wenger never managed to do, there is a definite conversation to be had about who the club’s greatest ever manager is.
Arteta now has a settled squad with incredible depth, and many of his players are entering the prime years of their careers. With the new contract tying him down until 2030, he is in the perfect place to go and win that European crown.
That is ultimately what will decide how his Arsenal legacy compares with Wenger’s.
Winning one Premier League title was a huge moment, and adding a few more would be incredible. But with the resources Arteta now has at his disposal, Arsenal should be aiming for much more, especially on the continental stage.