Arsene Wenger fears the huge wages being offered by
big-spending Chinese clubs could cause problems when the Premier League teams
look to negotiate new contracts with their star players.
Wenger is currently locked in talks with Arsenal duo
Mesut Ozil and Alexis Sanchez as the pair reportedly seek parity with the
best-paid players in the Premier League.
The Arsenal manager is hoping for successful resolutions
to those contract stand-offs, but he believes the money on offer in the China
Super League may persuade the Premier League’s star names to ask for even
bigger pay packets to stay in England.
Chelsea striker Diego Costa has been linked with a move
to China, with an offer of £600,000-per-week ($739,000) reportedly on the table
for the Spain international.
Two of his former Chelsea team-mates, Oscar and John Obi
Mikel, have already moved to Super League outfits, while former Manchester
United striker Carlos Tevez became the highest-earning player in the world when
he joined Shanghai Shenhua in December.
“That’s the danger, that the Chinese offers become the
benchmark for Europe,” Wenger said on Thursday when asked if the money on offer
in China could complicate negotiations with top players.
“You cannot compete with that but I still think that,
when you’re a footballer, the first thing is that you want to play against the
best players in the best teams.
“Of course it’s a worry but it happened in Europe
before. It also happens when you’re at a smaller club.
“Sometimes we had periods where we could not financially
compete with the bigger clubs who took our players away from us. It can happen
inside the country.”
Despite his fears, Wenger is confident most leading
players would want the prestige of playing Europe’s superpowers rather than
uproot for financial gains in the much less heralded Chinese league.
“My thought is that when you want to be a football
player, your first aspiration is to play in the best league, against the best
players,” he said.
“That has to be the first target, after that when you
are a professional football player you want to combine the fact you can play in
the best league, against the best players, for the maximum amount of money.
“I think that combination is the best in England at the
moment, so I don’t see why the players should leave the English Premier League.
“But China has moved forward, tries to promote football
and I’m happy that football becomes very popular in China, but I still think
most of the players, of the big players, will stay in Europe at the moment.”
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