One of the things you can be sure of with regards to Arsene Wenger is that he knows a lot more about football than you do, a lot more about football than any pundits or journalists know, and in fact a lot more about football than most people on the planet know.

Why then can’t he win the league as he did three times in his early years at the club, and come to that, what is he going to do about it?

It is obvious to everyone that football now is not the same as when Arsenal and Man U formed a comfortable duopoly at the top of the league and Arsenal got their two doubles and the unbeaten season.

Arsenal achieved that position by having an astute manager, with an incredible knowledge of the players of Europe, and available cash, plus a reputation. While Arsenal have never had the income that Manchester United have generated from the world wide marketing business they developed from the 1960s onwards (a time when Arsenal were looking inwards and wondering where it had all gone so wrong), Arsenal have made up for that by astute buys, and the development of a world class scouting system.

Now life has changed. Arsenal still earn the most of any British club from match day income, just as they did way back in Herbert Chapman’s day, and they do well out of TV revenue of course, but in one area they lack behind.

Certain aspects of club spending are free from FFP restrictions – such as building new youth facilities and a new stadium. But Arsenal don’t have an owner who will simply put his hands in his pocket and come out with a blank cheque.

While Arsenal have had to pay for their own stadium, and the redevelopment of their youth facilities, Manchester City, Chelsea, and even West Ham have stadium benefactors in the shape of 10% of the world’s gas supplies, a Russian oligarch, and the British government. Man U have already built and paid for their stadium long ago so likewise they have no problem.

As a result these teams with their benefactors should be top of the league – after all they have all the money and don’t have to pay for the odds and ends like stadium building.

And yes, Chelsea are top. But Man City, and Man U, both able to choose the best manager in the world, are still not there at the very top, despite the phenomenal net worth of their owners and their willingness to spend it.

This suggests to me that neither spending money on players nor bringing in a new manager is always the right answer. Especially if we look at Man U where they are now on their third attempt to get the manager bit right, and are in a position where playing in the Champions League is still not a certainty.

So here’s a thought to cast fear into the soul of each and every pundit and blog scribbler. Maybe there is no magic formula. Maybe it is not the case that if Arsenal did what bloggers the world over find utterly obvious and self-evident, they would win the league.

Certainly there is massive evidence to suggest that the vast majority of big money transfers don’t make much of an impact in year 1. In fact about a quarter of them never make the impact expected and are sold as failures three or four years on.

And certainly the world has changed a lot since the days when Arsenal were able to pick up Bergkamp, Henry, Ljunberg and Pires for quite reasonable, indeed in some cases modest fees. (Bergkamp remember came to Arsenal as the laughing stock of Italy – the press even had a weekly feature showing a player making a total hash of a shot or a clearance, and called it “Bergkamp of the week”.)

The fact that there are six clubs in England sniffing around every possible transfer makes it harder and harder to pull off the masterstroke, and maybe rather than bemoaning Arsenal’s lack of signings we ought to marvel at the fact we got Bellerin, Koscielny, Coquelin, Holding, Ospina and Iwobi for nothing or next to nothing.

On top of that let us remember that around 50% of big money transfers make good in their second seasons. Remember Pires – and come to that Henry – they both had poor starts in their time at Arsenal. Pires took a whole season to become a top player, Henry well over half a season. Bergkamp certainly didn’t shine too much in season one either.

On that basis the form of this season’s signings will have little to do with next season’s performances. Perez, Elneny, Mustafi, Xhaka, and yes Holding too, could all shine very brightly indeed next season. On that basis it is not who you sign this summer that counts, but who you signed last summer.

Then there is pure luck. Luck with the ball that hits the bar and goes in, or out. Luck with injuries. Luck with meeting a good team when they are having a bad day. Put a few good wins together, even if they are lucky wins, and the players believe that bit more in themselves.

And there is the refereeing. Yes there are some people who still snigger when anyone suggests there is something very strange going on with Premier League refereeing, but the stats are now out there, and whereas two years ago you would never have seen a national newspaper suggest that referees are “inconsistent” to use the current euphemism, now you’ll get a couple of articles a month. The Barcelona v PSG game certainly raised a lot of eyebrows that are not normally raised, and although it was possible to pass that game off as one that didn’t count (because the ref was foreign), it converted a few more significant voices into the group that is looking at the statistics and shaking heads in wonderment.

My point is that the classic methods of turning round a club that is not winning the league as often as fans would like, no longer exist. Everyone is scouting all the players, and the horrible fact is that only 25% make an impact in the first year. Likewise the old notion of changing tactics is much less powerful than it was, as everyone can order up the videos.

Changing managers doesn’t really help too much – all three trophy winners of last season have changed managers, but with no consistent effect.

I think what clubs really need is someone who can pull a rabbit out of a hat and who has luck and the crowd on his side. Arsenal are sadly lacking in the final notion, and that might well be their downfall as potential signings look at the crowd and think “I don’t fancy that”.

But they do have a manager who is already rather good with tricks involving head coverings and cute furry creatures with long ears. Maybe in the end that is all you need.