Credit: David Price/Arsenal FC/Getty Images

News

HomeNewsArsenalEnglish Premier LeagueFootball Finance

Arsenal chief Josh Kroenke proves how ruthless he is as KSE double firing confirmed

Adam Williams

Tue 15 April 2025 13:15, UK Updated Tue 15 April 2025 15:26, UK

As the heir to a £30bn fortune and a member of the top brass of three of the world’s biggest teams, Arsenal co-chair Josh Kroenke can stake a claim to be one sport’s most powerful people.

In 2013, Stan Kroenke appointed a fresh-faced Josh Kroenke to the Arsenal board.

The intervening 12 years have encompassed the Kroenkes’ full takeover of the club, the rolling out of era-defining financial fair play rules, a fall and rise on the pitch, and the European Super League breakaway.

Josh Kroenke has had a hand in each – and his influence in the Premier League grows every season.

Make no mistake, his father is still the ultimate decision maker and will have the final say in matters such as the potential expansion of the Emirates Stadium.

But Kroenke senior is now 77 years old and, while he is showing no signs of slowing down, there is clearly a degree of succession planning taking place.

It was Josh Kroenke, for instance, who was instrumental in the appointment of Mikel Arteta in 2019 and, more importantly, the continued faith in the Spaniard when things weren’t going to plan.

Reportedly, it was also Josh who led the search for a new director of football following Edu Gaspar’s decision to quit late last year, which has culminated in Andrea Berta being handed the reins.

And when the Gunners need a public spokesperson, its Josh Kroenke’s lanky frame which more often than not lumbers into the press room. ‘Silent Stan’, in recent times, has lived up to his moniker.

As a result, its the 44-year-old American who absorbs the lion’s share of fans frustrations too.

In January, a mural of the co-chair outside the Emirates – yes, really – was daubed with graffiti. “Time to splash the cash, Josh,” it read, with Arsenal’s failure to sign a goalscorer still fresh in the minds.

Equally, Josh will probably get more of the credit if the Gunners end their wait for a Premier League title next season, or perhaps even for a first ever Champions League triumph in 2024-25.

Position	Team	Played MP	Won W	Drawn D	Lost L	For GF	Against GA	Diff GD	Points Pts
1	LiverpoolLiverpool	32	23	7	2	74	31	43	76
2	ArsenalArsenal	32	17	12	3	57	27	30	63

If they do, it will have been a slow-burn approach. Think Liverpool under FSG, who only started to reap the rewards of their forensic, even-handed philosophy a decade into the Boston-based owners’ reign.

But that’s a lot of ifs and buts, and there are big decision to be made before the summer when it comes to giving Arteta and Berta a budget that will allow them to compete.

At the moment, however, there is no doubt where most of Josh Kroenke’s time and energy is being spent.

• READ MORE: Theo Walcott thinks he knows who Arsenal’s next manager could be after Mikel Arteta

Josh Kroenke fires Denver Nuggets bosses, Arsenal chief’s comments speak volumes

Kroenke Sports & Entertainment (KSE) don’t make any money from Arsenal. In fact, since KSE moved to 100 per cent control of the club in 2018, it has lost almost £260m.

Most of that gap has been plugged by interest-free loans to the club from the ownership, which totalled £324m as per the club’s last set of accounts.

Incidentally, Arsenal could soon incur an interest charge on that debt for PSR purposes because of Manchester City’s challenge to the Premier League rules that govern associated party transactions.

Anyway, the Kroenkes are able to afford that £324m thanks to the rest of their extraordinary sports and real estate portfolio, which is distinctly more profitable than their outpost in North London.

KSE own franchises in the NFL, NHL, MLS and NBA, all of which – unlike in football finance – have mechanisms in place that virtually guarantee big profits every season.

The basketball arm of their operation, the Denver Nuggets, won the NBA title for the first time in 2023, generating a tidy profit of around £40m in the process.

But head coach Michael Malone clearly did not have enough credit in the bank from that triumph. He has been sacked by vice chairman Josh Kroenke despite the Nuggets having qualified for the play-offs.

In a double firing that has been greeted with shock in the United States, Nuggets general manager Calvin Booth has also been given the boot. The news has not gone down well with fans.

Josh Kroenke has revealed that the plan to remove the two men – who had racked up nearly two decades of service at the team collectively – has been in the pipeline for months.

“This wasn’t a decision that was taken lightly or in a reactionary fashion to anything specific,” he told the Nuggets’ media team, in a window into his thought process that will interest Arsenal fans.

“Having observed our group over a very long period of time, what I would say is that there were certain trends that were very worrisome but which would get masked by a few wins here and there.

“In the world of professional sports when winning and losing is your currency, winning can mask a lot of things.

“We went on an eight-game win streak right before the All-Star break, but since then we are 11 [defeats] in 14 and we have lost our last four.

“We’re trending in a direction that would be a very near end to our season in the near future. All that taken into consideration, we wanted to figure out a way to squeeze out as much juice from the rest of the season as possible.

“I think that after talking with my father, we made the decision that we were going to be changing these roles at the end of the season.

“With that thinking in our minds, then your mind turns to the best decision for this group right now. From that point forward, I became comfortable with trying to shake this tree and squeezing as much from the season as we can.

“There is hope for a spark. There is more [to come] from this group than we have seen so far. How much more is there? I don’t know the answer to that – I don’t think anyone knows. But I have a belief that there is more that can be accomplished.”

Kroenke not afraid to make big player trading decisions

In a later press conference, Josh Kroenke responded to reports that the Nuggets were not open to trading forward Michael Porter Jr.

Again, his words could be emblematic of his philosophy in player trading as Arsenal approach a critical summer transfer window.

“I think that any kind of report saying that we’re not open to trading everybody possible to improve the team is completely false,” he told the media.

“The other thing I’ll say is … I’m not going to be green-lighting any trades around here when I don’t see complete organizational cohesion and we’re not maximizing the group we got.”

• READ MORE: Ian Wright reckons William Saliba has told Mikel Arteta to sign £60m player now

Revealed: How much Arsenal have spent on agents

Another item high on the Kroenke agenda at the moment is the imminent introduction of an independent regulator for English football.

Arsenal’s owners are no fans of the proposed body, which would have powers to oversee talks between the Premier League and EFL over new financial rules and block stadium moves or breakaway leagues.

Late last year, they sent Arsenal vice-chair Tim Lewis on a round of media appearances to argue the case for a lighter-touch regulator.

In those interview, Lewis said he would like to see the regulator have some influence over agents’ fees.

As it happens, the FA have just published club-by-club breakdown of agents’ fees for 2024-25. Staggeringly, Premier League clubs have paid intermediaries over £400m over the season.

Five teams spent more than Arsenal, whose £23m outlay was about what you’d expect relative to the amount they spent in the summer and January transfer windows.

But the figures across the Premier League make it easy to see why Lewis and the Kroenkes are concerned about the agent industry in general.