Arsene Wenger intimated that Arsenal would be prepared to change their transfer policy, while admitting a £40 million signing is a very real possibility.
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Wenger has come in for plenty of criticism for his lack of transfer activity in recent years, and many feel he and the Arsenal board are more concerned with financial prosperity than they are with achieving results on the pitch.
However, reports claim Wenger has a £70 million transfer budget, and the Frenchman suggested he would be willing to spend a large chunk of that on a single player, if he felt the player in question would help the Gunners mount a sustained and legitimate challenge for trophies on all fronts.
"We can do it and if we can afford it, we will not say no," he said.
"I am not reluctant to spend and if we find tomorrow a player of top, top, top quality, we will take him.
"First of all, we only had money recently (after Emirates Stadium move). Secondly, in England there is a way of thinking that every problem is sorted out just by spending money but that's not always the case. If it was like that, the same teams would win the Champions League every year.
"I believe that the problem today is not the money, it's to find the talent that strengthens your team. We went out to spend money at Christmas but we didn't find the players."
Wenger also admitted he sympathises with Arsenal's supporters in the face of ever-increasing ticket prices at the Emirates, this despite the lack of success on the pitch, while suggesting that the main reason the Gunners' standards have fallen is their inability to keep hold of their best players.
"I think what angered more our fans is that we lost the players we educated and that was difficult to swallow," he added.
"That is what we have to change and we are in a position to do that now.
"There were many major issues we were fighting to keep our best players. You can only keep your best players by paying the wages of the market. To pay the wages of the market we have to put the ticket prices up and then the fans turn against you, but that was the consequence of the unfair competition that we faced."
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