Arsenal chief: We may be next for Middle East buy-out

Peter Hill-Wood has admitted that Arsenal could be a target for the Middle East invasion of the Premier League.

Arsenal were on the list of Abu Dhabi-based Dr Sulaiman al Fahim before he opted to invest £210million in the takeover of Manchester City.

But other financially-powerful Middle East families like the Makhtoums are keen to move into English football and Arsenal will once again be examined.

The Arsenal chairman said: "If somebody came and made a really huge bid then you cannot recommend shareholders turn it down because we don't like it.

"We want the club the stay in its current ownership and, of course, you have some concern that someone will try to buy the club.

"The directors don't want to sell but we are a public company. It depends on the price."

The Arsenal board have agreed on a lock-down arrangement until 2012 - largely to fend off interest from Uzbek billionaire Alisher Usmanov's Red and White Holdings company.

Arsenal is currently valued in excess of £300million with shares being traded at £8,200 each.

But the board know that if there was an opportunity for the numerous small shareholders to make a huge profit they would be likely to sell.

Hill-Wood (below) acknowledges that Arsenal are an attractive proposition.

They have been able to move to the £350m Emirates Stadium and the financial plan has been so diligently constructed that not only are Arsenal able to service their loan to build the project but, as chief shareholder Danny Fiszman revealed recently, manager Arsene Wenger has up to £30m at his disposal to spend on new players.

Wenger opted not to use that fund this summer after failing to agree a fee with Liverpool for Xabi Alonso.

Many fans were puzzled by the lack of activity. But Hill-Wood stressed the need to keep faith with Wenger and his policies. "They have been very, very successful so far," he said.

"Arsene doesn't spend for the sake of it. He is very careful. He won't bring a player in if he cannot improve the squad.

"And he believes he has the squad at the moment to challenge for honours this season.

"Samir Nasri has been an excellent signing and Mikael Silvestre will give us experience. And we have players like Abou Diaby and Tomas Rosicky to come back from injury."