Gazidis adjusts to life after MLS

Ivan Gazidis has been on the job as the chief executive of Arsenal FC in north London for about seven weeks, but he already has his terminologies straight.

"It's like driving on the left-hand side and the right-hand side of the road," Gazidis said in a telephone interview Monday afternoon. "Depending on where I am, I can just shift my brain over. I've used the word football over here and I think I almost haven't slipped up."

That's not to say it's been a seamless transition for Gazidis, the former deputy commissioner of Major League Soccer. Born in South Africa and raised in England, Gazidis spent 15 years in the United States. His wife and two sons are American and he, too, feels a strong bond to the U.S.

"After 15 years, I feel at least a significant part of me is American," he said. "My family is an American family and if you ask me where home is I feel that the U.S. is still at least half my home."

Gazidis said his sons grew up as MLS fans and he often took them to watch the New York Red Bulls at Giants Stadium. They have quickly transformed into Arsenal fans, not a surprise according to their father.

"It's not a difficult club to fall in love with," he said.

His home is in St. John's Wood and his office overlooks Highbury, next to the state-of-the-art Emirates Stadium. Gazidis said he is still in the "initial assimilation phase" of his job, but he already has noticed a major difference -- game day.

"It's very different being a league executive and being neutral and being a team executive and living with every bounce of the ball," Gazidis said. "The entire focus of the whole week, not only of the club, but of the public, the country, the media, is on the upcoming game. It's a very dramatic feeling."

Gazidis is also quick to point out that while Major League Soccer's product on the field is not yet the level of the Premiership, that's not the case on the business side.

"We tend to fall into the trap within soccer thinking that everything that happens in Europe is bigger and better and more advanced," Gazidis said. "On the business side, I think MLS is every bit as sophisticated a business as any that exists in the world of soccer."

Gazidis believes having that background as a U.S. sports executive has helped him in his current position.

"I bring a fresh perspective on things because I come from outside the English game," he said. "I think in some ways that enables me to be a little fresher in some of the ideas I may have. I also believe that MLS is superbly run organization with great leadership, very professional top-class people and sometimes we underestimate that."

Gazidis has already opened some eyes with his comments comparing the English Premier League to the "Wild West."

"What I said is in the States we have a system in sports leagues with salary caps and drafts and no promotion and relegation that's very highly regulated and, as a business model, makes a lot of sense in the U.S. environment," Gazidis said. "Over here, without salary caps and with promotion and relegation, if you're looking for the Wild West, you look East. It wasn't meant as an indictment. It's that feeling you have of operating without a safety net."

Gazidis' main concern now is that of Arsenal FC, but he is not completely divorced from Major League Soccer. He was the person who helped broker the deal that brought David Beckham to the United States and he is keenly watching the on-again, off-again transfer to AC Milan.

"I think it's interesting when MLS signed David Beckham everyone was saying it was because he had nothing left to contribute," Gazidis said. "Now we have the English national team and AC Milan, one of the world's great teams, who would love to have his services. I guess MLS just cannot win."

But, as Gazidis quickly pointed out, MLS has survived with and without Beckham, and will continue to do so.

"MLS is not the David Beckham league," he said. "Its success has been built through slow and steady growth of a strong and committed investor group over a long period of time. Whatever the resolution is of the David Beckham situation, and right now it looks like he's coming back to the States, the fundamentals of the league remain the same -- very strong with great prospects."