The split among Arsenal’s main shareholders widened last night after Alisher Usmanov cast doubt on the club’s ability to deliver sufficient money for the team to challenge for honours.

Usmanov’s proposal to create fresh funds for transfers as well as to reduce the club’s debt, by issuing new shares, was rejected after a board meeting on Thursday. The decision was not a surprise but Usmanov, the Uzbek-born Russian billionaire who is the second-largest shareholder with 25 per cent, will use Arsenal’s failure to sign Felipe Melo, valued at about £20 million, as evidence of the club’s tight finances. The Brazil midfield player is set to join Juventus from Fiorentina.

Usmanov’s proposal was also aimed at gaining favour from supporters anxious after a fourth season without a trophy, with Champions League qualification no longer taken as read and with Arsène Wenger’s future as manager in question after his flirtation with Real Madrid and unhappiness with the boardroom struggles.

In addition, the club’s redevelopment of Highbury into flats has run into problems with the downturn in the property market and they must renegotiate a £133 million loan by April.

Arsenal’s shortage of money is, in part, a legacy of building the Emirates Stadium, which cost about £440 million. They borrowed £260 million, with the rest coming from sponsors and other contracts that were structured with most of the money being received early in the deals, leaving little coming in now.

Usmanov said that it was down to Arsenal to prove their numbers add up. “The board has informed us they are confident that they have adequate financial resources to support the manager to strengthen the squad, to weather the property downturn, to renegotiate the Highbury Square loan on good terms and to deal with the continuing difficult economic conditions,” read a statement from Usmanov’s company, Red and White Holdings. “We do not share their view, though are prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt for the moment.”

The club’s board considered raising £70 million, £100 million or £150 million by issuing new shares, and how it would use the money. Arsenal claim that the proposal was turned down because it would generate a one-off sum that might only allow them to sign a couple of players in an inflated transfer market and they believe they can cope with their debt repayments. The more pertinent reason is that the plan would require existing shareholders to take up their full allocation of new shares or face their stake being diluted when the process is completed.

In the case of Stan Kroenke, the largest shareholder with 28.3 per cent, it would have required the American to spend £20 million had they issued £70 million of shares.

Usmanov has claimed that he does not want to take over Arsenal, but whatever his strategy, he has few options save for symbolic gestures. He could call for an extraordinary general meeting and challenge Arsenal’s board to prove its figures or table a motion of no confidence, but neither action has much chance of success. He may attempt to gain fan support if the team begin badly next season.

The Russian is unhappy at not being appointed to the board, as Kroenke was last year, and suspects that the American may be receiving preferential treatment. Kroenke recently bought £90 million worth of shares from Danny Fiszman and the Carr family for which he has yet to pay.

As Robin van Persie signed a new long-term contract, off the pitch, Ivan Gazidis is undergoing an overhaul of departments that has been causing disquiet among staff. The chief executive wants to appoint five senior executives, one of whom will replace Adrian Ford, the commercial director, who will leave next month.

“We have built, not bought, a team,” Gazidis said of the club’s caution with transfers. “There’s a football graveyard of clubs that have not adhered to these principles and have unfortunately suffered the consequences.”