Patrick Vieira says his relationship with Arsene Wenger remains ‘really good’ and that he could turn to his former mentor, along with other managers he’s played under, for coaching advice.
The former France captain left Manchester City in January to take up the head coach role at MLS outfit New York City FC and hopes garnering experience Stateside will help him fulfil his ambition of one day managing a top European club.
“When I did my Pro Licence, I spent a week at Bayern Munich [watching Guardiola] and I have a really good relationship with him,” Vieira told The Times [paywalled].
“All the good coaches I’ve had, I have a really good relationship with. I’m in contact with Arsène, with [José] Mourinho. If I have something that I struggle with and I want someone with experience, I know I can pick up a phone and give them a call.
“No [I’ve not contacted them yet], because they’re really busy!” he added.
“When the season finishes I’m planning to go and see some of the coaches that I really like and spend a few days with them — if they want of course — and try to take something from them.
Asked if he might drop in on London Colney when the MLS season ends, he added: “I know Arsène really well so I may want to go to some people I don’t know and see something different.”
In a wide-ranging interview the 40-year-old also had some juicy lines about Arsenal not employing former players as coaches; a role most recently highlighted when Thierry Henry had a job offer with the under-18s withdrawn when he refused to give up his media work.
“I find it a little bit disappointing not having ex-Arsenal players working at Arsenal,” Vieira says.
“Players want to do it and not having the opportunity they feel disappointed. The perfect example is Ajax when you see all the old players working for the club. The door’s always open for them. That’s nice.
“Arsenal don’t do it and I don’t know the reason. Arsenal are the first team — with Manchester City of course — that I watch. I’m still a big fan of Arsenal.”
Arsene Wenger, Arsenal and ”something different” should never be used in the same sentence.
Disagree lol I think something along the lines of: Arsenal need something different from arsene Wenger
Viera becoming a great coach and coming back to manage us would be pretty special
viera as manager
henry as head coach
wow
Henry would never become a great coach take it from me.. He’s not made to be a coach or manager type he’s too immature and not willing to put in the work and doesn’t have the temperament or personality to be that type of leader a manager and there’s a lot he doesn’t know and he’s not willing to work at learning them. Viera might become a very good manager tho he seems like he’s on the right path although he too has a lot to learn..but he’ll get there.
Then he could give us three more summers of vieira to Real Madrid sagas… With him whining his way out of the club again… Yay
even if so still would be better than 13 years of humiliation and blaming media, transfer market, other clubs, bad luck, explayers and even fans for this repeated failures.
if he loved the club enough he’d have “tapped” Pep up for the Arsenal job whilst he was watching Bayern for those few days with him. Bloody oil money!!!
I read his excerpts with a calm tone.
You don’t know how spot on that comment is!
Well Mr Vieira, that’s because most of you are spoiled brats who don’t appreciate what this club has done for you and decided to bail when the club needed you the most. Being a footballer and being an employee are different things. Maybe if you respected your boss and did your job like 90% of the population do, maybe it will happen.
You all seem to be forgetting about how the majority of these players kicked up a fuss about transfers when they were still playing for us, Adams excluded. Why should they be automatically given jobs at the club when they wanted out in the first place?
Fuck sorry, I didn’t mean to hit reply!
And Tony Adams is currently working at Arsenal?
What exactly is your point?
You dont think its disappointing that we don’t have any of our ex-legends working at our club(football staff)
Im sure AJAX were disappointed that their greats like Bergkamp, Overmars, De Boer left to play for other clubs but it hasnt stopped them from employing them!!!!
Its like Arsene has blinded us for so long that we cant even see the truth. But its right there in front of us, we just need to open our eyes
Correct me if I’m wrong but wasn’t Pat Rice the captain in our double year in 71 and I believe he was replaced with Steve Bould.
Grimandi still works for the club, as does Boa Morte, and Freddie
And what an outstanding job Bould is doing!!! 😉
Henry was asked to be u18 coach. But he wanted to have his cake and eat it by also having his sky punditry role. These spoiled brats all seem to think they can get everything their own way.
Also, just because someone has been a good player, why would that automatically mean they have anything to contribute once their playing days are over? Totally different skill set required.
Apparently Charlie George leads the stadium tours…
I love Charles George. He made me a Gooner.
I wish he still played for us, even if he is 84. We might win something.
…I love Bananas as well.
Suggestion was Adams was offered a job and went for the cash. Same with Henry. I get the impression Artetta (who didn’t force an exit I might add) would have been welcome to stay too. I don’t buy this whole ‘no jobs for former players’ thing.
When Henry left, Wenger said at the time, Henry perhaps grew impatient about how long it would take for the young players to develop. These young players were Senderos, Djourou, Denilson, Clichy, Aliadiere and co. Boy! We were ambitious for the likes of Henry and Vieira to stay. At Barcelona, Henry was saying he could not play against Arsenal even though he was paid to destroy Arsenal on the field if he could. Every DNA in Henry has Arsenal printed on it.
@Eternal
I even remember one time he was injured for couple of weeks and he flew to London so he could watch Arsenal play instead of his team at the time Barcelona. I have never seen another player do something like that. he is a club legend. these kids probably forgot what he did at Arsenal. the fact that we sold these legends for huge amounts and didnt reinvest the money shows the very reason of the transfers.
yeah every one leaving this club is a cunt. the fact that we sold RVP or Adebayor or Nasri to direct rivals to earn even more money makes them the cuntest of cunts. Henry and Viera dont even deserve tiniest respect from you the biggest fan of the club who have contributed so much to Arsenal. spoiled brats. hail you Wizardly, you are indeed an Arsenal legend.
There’s some similarity between these quotes of Vieira’s and most of Tony Adams’, almost always when Wenger’s position was under threat. Although it would be awesome to have someone of Vieira’s stature as a coach / manager, I don’t think he’s done enough to be considered for the position of Arsenal manager. On a different note, if Wenger leaves (sacked immediately as a few supporters would have it or at the end of the season) what are the alternate options for us?
There is no question of him being sacked or he leaves voluntarily, the average fan of the club remains behind him, the boards knows his value and knows the quality of work he provides, and has their 100% support. the boss is here to stay despite the keyboard worriers constant whinging about transfers or lack league silverware in recent years.
So your saying the rest of us are a below average fan then because we don’t agree with your simplistic theory?
Oh and the board that you talk about, do they appreciate the value you bring to the club? I say you and not us because the rest of us are clearly below average fans eh?
Enjoy that ‘blame the fans’ bandwagon won’t you and try not to fall flat on your face when you eventually fall off it.
I don’t know or necessarily agree with Fletcher, but ‘average’ in the context he refers to (and pretty much every use in terms of ‘average fan’) is statistical. Assuming the people who aren’t the ‘average fan’ Fletcher talks about as being ‘below average’ is a nonsensical. They are the outliers, not below (or above) average.
I know it’s semantics, but replies like this make all of us Arsenal fans seem like idiots.
If I misunderstood the context of what was said then that’s one thing and I’m adult enough to hold my hands up if that’s the case.
However how does not make me an idiot?
I suspect you wouldn’t say that If I was standing in front of you but your quite happy to do so from behind the comfort of your keyboard. Jog on you twerp.
I’m assuming the thread is too long to reply to ‘Gooner Ribz’, but you’re kind of proving my point – by arguing against something from a nonsensical standpoint makes US (as in fans in general) ‘seem’ like idiots, bickering and infighting.
As for your thinly veiled threat, you’re doing it from the comfort of you keyboard too?
Fletcher , it’s people like you that have held the club back for ten years , if you got someone to do work round your house , charged the earth and fobbed you off when it wasn’t working, would you keep ringing them again and again, NO you’d find someone else.
Laters Arsene
The summer of 2005 when we sold Veiera was the start of our decline.
Not a coincidence really, is it?
If that was the only factor, you could make that case, but it clearly wasn’t.
It was the start of our decline and also a change in tactics from Arsene from being a physically stronger and faster team to a more technical smaller team.
Up till today im still baffled by it, if it aint broke why fix it
Apart from the fact that at the time the entire media was crucifying us for being “dirty” and bringing up all the nonsense about “x red cards since Wenger took over”. So we were pressured to change.
All the above of course totally ignoring the fact that United were allowed to kick 7 shades out of us when they played as were the likes of Blackburn , Bolton etc.
So we changed what worked to something that still hasnt worked all bcos of the media and what other ppl think.
Guess Arsene forgot to mention that the media influences him too 😉
I think the last thing that affects Wenger is media pressure
Not so much about Media pressure, more the fact that the officials kept giving our players red cards whether they deserved it or not. We lost games because we finished with 10 players and he wanted to stop that (which clearly didn’t work), whilst hoping we’d win a few against 10 players instead. One of the reasons Paddy left was because he got fed up serving suspensions…
This is it! Where are our edu, Lauren, Ray parlour, wiltord? Instead we have Walcott,jenkinson,Ramsey, ox. See the difference?
All of those players had/have massive potential. not a super club in the world wouldn’t have taken a punt. I’d still back Wenger all day long to find a player capable of becoming a legend. But it’s hard to back any player to realise his potential with so many toxic fans with nothing better to do than rant about Wenger out. The only thing that’s going to change if you sack him is no more champions league.
The ‘start’ of the decline….not the only factor.
His transfer was the beginning of a seismic shift in both tactics and a more ‘uniform’ pay structure.
….and didn’t he win 3 titles after he left us? What was Wenger thinking?!? Ha!
It wasn’t the managers decision. The player had wanted to move for a few years but we managed to hold onto him. But that can only happen so many times.
I’m sure fans of Leeds, Nottingham Forest, Blackburn, Sheffield Wednesday, Aston Villa (to name a few) would laugh at your definition of ‘decline’ Maybe 2005 was the start of the increase in expectation of our fan base. The move to the new stadium was supposed to propel us to the very top. Hasn’t quite worked out that way, but at least it hasn’t fucked us over either.
Come on arseblog, moderate my comment. It’s really important!
With respect most if not all of those clubs you mention havebeen in the financial financial trouble. A position we are most definitely not in.
Financial issues related to either lack of performance on the pitch or flying too close to the sun and spending money they ain’t got. When Wenger leaves we will be in rude health financially – in the top 5 in the world as we speak. If that is his legacy, you’d need to be a tad ignorant not to appreciate it.
Top five in the world!!!! ? are you serious? I can think of five teams that will end up higher in the league than us – then there are the two madrids, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and juventus to name a few more that would ensure we aint even top ten in the world!!! You sir are deluded!!!
Unfortunately I was referring to our financial position ?
Yeah but what’s the point of being one of the richest clubs in the world if we’re not going to invest in the team?
Sorry Danny, I realised you were talking about the finances, not the team, after posting!!! But yagaru makes a good point about it being pointless us being in the top five richest clubs if we don’t use it to put the team into the top five worldwide!!!
Did I say anything about not appreciating what he has done?
I merely pointed out that the clubs you referred to are not really an appropriate comparison to the position Arsenal Football Club are in.
And I don’t really care where we are in the Forbes list of richest clubs. What motivates me is Arsenal Fc doing the best all they can to be the best that they can within their means.
IMO we continue not to do that.
Fair enough. I agree, if we get to September and haven’t signed a striker we’ve blown another season. However, I was just trying to put our decline into perspective. Yes we’ve declined on the pitch, but proportionately the club itself has grown exponentially. You could argue that Wenger has sacrificed success for the long term good of the club. As a fan that is pretty shite, but if it means there are glory years ahead then I’m sure we’ll all thank him for it.
I understand what your saying in that our structure puts us in good stead for the future. I guess my arguement is why that future does not start now or did not start 2-3 years ago because financially we are in a position to TRY and compete at the highest level now.
If we wait too long we will be left too far behind and it will end up costing us more in the long term to rectify it.
I’m pretty sure he didn’t want to be sold! Arsene wanted some money for him while he could still command a fee.
Getting rid of him and later Gilberto too early hurt the team but helped pay off the stadium and ‘didn’t kill Denilson’…
TobyC,
Why are you sure he didn’t want to be sold? Is it a personal view or do you have information?
If the former, that’s nice but not of any real value.
I’m pretty certain he did want to move. He’d regularly complained about being ‘picked on’ by the officials and how much he hated watching whilst he was suspended. Also his agent had been wrangling for either a move of a big pay rise, for a few years.
You are confusing correlation with causality.
our decline started with Kroenke and Emirates deal.
The answer to why ex players are not given any chance at arsenal is simple, there can only be one boss at arsenal and only one person with an opinion of arsenal, not the fans who have been brainwashed by the media according to wenger and most definitely not an ex player who feels because he played for the club he should have something to say
Wenger surrounds himself with yes men, and the club have given him too much control. Hence, we have problems.
Steve Bould and Freddie both work at the club. Liam Brady works at the club. Henry himself recently left to focus on being a pundit. Adams was offered a job but turned it down. Arterta was offered a job but turned it down. It’s all a load of bollocks really.
Bobby pires is a coach at arsenal. The under 18’s coach Kwame ampadu is a former player ( and youth product). That means at least four ex players on the coaching team.
Most of our overseas scouts are former players.
I’m not 100% but wouldn’t be surprised if we employ more former players than most other PL teams.
Wenger does not like big characters or people who will question him. Notice the trend throughout the years even down to his transfers…He ‘makes’ players because they are then indebted to him. Henry and Adams were meant to come aboard and coach the Arsenal youths u18s i believe yet this did not transpire…Henry since seems to have the hump with Wenger but he will never fully turn on him because he owes Wenger
Yeah maybe, but that’s a different argument to not employing ex players. I’d love us to follow Ajax and to have our legends back working with the first team, none more so than Dennis.
Novel concept here, but how about employing coaches on the basis of their ability to coach players, rather than some misguided feeling of nostalgia? Not every professional footballer makes a good coach.
I know it’s hard for some of the anti-Wenger brigade to accept it, but perhaps he knows a bit more about the subject than some of the people sat at home…
If Vieira comes to Arsenal that would be one more Arsenal staff for Wenger to worry about.
Is Blogs creating another article where PV is critical of the lack of character/ personality and size in our current team.
It is of course spot on and painful to read if you are a fan.
underwhelming this current Arsene team.
Force of nature on the pitch. How does someone so humongous be so graceful? How many ‘the next viera’s have we seen since 2005? Diaby showed glimpses when he was not injured (the poor guy) but unfortunately the true ‘next viera’ seems to have cost manure a hundred million quid.
Not entirely true, I have a really good feeling about Xhaka, he looked assured for his first start in the Leicester game. Only 23 years old too, big things to come i think
By any mean I’m not Wenger’s biggest fan anymore. But realistically he’s not ever going to be sacked and the more he pressure he’s under the more stubborn he gets. So lets get behind the team our support is becoming toxic during games. Also, I’m more worried about the available Managers once he leaves this summer.
I think Wenger need a different assisting coach. Him and Bould almost never seem to communicate, and I can’t really see those two sitting down and discussing all things Arsenal and bouncing new ideas back and forth etc. Also I don’t think the club should just hire ex arsenal players but stick with hiring the most qualified people for the job. If that is a ex Arsenal player then fine, do it, but don’t do it just because. So many overpaid entitled Assholes in this sport these days. I like how Mourinho and Guardiola deal with divas not pulling their… Read more »
Wow. The blog post is not half as long as this comment. Can it still even still be called a comment?
Well, it still is a comment.
On a very different note, it’s nice when I see Yoruba names in the comment section of Arseblog.
Lol@Yoruba names.
What on earth is a “Yoruba” name?
It is a type of device people use to power their sex toys.
Wenger is quite happy to get rid of players he doesn’t want.
The big difference between wenger and pep/Jose is that the p/j don’t spend very long at a club so the players they are freezing out are other people’s signings.
It is also questionable whether either improved their last clubs. Bayern were better under heynkes than pep and Chelsea had their worst season since abramovich took over last year. Madrid have won 2 champs leagues in four years after Jose left but didn’t make a final with him in charge
‘No point going to see Arsene as I won’t learn anything’
Poor remark there…not sure Patrick meant it that way. No one is the same year in year out except God. A word you least expect from a person you think you knew too well, may refresh your perspective for ever.
Another city rumor now a reality. Funny how ours always remain a rumor!!!?
Fuck
This
Guy
He shat on the club when he left for Juventus.
He shat on the club when he was at Man City.
He’s probably been shitting on the club since he’s been in the MLS, but I really haven’t been paying attention or care.
I’m just…done with him. I’d rather read a story about Fran Merida than this guy.
Bit harsh, he was upset that the club sold him when he wanted to stay.
Thats utter bollocks I’m afraid Bobby P
How many ppl are you going to hate for leaving our club?
Should players that probably wanted to stay but were sold hate the club, manager and its fans?
Stop hating ppl that have contributed more to this club that you ever will
No more how inept i think Arsene has become, i can never hate him. I would just rather he leaves at the end of this season
most of the coaching positions at the club are already filled by ex players.
What are we supposed to do, create new positions just to accommodate these guys?
They can be assistant managers to the assistant manager?
Regardless of whether a legend takes over from Arsene or not , that person must have the ability to attract top players. Like him or loathe him , that’s one if Wenger’s many strengths !
It is interesting that when the “not so physical players” issue comes up – people tend to forget about the consequencies of our economical environment that time. If you have no money to buy players –> you have to “grow” them –> that means: you play with talented, young players who need years to be ready (mainly physically). This is not rocket science. Just take a look at Sczesny, Walcott, Ramsey, Wilshere or even Koscielny now and then. What Viera is talking about was a decisive factor 3-4 or 6-7 years ago, but I think today we are much better… Read more »
Watching ManU play and seeing Zlatan, Fellaini (affront to football TM) and Pogba line up in the wall, they looked frighteningly big. With so many smaller, technical players in teams, I am wondering whether this season size and physicality will be a competitive advantage. It is just that is was so noticeable, that it got me wondering whether there is a bit of shift in the balance coming.
Arsenal is the most loved club in the world and one of the most hated in England. I once got a four full day ticket from another fan at Disney in France for me, my wife and two boys because I had an Arsenal shirt on. I love the diversity the club has attracted and a llot of this is due to Arsene. I don’t agree with Arsene on a lot of things particularly on team selection and substitution and it’s timing; but I appreciateh him a lot. I think Arsene has the material to win the title and adding… Read more »
Viera should just go and sleep.if I could remember, I am bound to be corrected, Is it not this same Viera that almost left us for Man U?Until we gave him an improved contract.. He was sold because of this attitude. He should just com out straight and says he wants Arsene job,but duuurrr.. we don’t need you,now or in future.
I am fed up with waiting for new signings.
Suddenly I found myself skipping over the most downvoted posts. Maybe its because I dont like negativity mixed sometimes with bollocks or maybe its because my mama used to make eat the veggies before the meat
Look, are we going to fucking sign this Viera dude or what ? And is he any good anyway ?
Ex players coming back to be manager/coaches isn’t all it’s cracked up to be…… Geordies worked that out appointing Shearer.. (Think Henry has more upstairs than Old Alan mind)
Seriously guys, girls, them/they, lets take a step back and talk about how trippy that Leicester city pitch was.
…SSSSSMACK !!
Take that you cunny.
Super far out.
One of my favourite invincibles. We’d be quite happy to have u Patrick