In a fairly no-holds-barred interview with Chilean newspaper La Tercera, Robert Pires says he doesn’t understand why Arsenal sell their best players to rival clubs.
He was talking ahead of the now inevitable departure of Alexis Sanchez to Manchester United, and questioned why the policy of the club isn’t to add players of similar quality in order to help them hold onto their top talent.
Pires insists that Sanchez is not a mercenary or moving for money, and also suggests that Mesut Ozil is frustrated because of the lack of investment.
Asked if Sanchez was willing to leave because he had become disillusioned at Arsenal, he said, “It must be that. I have been here for a long time and I don’t understand it. But if players like Sanchez want to leave because they feel there is no desire to win here, yes, it is better to leave.
“What I don’t understand is that a team like Arsenal allows its best men to sign for a rival. I don’t get it.
“I know that’s the way football is, that Manchester United is offering Alexis something that I don’t know if Arsenal can match.
“But I know that if I have a player like Sanchez, the first thing I do is renew him. And buy other players to make a better team and try to win the league.
“However, I’m not the coach, I’m not the president, I’m just an ex-Football player from Arsenal.
“The club must sign quality players. That is what they have to do. This club has a lot of money, but has to buy.”
He has a lot more to say about Sanchez and his attitude, what the club should do and more.
the fans don’t understand either.
Surely Bobby is a fan too now. And a dreamy one at that! So isn’t this comment redundandandant? Hmmm…….
We don’t either Bobby, but Wenger has changed, we no longer sell to our rivals, we just swap players! And not for a similar quality either, I mean may make sense!
Bobby pretty much sums it up. At least he is on the same page as most rational thinking Arsenal supporters…
He is talking to a chilean newspapers. Do you thin he would talk of Sanchez as a mercenary ?
And for all you deluded fans who want to talk about how this is the best outcome given the situation, yes it is…but my question do you think we’d ever be on the other end of this, being strengthened by a rival…where we inherit a player like Sanchez from a rival and send a player half his quality the other way, in a ruthless way in the form of aggressive leadership? Yes this is a good outcome compared to what could have been, but it’s still a shit one. A one which could have been avoided had we have shown… Read more »
Sol campbell
Signed by David Dein over Wenger’s head almost 20 years ago
I was thinking the same thing myself
HIstorically yes, when we were a club not a cash cow….but in the current climate???
Cashley out —->
Gallas in <—-
You’re missing his point. If you have a player like Alexis, you make sure you get other tools in to complete the team and not be the team that doesn’t sign a single outfield player in the top 5 leagues. Leicester winning the league as a result is what pissed him off.. His antics and strops were a result of that but he was still better and hungrier than most.. so fair play
Firstly
How are we selling our player to a rival this time ??
Dont we look like an average mid table team
Indeed.
Who understands what’s going on. We sell RVP to SAF and Sanchez to Mourinho but refuse to sell Debuchy to LVG.
😀 😀
Robert to be given a role in the post Wenger era? Director of football? I mean…..technical advisor on footballing matters…….mustn’t say the d word…..
We already signed Sanhelli from Barcelona for that. We have really good people – sanhelli and Sven to run the transfer/ squad building side post Wenger. Pires could join and learn from them
Robert won’t be given a role at the club for the same reason why we sold sanchez and let these important contracts run down so far. It’s also the same reason why we try to sign players on the cheap. It’s kroenke.
Just because you were a great player does not mean that you will be a great scout/ director of football or manager. They are very different skill sets. If our goal is to challenge for titles then we need to bring in people who have a lot of experience (Sven and Sanhelli) rather than simply putting untired in a role b/c they played for the club.
I love Bobby, I mean who doesn’t? But I wonder if he has been asleep for the last ten years.
Hopefully he’s making this point in a last ditch attempt for the club to pull its finger out and get Ozil signed up!
“But I know that if I have a player like Sanchez, the first thing I do is renew him”. Difficult to do when the player won’t sign. He was looking for a paycheck Arsenal or mother fucking CITY were not prepared to pay.
Shove it up your ass Robert.
Renew as in two years ago……
I don’t get the impression he was prepared to renew then either
The club dropped the ball not investing more money sooner for sure
If we do get Mhki and Auba (plus Lacazette) at least we appear to be trying to do something about it now. If we can keep Ozil and Jack better still.
We still need to spend more on the midfield and defence but it’s a good start.
Sanchez swap is making the best of a bad situation as far as i can see. It was that or let him go to Manchester on a free at the end of the season.
Correct. Fans never understand that it takes 3 parties (actually even 4) to make a deal. There is the selling club. The buying club(s) Then there is the player himself. YOu can’t force the horse to drink, although in the Ox’s case we should have put the gun to his head when Gnabry was pushing for a regular berth…instead we lost both. Also there is the agent. As seen from recent Mhykitarian panic buy, we were forced to take a player low on confidence or risk losing the deal for Alexis. The agent gets 10m BTW just saying. Its not… Read more »
Because most of them think its like a computer game and you just click on the player and he is yours
It’s as easy as the player lets it be. Take a look at Koscielny renewal for example.
He still has to sign it. Not like how you do on FIFA.
What you say is sensible, but when you tell pires to shove it up there, I have to thumb you down
What will I do with my life now?
The blame lies solely on Arsenal. If my memory serves me correctly, I remember Arsene saying Alexis reneged on an agreement after the 5-1 loss to Bayern. Considering our recent Round of 16 record in the Champions League, that’s some horrible timing to sell our “potential” to anyone.
Or maybe he was looking for a club with a bit of fucking ambition!
You said it. You can see when he had a wry smile (Can’t remember which game) when our defense collapsed in a recent game this season that he does not think we will solve our inherent issues. They are as much systemic as in our transfer decision making. You add our decision to sell Gabriel and entrust two young defenders to step up BEFORE one has shown delivery on promise, the decision to sell SZSC, our inability to nail down the Ox when Gnabry was itching for first team, its not convincing. Recent signings of Mhykitariand and Aubameyang also point… Read more »
He was looking for a club with ambition???
That astronomical wages of £505K a week, has nothing to do with it, you think???
What is he takling about? Özil isnt going anywhere
Why are people suddenly saying this? Where’s the optimism coming from? Like we made a choice between him and Sanchez over who we would sell, it just happened. He still hasn’t signed, don’t set yourself up for more disappointment.
Ozil still unclear though, clearly the man still waiting for something before prolong his contract. Probably he’s still waiting to see our ambition, moreover in summer he can go to a better team with huge wage waiting
Or just waiting for the window to close and thus ensuring he can walk for free in the summer.
We are prepared to lose Ozil for potentially nothing. Which is why we sold Alexis now for something. We would be even more foolish to lose both in the summer. Prices will climb as many top clubs will be reshuffling their pack. The lack of CL may also heavily impact our selection AND the Wcup will delay the process. Remembering we are never first to the feast (and for good reason) we will again have severe impact to start of season. Ozil may yet sell for something in the summer but Mhykitarian is as much a hedge on the market… Read more »
Why would he have to wait for the window to close to ensure he can walk in the summer? He can refuse any deals with clubs and just wait. He doesn’t need the window to close?
I hear you Bobby. I see all the spin coming out, ‘he loses the ball a lot’ and ‘he wasn’t liked in the dressing room’. Trying to make ourselves feel better that we just sold our best player. AGAIN. TO MAN UTD. Ugh. Merde.
This “spin” has been said about Alexis for quite a while, tbh, although it is coming from more quarters lately. We’ll obviously miss his goals, and his arrival brought some much needed tenacity to a side that had little of it, but it is entirely possible to see this transfer as less than the end of the world and, perhaps, something that will be of net benefit. Very different from RvP in my opinion because then we had no idea where goals would come from, and I don’t think it’s the case now.
I don’t think it’s that different.
Neither do I. Only Kane, Aguero and Lukaku have scored more league goals than him in the last 4 seasons. Overall he notched up 121 goals and assists in 166 appearances.
This is simplistic.
Alexis is not an out and out striker. His berth is from left side and he scores plenty for us but also creates and assists.
Also he adds a dynamism we lack in being able to engage players. Otherwise cue side to side passing.
Its disingenuous for fans to suddenly invent all sorts of ills on Alexis so they can feel better.
Truth is we have lost a top player and we have been forced to take a player low on confidence who may not necessarily fit because United have us by the bollocks.
Plus 112 strops when substituted
Even coq came out to deny any issue
Not much spin there: Alexis was so wasteful lately: not only giving the ball back but those bell passes to nobody. If he costs 3 goals and scores 1, what’s the conclusion? – No question we need to reinforce but we should have sold him in the summer.
Not much you can so when there’s 4/5 months left on the contracts and they want 500k a week. Least were getting a very decent players back off them in return!
There’s so much we could have done earlier though, things that would have put us in a better position to challenge for the title as well. That’s what Pires doesn’t get, why we keep putting ourselves in these situations.
Alexis could’ve gone to City to play glorious football under Guardiola and win the League, but decided to go to man u because of the money on offer. That’s exactly what makes him a money-grubbing mercenary.
To Be fair, how many people would turn down that kind of money. It is a short career and you cant blame him for making the most of it financially. Arsenal just need to move on and build a team that can challenge again in the future.
He’s not some journeyman on 10k/month who needs to worry about how he’s going to pay the bills after his career ends at age 35. If you’re already making 150k/week and you’re going to be making at least 200k/week no matter where you go, it’s hard to see how there’s any financial necessity to take the 500k/week instead. Money is only money, and past a certain point the returns on each additional dollar diminish considerably. Short of something like donating 100% of the extra money to his hometown’s anti-poverty initiatives it’s hard to see a good argument for taking the… Read more »
I’m assuming you don’t personally know Alexis Sanchez so I’m struggling to see how you can possibly know what his career satisfaction is or what makes him happy.
For whatever reason, he decided to leave Arsenal FC, and through sheer and unmitigated incompetence, the club made a complete hash of the situation.
As far as i’m aware, Alexis Sanchez has never said a bad word about the club and never publicly agitated for a move.
Exactly. get this straight, between a club that shows ambition and is offering less and one that is showing equal ambition but offering more, which would you take? Its all fine and dandy to invent all sorts of excuses to demonise alexis but you are simply trying to make yourself feel better. truth is its a poor deal for us but the best we can make given circumstances we got ourselves into. Wenger did not make all the best choices last summer. The current scouting/director of football team to me isn’t making the best choices for us either. They are… Read more »
I don’t think this short career excuse holds up anymore for these wages. Double your salary and multiply it by 40 years. Then compare it to what Sanchez will earn in 1. On my current salary, it would take me 742 years to make one year of his salary or the other way round, what he makes in 3 weeks would be my entire career
Whilst i agree, either way he was going to a rival. At Least were getting someone out of it and that someone is someone who is undoubtedly very talented it’s a win win for all for me
(Though I still don’t get why we didn’t sign Sanchez to 5 year contract instead of 4 and had this situation with him being 30 and a half lol)
Pires is someone I see.. who is always there at the training sessions and all that. He is still very close to those at the club and when you see him questioning the club’s ambitions.. then the Board better know and act or they simply walk out of the club. I would prefer them choosing the last option.
I’m just happy someone at the club is speaking in direct terms about the central issue of ambition that frustrates all of us.
Being told this will hurt less than RVP is just a way of avoiding the fact that six years later the criticism RVP levelled at the club is still valid.
Yeah, but the whole point is that Bobby is talking to Chilean media, not UK Arsenal-Fan media. If he said it to Arseblog I’d totally agree with him and back him up.
His choice where to vent his frustration is a very questionable to say at least. Especially after what Chilean media was spouting against Arsenal FC in the summer (Alexis in a prison called Arsenal)… etc
However much we dress up this swap deal, we have lost one of our best players to a direct rival and got a player in return that we don’t really need.
Their reject
He might be great for us but we let mourinho, of all people take our best player
Yeah, I realise that we have the make the most of a bad situation, (a situation created by the club’s lack of ambition) and Mkhi might well work for us.
But I think we’d be deluding ourselves to think we’ve been hunting for a 29-year-old number 10 who has barely played for the past year.
Bring in a player low on confidence into a team fragile in mentality is never a good sign.
let alone where he plays. we are in need of wide players with technical skills/ and creativity. He doesn’t fit this.
Its a deal forced upon us.
Circumstances, innit. We spend so much of our waking lives reading and thinking about the Arsenal, reading newspapers, talking in online forums, occasionally checking the odd blog or two, and although we only really ever get half the picture I don’t think any of us are surprised to see Sanchez go. From an early age playing football you’re told you air your frustrations off the pitch but Sanchez has sulked around the pitch multiple times in his time with us, and whilst I can well understand his reasons for doing so, I’m not sure I understand what he was expecting… Read more »
Maybe he believed Wenger and Gazidis saying the financial shackles had come off, that we could compete with Bayern
Mhykitarian isn’t even an option we exercised to mitigate loss of one of our best players. We have no choice in the matter. If we don’t take him, we lose out on United’s deal for Alexis and make our summer even more complicated. We’ve been played. City pulled out because we wanted too much (Thank you new negotiating team) and United are the only one left so they dictate terms because we are in a poor situation. Truth is we would have slightly more leverage selling last summer but Wenger wanted to gamble on Alexis propelling us into CL first… Read more »
Santori
Get your facts right mate.
City pulled out not because we asked for too much (which there’s nothing wrong with it for a change- cuz we’ve been selling players for peanuts)…
City pulled out cuz Sanchez got £505K from Utd and asked City to match it. They refused to be mugged off by Alexis and his greed.
I agree with you when you say that we did not have a choice though
So true…I think it’s OK to recognise both that the club need to buck up (very quickly) but also that Alexis is not this trophy hungry innocent chap who left because the club did not allow him to achieve his footballing ambitions: 1) As you say, he saw before he came here what things were like. The summer of 2015 should never happen again (and the club are totally responsible for this) but in saying that his performance in the 2015-2016 season was not the same as the next season, granted injury did play a big part. Things might’ve been… Read more »
Isn’t this at least partially the hubris of AW? It seems like he enjoys demonstrating that he can replace top players as much as actually winning.
Yeah, but he doesn’t actually replace them. Just whinges about being destabilized. The club will not rebound until the manager changes.
“But for me, Alexis wanted to stay at Arsenal. I have not talked to him, but what I see, what I smell, is that he was very good in London, very good in Arsenal. What Alexis wanted was for Arsenal to spend money on other players.”
Sounds depressingly familiar.
Sanchez wanted money, basta.
Kroemke wants money, why sacrifice yours for him
We are cheap. It’s all about the money
Ambition too. Given equal amount of money, I think Alexis will still choose to leave.
We have not solved many issues in the squad and he would feel he cannot carry us any further. It was the same with RVP.
I don’t know, when Pires says “I have not talked to him” it sounds like Pires might be projecting. I think the only way that we would have kept Sanchez is if we were competing for the title. Wenger probably thought we would compete this season, and by doing so, convince Sanchez to stay. Only problem is that Wenger is probably the only person who believed we would compete -delusional.
Yeah. And 500K per week in his bank account whilst he was our opposition’s best defender
I agree completely about the investment but I don’t know if I agree about the allowing him to join a rival.
It looks like his aim was always to stay in the PL and Arsenal didn’t have much choice but to sell him or allow him to leave for free. Other than Spain, where he’d already played, the only teams he’d have been likely to consider were PSG, Bayern and Juventus. And none of them showed much interest that we know of.
PSG have too many left sided options as is. Bayern will be looking for younger options. Juve doesn’t have the money to compete. Barca and RM are out of it. Barca won’t want an ex player. RM maybe but its volatile there at the moment. So you’re left with PL clubs. Chelsea are showing austerity for the moment. Only Liverpool, City or United are in the offing. Of those 3 City are better destination only because they are so far and away already they don’t represent any rivalry this season. United and Liverpool (and Chelski) We can still ‘potentially’ catch… Read more »
Didn’t Bayern inquire about him only to come out publicly later on that he asked for astronomical wages?
God bless you Robert. Needed to be said, and by a legend who is around the club it has even more force of conviction.
Renew him and sign others. It is so simple from the outside.
If he doesn’t renew 2 years out you sell then
Pires is partly right and partly wrong here. He raved about Lemar in the summer only to come back and concede that Lemar is not worth 90 million. The margin for error is too small in football and hence I can understand the club’s cautious approach to spending. Arsenal are essentially a people’s club in the sense Arsenal are more about the entire Arsenal staff than just the starting 11 and I respect that. What really frustrates me is that there is no justification for the ticket prices they charge. I have never been to a game but I really… Read more »
Love Bob but he is wrong: Sanchez wasn’t our best player.
He was start of season when the same people here were clamouring to sell Ozil.
How quick we forget.
How quick things change around.
We do what we always does….make them and sell them…We never loose, always staying in the race. How many other other teams can say that, certainly not Southampton or 18 other teams we compete with.
I don’t think what he said is so smart. If it was Ozil he would have a point. Sanchez had huge salary demands and would have been out of contract anyway. It’s better we get something for his loss. We shouldn’t sell to our rivals but in this case, Sanchez hasn’t been our best player this season. If he had a year or two left then I would agree.
Well said. Like a few others had already said, we were making the best of a horrible but totally self inflicted situation. Better late than never ever (in our lifetimes atleast?).
We didn;t make the best of a horrible situation.
We had no choice.
We lost out on City because our negotiating team is unconvincing without Dick Law.
So the only option was united and they could dictate terms.
They had us by the balls.
We did not ask for Mhykitarian lets be clear. He has been forced upon us by his agent who stands to BTW make 10m on the deal.
“We did not ask for Mhykitarian lets be clear” — Do you actually have irrefutable proof regarding this santori or….are you just being a negative Nancy for the heck of it?
Pires doesn’t understand? I do.
We sell our best players because we’re no longer competing with the best clubs.
We sell our best players because even if we kept adding world-class players, we would still be limited by a manager who is uninterested in coaching defense and uninspired when it comes to offense.
We sell our best players because they’re unwilling to play for a club that fosters complacency and mediocrity, where players who want to win are called troublemakers.
We sell our best players because we’ve become a mid-table club, and that’s what mid-table clubs do.
Dont you dare to use fact based arguments here!
At writing 14 disagree. Fuck me deluded or what
They aren’t deluded anymore, they are reflecting their guru Arsene Wenger who knows what is going on at all times but stubbornly sticks to his plan because at this stage it would be admitting defeat and being wrong for a number of years.
They are delaying the inevitable and it will Ben all the more painful when they allow the realisation in which inevitable must follow this period of disingenuous arguments and contrariness.
Walcott even mentioned Everton’s willingness to invest as a reason he went there. Wenger didn’t want him to leave. RVP mentioned lack of investment as his reason for leaving. Haven’t learnt a thing
Spot-on.
Ronald Koeman plonked down £150M on transfers last Summer.
Everton sit in 9th on 28pts. Koeman now sits elsewhere.
Brilliant!
jw1
Utterly damning from Robert there. From someone regularly on the inside who knows the inner workings and mood amongst the squad far better than any of us fans to say that the Club simply aren’t ambitious enough and have failed to surround their star players with enough quality to get them to stay is quite shocking. Says it all, sadly. He defends the manager but deep, fundamental change at Arsenal is clearly required for us to move forward.
He means theo to everton
Oh oh Bobby’s out of a job
Hopefully. Stadium ban to boot.
So true. Kroenke out, Usmanov in.
I’ve been wishing that for a long time, Old Boy Gunner.
But I’m afraid that the Board won’t let it happen cuz that would mean that their shares will be devalued. All the Board cares about is their profit.
Usmanov apart from the money, will bring back David Dean thus Success
I have a friend who had the pleasure to spend a match at the Emirates in Pires’ company a couple of years ago. If you think he’s outspoken on this you should have heard what he said about Arsene playing Arteta as a defensive midfielder!!
Damn, would have loved to listen in on that conversation.
That would be Interesting?
Rivals? Didn’t realise Burnley had come in with a last minute bid!
This is exactly the same thing that all the arsenal fans around the world wanted to say….
Not really….we also wanted to say that we don’t understand how Alexis would want to play for a cunt like Maureen.
I’m pretty sure we are seeing how much Miki will cost and any other players before we sign up Jack. And Ozil will see if we sign two quality players for him he can be in sync with to replace Sanchez. If we don’t I’m sure Jack will also listen to offers from abroad.
Not sure why the club is trying to squeeze every last drop of money when they don’t need to. And is counterproductive, in a way which cannot be easily put infront of an accountant.
….or owners blinded by profit.
#kroenkeout
Ornstein says that if we get the swap deal done and sign Auba there’s no more money for anyone else. So where the fuck is it? How can anyone expect to run a top football club with a budget like that? And please why can’t we get rid of Debuchy and Akpom and Welbeck who are all not nearly good enough but are taking up squad spaces and salary.
So, if we didn’t sell/trade him, he still goes to the very same rivals for free. How is that any better? Sanchez wasn’t exactly Mr. Arsenal either. Sad to lose a talent for sure, but some are pining for him like we pushed him out the door while he was holding onto one of them. He left us. We’ll recover and move on.
Further, Arsenal brought him to the PL where he was given free-reign to do what he wished on-pitch. He thrived. He became world-class. There were no guarantees that would occur when Barca gave up on him.
Pouting aside? Both the club and Alexis should be satisfied.
Alexis got his his payday on his last big contract. I’m actually happy for him.
I hope he does great– and United flops.
Everybody wins!
jw1
I agree with everything he says but I also think in the Sanchez case its not so simple. They had to get rid in Jan cause he was clearly dragging the whole team down and didn’t fit with the style of play. The team seemed liberated v palace.
WOW, so you’re saying that based on what exactly? Coquelin himself said that the whole dressing room thing was nonsense. Dragging the whole team down? Really? The guy helped carrying us on his back for the last 3 years and now he kind of had enough of being humiliated and not competing for shit. It’s called winning mentality, trying to describe this guy as harmful to the team spirit is true only when the team spirit is that it’s ok to lose, nothing happend and we’ll ‘bounce back’. Idk, maybe a lot of the mediocre players we have in our… Read more »
As you say yourself, the guy had had enough, cohesion is important to football teams.
I seem to remember Bobby not signing a contract and leaving for more money./longer contract.
Legend and thoroughly nice chap that he is.
Its curious to hear that you remember things which never happened. Up to you but i would consult it with someone (or at least verify my words before talking bollocks).
Arsenal offers pires a one yet deal but he went to Villarreal who offers him two. I think that’s common knowledge. Why would you accuse someone of talking bollocks by saying that ?
‚Leaving for more money’? Really?
‘Leaving for more money./longer contract.’ Is what he actually said. Seems fair enough when you don’t cut his sentence in half…and his last sentence made clear how much he respects Pires. No idea why it would make you so angry.
His and yours statements suggest that Bobby should not take his position in the discussion as he did exactly the same as sanchez now. Which is 10/10 bollocks. If only he was still wengers regular player he would never left for villareal. This cannot be that difficult to follow can it?
Players leave clubs. ?
“But I know that if I have a player like Sanchez, the first thing I do is renew him. And buy other players to make a better team and try to win the league.
Come on Bobby, you’ve been around long enough to understand that’s not how things work around here.
First, staying here is not an option, he’s not for the crest anymore (I question if he ever was, really) and gets VISIBLY upset when play does not run through him. He can’t stay. It’s not best for the club. Furthermore, I am thrilled he is going to United rather than City. I think he could be a valuable asset at City and work alongside Kun Aguero. To me, it seems like Mourino is just “collecting” strikers at United. Where does Alexis fit in with Mata, Martial, and Ibra when he comes back from injury. I think that’s going to… Read more »
When the meltdown comes? And it WILL come– the flammability of the egos in this collection of explosive-types will make for beautiful fireworks.
The United crest should be modified to read:
‘Light No Flames.’
jw1
Help me understand here, weren’t they (Ozil and Sanchez) offered new contracts with 18 months still to run? It doesn’t matter when u offer a new contract, if a player doesn’t want to sign they will not sign. I don’t know what to make of this whole thing, if u want to win trophies you go to City, maybe he feels United will be competitive next season who knows. But Arsenal didn’t have much of a choice on which team he joins, you can’t force a player to sign either. I think Arsenal left it too late thinking he was… Read more »
Isn’t Mata leaving on a Bosman this summer?
I just hope Sanchez ,with his selfishness and super ego, destabilize that Man U dressing room,c’mon Alexis..
Join the line Bob! Seriously though, we need to shake off this feeder nonsense. One AW!… In the directors box!
Bobby needs to answer one question. If it wasn’t all about money for sanchez, why is he heading to United and not City?
We all know city already agreed compensation with him. United offered more money than arsenal and city offered. If Arsenal offers more money than United is offereing right now, I assure you sanchez will have a change of heart.
I don’t have a problem with getting all you can when you can still earn it, in fact I’ll encourage it, but let’s not pretend that it’s anything more than the money
Sell our best player who creates chances and scores goals for 30m when we could have sold last summer for double and bought Mahrez in. Wenger took the punt in the hope Alexis could somehow help his flawed set up in competing for the title but we are so far off now, he decides (rightfully) to sell before we lose him for nothing. But in truth the right option was to sell one of Ozil or Alexis last summer. Instead we get a low ball offer from City we do not want and they drop out leaving us with United… Read more »
I tend to both agree and disagree with some of your comments
Wenger’s idealism, soft hearted nature and father like persona has no place in football anymore…Its sad because i commend him for wanting to hold onto whatever his ideals and valuea are but they directly affect his ability as a manager of a football team in the ever changing cutthroat and ruthless business it is.
I expect headlines like, “Pires blast gunners for their transfer policy”. A few days later when the journos inevitably ask wenger about Pires’ comments, the newspapers will write, “Wenger hits back at Pires for questioning his authority”
Was a major fan of Sanchez but he is clearly driven by cash and his demands were excessive. In the end, I am glad this chapter is over. Getting M in exchange is good news, hopefully he will blossom as no-one in their right mind would want to play for Maureen.
Am really worried about Ozil. Why hasn’t he signed?
Because our rivals are the only ones who can afford to pay them and have the ambition the players are chasing.
Our best are wanted by everyone but for only a handful of clubs in the PL it’s a possibility – City, United, Chelsea, Liverpool
all of this is bullshit, we been crying out for a good defensive midfielder for 10 years now. You can’t win the premier league without one.
I wasn’t too bothered about the Sanchez transfer before.
But after seeing that rat faced Lingard’s Instagram post, I’m pissed.
How have we become this bad?
2 years ago the market was not crazy. there was the pogba deal worth 80+ mil. no neymar crazy deal to inflate the whole market. so if we’d sold Alexis 2 years ago he’d probably have gone for 50 mil? then we would have lost out on his goals and assists last season, and we might not even be playing Uefa cup (but then again we won the FA cup so i think that’s automatic qualification). i just hope that signing Mkh + Aubameyang is a positive step to add quality and not to replace alexis and ozil cos ozil… Read more »
Because our board and manager are weak
I think Wenger has a point to prove and I think that is why he is so reluctant to just purchase players for the sake of it. I also think he genuinely believes that if he has faith in his players, they will return that faith on the pitch. Obviously it hasn’t worked out that way, which is why I believe strongly that he needs to strike a balance. Of course, Wenger is stubborn (for better or worse) and he wants to win on his terms. To be clear, I’m not saying all this to exonerate him of guilt; I… Read more »
Hahahahahaha
http://www.skysports.com/football/news/11667/11216832/utd-are-a-rich-mans-stoke
I love Bobby, but it honestly looks like nobody could afford Sanchez outside of England, and even then Manchester City pulled out from offering him a deal, says a lot about the situation imo, not saying it’s acceptable and we should be happy with it, but unfortunately it is what it is.
Just speaking about Alexis only Where would he have gone if we tried to sell him earlier in summer ’17 or ’16? There are only 5 clubs outside the Prem that are possible destinations for him. Out of those 5 how many would have met the club valuation and his wage demands? Juve might have met the valuation but wouldn’t have met his wage demands. BM is more conservative then Juve on transfer fees. Definitely wouldn’t have met his wage demands PSG would be the club that would have met both his valuation and wage demands in ’16 but not… Read more »