Laurent Koscielny has left Arsenal for Bordeaux in a deal worth around €5m.
The former captain’s relationship with the club broke down this summer over a contractual dispute, with the 33 year old refusing to go on the summer tour of the USA.
Despite efforts from Unai Emery and Raul Sanllehi, there was no reconciliation, and the defender’s desire to go back to France to see out his career won out.
It’s a shame that it has ended the way it has, because a popular player who has given a lot to Arsenal is leaving under a cloud. His reputation among fans has been badly damaged, and it does overshadow the positives aspects of his nine year stay in North London.
Since joining in 2010, he made 353 appearances for the Gunners, scoring 27 goals and making 5 assists. He picked up 47 yellow cards and 6 red cards.
The Frenchman had a habit of scoring important goals too, including a couple of final day winners against West Brom and Newcastle which saw us qualify for the Champions League at the expense of Sp*rs – as well as an equaliser in the 2014 FA Cup final against Hull after we’d fallen 2-0 behind early on.
Like most players he had his ups and downs, but over the duration of his Arsenal career there were far more positives than negatives. His partnership with Per Mertesacker was about the best we’ve had in a long time, and over the years he’s been paired with some players who would make life challenging, to say the least.
Fans generally appreciated his whole-hearted approach, and even last season after coming back from a terrible Achilles injury, he was our best central defender.
Without defending his behaviour in any way, it’s sad that it has ended so acrimoniously.
An Arsenal statement this afternoon read:
Laurent, who started his career in the French second division at Guingamp in 2004, has played 51 matches for France and was entering the final year of his current contract with us. We decided to sanction his move to Bordeaux once we agreed acceptable transfer terms.
We thank Laurent for his contribution to the club and wish him all the best for the future.
The club now have to replace him, with not a great deal of time left in this transfer window.
Bon voyage
He wants his own song
He wants his own songggg
Laurent Koscielny, now he has gone.
No doubt that the way he’s ended up leaving the club has lacked a lot of class on all sides (mainly his) but we didn’t cover ourselves in glory either by firstly; allowing this situation to arise in the first place. We knew he wanted to leave. We should have looked to secure a deal to move him on as soon as the window opened. Secondly; when Koscielny refused to travel with the squad to the US, we should have kept that all in house, putting his absence down as an injury (or whatever else). We shouldn’t have been airing… Read more »
‘faith
Sad the way you are leaving. It doesn’t have to be like this. Just say “sorry” and we will forgive u, Captain! I know I want to.
Bon riddance
C’est la vie.
yeah… thank you and good luck.
Played football as a kid and of course u could help but wonder how itmust feel being in the red and white.,! Ummmm. Sorry but you really shit on that special feeling.
What a terrible manner to part ways.
Yeah and aside from that, the sad thing about that beautiful generation of players who’ve now gone, from Koscielny to Cazorla to Rosicky, is that they should’ve won a title.
Anyway, good luck Lolo.
He joins the ‘Legends But We’re Still Pissed Off At You’ club with Ashley Cole, Alexis Sanchez, Nicolas Anelka.
Cesc?
No way. I strongly disagree. He can’t be put in the same category as Cashley Cole. We don’t what happened and while a bitter taste is left in the mouth by his acrimonious departure, clubbing him and Cashley together is extremely disrespectful to Koss.
*know
I’d add Sanchez to that category. Entitled little primarona who left for big money and a prestige club where he became shit.
I expect Kos to be an asset to Bordeaux for however long he’ll be with them. No way is he in the same category as that prick Sanchez.
Ashley was a great player for us no matter what the history books say
I don’t think I ever recovered from his departure, big loss
At least Cole was a great player for us
None of those players listed are legends
Legends?
Koscielny, Sanchez and Anelka, legends. Really?
Sanchez, Anelka? legends?
Don’t forget Samir Nasrat.
Just seen his unveiling video. I have been trying to see this from the angle if Koscielny. I have maintained that his legend status should not be in question but that unveiling video was cheap, daft and disrespectful to more than just the club administration. As a fan, that truly hurts.
Do you have a link to that video?
Saw this on twitter https://twitter.com/girondins/status/1158767162640732160?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1158767162640732160&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mirror.co.uk%2Fsport%2Ffootball%2Ftransfer-news%2Ftransfer-news-live-rooney-lukaku-17678250
Watched it now and I have to agree with NairoGunner89 that it’s a pretty cheap and disrespectful. That kind of display should be beneath him. Poor taste!
I’m sorry but there is no way that Koscielny is a ‘legend’.
He served the club well for a long time, I’ll give him that & I’m appreciative of his efforts but he’s not in the same league as McClintock, Rice, Adams, Bould, O’Leary or Sol.
A good servant, that’s it.
Kind of want to thumbs up but you missed so many people who should be in the legends category I’m not sure
Yeah wished I didn’t see that. Another mercenary maggot. I really liked him, but if he can’t even have the respect to the fans that have still literally been defending him then fuk him. Pro sports… Not even sure why we do it to ourselves when it’s full of these over glorified over paid dogs.
Fuck him! That’s what I say
Does it really hurt that bad? Maybe I am just a cold bastard but I literally watched it, shrugged and kept scrolling.
The only people that give a shit about the shirt are the fans. What he did doesn’t affect management. Fans loved kozzer (I DID) so he did the one thing he could to fully disrespect the fans and that is disrespecting the shirt that made his career and the fans that lauded him for it. Pathetic, but really why expect more from pro football? Money trashed this game years ago, just another moment that makes me question why I still care at all for this game. Might check on the women’s team again…
I wish he had more class. Forget what the club said or did, what about the fans – do they mean nothing. 9 years and you throw it all away, just like that. Fans are letting it go because he’s past his best. If he had tried something like this a few years ago, when he still had some value and we were in a situation that we are in – the perception would’ve been much different. In any case, the club has shown on Arsenal.com how they will remember him. Personally, if he’s not bothered about his legacy, why… Read more »
Exactly
What a shame it ended this way, good riddance
Still don’t know if it was the club’s fault or his so such a sentiment is surely premature.
Going on history, I think the club would be at fault.
I think there was a gentleman’s agreement with a club representative and, despite a change in hierarchy, Kos has met his end.
I know he hasn’t moved for money or glory.
I’m not sure, but I suspect that his true allegiance and loyalty was more with the Prof (Wenger) than with Arsenal as a club. I mean bearing in mind that comment about wanting to leave pre-world cup after Wenger left. My thoughts, though I might be wrong. Whend/if he eventually tells his own side of the story, we’ll know much better. Till then, best wishes Kosc.
“I know he hasn’t moved for money or glory”.
Surely not for glory but money, not so sure. If he goes for free, he gets a bigger pay check. What do you think he kicked up all this fuss for..
Sounds like Gazidis shit to me
Koscielny is a professional and playing for Arsenal was a job for him. As much as we like to think of him embodying the club, and to some degree he did, there’s a disconnect between fans and someone who is doing a job. The whole thing stinks, but important to remember most players never have the connection we do to the club. If they do great, but most don’t and that’s fine. And they’re entitled to seek whatever employment they like. He owes us or Arsenal precisely nothing.
What “connection” do you have to the club? Your a fan sure, but what meaningful contribution have you made to Arsenal? You think you’ve somehow got a deeper or more meaningful connection with the club than Koscielny? The way you’ve just decided that Koscielny has absolutely no regard for the club, good lord some of you are real specimens.
Good job completely misunderstanding my comment. My point is that *most* players (I have no clue how Kos feels about Arsenal) don’t have the emotional connection to the clubs they play for that we like to think they do. It’s a harsh reality, but a reality I think a lot of fans would do well to acknowledge. This has been confirmed time and time again by players, usually when under intense pressure from the fans. So yes it is painful that Kos is leaving, he’s been our captain and stalwart for nearly 10 years. You’d like to think he wants… Read more »
Players have contracts, what they do after fulfilling them is up to themselves. In this case he had one year left, and he refused to do his job, that’s not OK.
We have a lot to thank Kos for, but so does he.
He became a top footballer at our club, and earned a lot of money. Leaving this way ruined his legacy.
Similar to the point I was trying to make. Well said.
Well, he did owe us another year of service.
And we owe him nothing in return. Ta ta.
Exactly right! If he got word from arsenal that he could leave at the end of last season, new hierarchy or not, you have to honour the promise. I have no bad feelings towards him, quite the contrary, I think he is the best CB we have had in the last 10+ years and have massive respect and admiration for him. He captained us on the field and won trophy’s for us, put his body on the line quite literally with his persistent Achilles problems which requires daily treatment and still he plays 3 game in a week, no complaints,… Read more »
The f**k is wrong with some people though. 9 years worth of service – to which he gave 100% almost every game, remember multiple games when he looks the only one who cares? And you’re getting all salty because he refused to travel for a pre-season tour?
This is exactly why the media and pundits alike love having a go at us. Small sh*t like this gets us all worked up and having a reaction – when really if you take a bit of perspective it isn’t that bad at all.
No, you’ve got it backwards.
It’s precisely because he built such a good reputation at the club, that he was the last person any of us expected this BS from. That’s what the reaction is about.
It’s not a “small” issue when a player downs tools to force a move away. If Reiss Nelson or someone like Pepe does it next summer to force a move to Barca you’ll understand why it’s dangerous to encourage this kind of behaviour from players.
And what you wrote in your first paragraph is exactly why there’s vvery likely more to it than simply Koscielny just deciding to be disrespectful to the club. Precisely because of how he has such a good reputation around the club. Thats why I, and I only speak for myself, am waiting to see more, if or when it comes out. In relation to your second paragraph, there are WAY too many examples of players in the past few seasons from a multitude of clubs in all leagues who have set the precedent for young players to “upgrade” their club… Read more »
You think Koscielny set a good example for all the academy graduates we just promoted to the first team and who went on the US tour?
What some of you really want is for some snippet of info to come out that lets you put 100% of the blame on the the club. You’re entitled to wait for Koscielny’s big interview in L’Equipe or whatever.
Personally, I have a lot of respect for people who love Koscielny but aren’t afraid to condemn his unprofessionalism.
Do I think Kos was unprofessional? Yes. What I am arguing is that I don’t know – none of us knows – if he was provoked. Is there some level of justification to his decision and behaviour? It’s not about wanting to blame the club but about not wanting to rush to judgement. I don’t know about you but I’d rather watch, listen, and THEN respond. If he’s in the wrong, I’ll be right there saying it. Did he set a good example? I don’t know. It goes to whether he was justified. If not, no he didn’t. If he… Read more »
Once you’ve acknowledged that what he did was unprofessional, what else is there to argue about?
Aaron Ramsey just gave us a perfect example of how to leave a club while conducting yourself with dignity. Instead Koscielny threw his rep away, and no good reason will come out that justifies it.
Again, you just seem to want to be mad at Kos. Reaction and justification are related but different. Was Kos justified in wanting to leave (based on some form of gentleman’s agreement)? How he reacted to the club saying “no” (if such an agreement was in place) was what makes it look unprofessional. I’m man enough to acknowledge that there are layers to people’s character and behaviour. Have you never had an argument with your missus (assuming you are a man and straight) where you’ve legitimately been in the right about something but because she pushes you, you lash out?… Read more »
Don’t be so juvenile. I wrote ‘good luck’ to Lolo in my first comment on this thread.
He may have acted badly, but we can condemn his actions and still wish him well. Cheers for the debate
Juvenile for asking you consider a less binary approach? I don’t think so. For the record, I don’t follow all your posts. In this particular thread of comments, you haven’t shown much of this wellwishing.
Who cares
Actually – as Arsenal fans we should.
The manner of his exit was very sad and did not reflect well on anyone. But football is a game, now run wholly by and for the players. That is the fact of it.
The Clubs…and the ‘fans’….’supporters’….are a distant consideration.
Compared to a lot, Kos’ conducted himself well. He was one of Wenger’s best later signings and gave his all, when he could. Unlike a lot of others who hid.
Sad to see him go………like this.
But there it is.
Onwards and upwards. ‘Forza Arsenal’….
It doesn’t reflect well on Koscielny no one else.
As far as we know only he reneged on his contractual obligation, not the club. If he wanted to leave he should have put in a transfer request not refuse to play!
This disqualifies him for even being loosely called legend and he shouldn’t even play in so-called legend games to collect money for hospitals. Not even games where Aliadiere shows up as a legend.
Yeah!!
Everyone knows that the real mark of a club legend!!
Until we know more, how can you say it only reflects poorly on him? What would you say if it turns out that the club DID give assurances that they reneged on?
I’m not saying he’s innocent or guilty and that’s my point. We know too little right now.
You’re making assumptions to get to that conclusion. Personally i don’t care why he wanted to leave, as i don’t think it matters but there’s a correct way to conduct yourself, which clearly he hasn’t done. He could have made a public statement regarding his desire to leave, still go on tour and put it back on the club but he chose not to play, which can’t be defended. And I also don’t buy the line that he physically can’t do it anymore and has risked his health for the club, he’s not retiring and obviously feels he has another… Read more »
Shame this couldn’t have been worked out behind the scenes. 5 million is a perfectly respectable fee if that’s what we’re getting, would have been no reason for all the unpleasantness.
This sums it up nicely
Two thumbs up
Good luck to him. It’s a shame he left under a cloud but after some time passes he’ll be rightly appreciated.
The winner against Newcastle to get us in the top four (it’s 1-1 at St James Park, lol) and the equaliser against Hull in the 2013 FA Cup final, he scored some big goals for us and has been an important part of the squad for nearly a decade.
I wish him the best but the manner of his departure leaves a lot to be desired.
Hear, hear.
To everybody saying we should have let him go for free: that’s £4.5m To add on to any deals for his replacements. So happy we’re run like a professional organisation now
We really need to bring at least one defender in. Even if it’s just Tierney, have Monreal play CB if necessary. But we really need bodies at the back.
Monreal as a CB in a back four is crap — especially now that age has slowed his pace even more.
That is a lousy solution. Monreal cannot play Cback unless its a back 3 and even so. You’re better off keeping Mustafi at that rate. Too many fans do not live in reality. Tierney would be a good addition but we can’t afford him now without compromise to the priority needs at Cback. Rb can also frankly wait. AMN will improve. These fans just want quick fixes rather than substantive change and they live in a fantasy world. Reality is our immediate need is (has been for a while) at Cback and we don’t just want any other Cback to… Read more »
In my team, the older you are, the further back you play!
My favorite gunner for the better part of the last 9 years, shame it had to ebd like this but I hope he can still be fondly remembered.
End* fat fingers
Never reached his full potential with the injuries
That’s Walcott… wrong article and wrong year
To be fair, that comment could be generically applied to virtually every single player from the 2006-2014 era, with the exception of Cesc and maybe Bendtner (whose potential was nowhere near as high as most of his strikes).
Of course he did. He wasn’t an injury prone player and for 7 years was one of the best centre halves in the country. He also played 51 times for his country
Not the manner I’d have liked to see him depart. After Rosicky and Santi leaving with injuries, I was hoping to see him retire with us and get a testimonial. Club legend in my book.
Kos the boss! Farewell! I will remember him for the fond memories…
Tha
Any realistic idea’s on who we should get to replaxe him?
Sol Campbell
Samba deal is still on?
Jagielka surely.
Evans?
Solomon Kalou is currently having a medical
Best of luck
Could have been a legend, but I don’t like his behavior this summer. Good riddens!!
Riddance, unless that is a phonetic spelling from Yosemite Sam
This gives Chambers a real opportunity to stake a claim. He’s a bit too slow over the first few metres, and also lacking in agility, but he’s generally decent enough, and looks to have improved in the air, hopefully the pace and aggression of Sokratis will make for a good combination. There’s talk we’re in for a loan for Coutinho? If there’s any truth to that? Then it’ll be the signing of the summer. Emery said last Dec/Jan “I need wingers” He’s also spoke about investing in defenders on a couple of occasions. If you’d offered me Coutinho + Ceballos… Read more »
Pepe is the signing of the season. Coutinho is overrated.
Supposedly the scum are in for coutinho as well, and are favourites according to Sky.
Overrated or not… that’d sting.
Thank you Laurent Koscielny for your contribution to the Arsenal, and best wishes for the rest of your career.
In my view, Koscielny was one of Arsene’s best ever signings.
Better than Henry?Really?
Mate you need to learn what “one of” means
But there is a very long list of players before I reach Kos.
Anelka, Henry, Pires, Freddy, Viera, Sol, Gilberto etc etc……I’ll stop now. Kos was a great player though.
Au revoir mon ami! Oh Captain my captain! Not the best way to say goodbye but he is a true Arsenal legend.
Is he fuck an Arsenal legend.
why not?
Don’t get me wrong, he was a pretty good defender a few years ago but never the sort of player who dragged the team to victories. I remember him making loads of silly mistakes which led to us conceding goals. Wouldn’t put him in the same bracket as players like Adam’s, Vieira, Henry, Wright, Bergkamp et AL. Those players are what I’d call club legends.
Yeh sure, he isn’t in that Caliber. Still has been one of our best and committed players over the last 9 years and won three FA Cups. I Just don’t really think that skipping pre-season friendly matches in order to push for a move back home at the age of 33 with dodgy achilles really warrants the level of betrayal that some people are suggesting. Bracketing him with the likes of Cole, Nasri, Van Persie who left us in their prime to join direct rivals stung, but all I can say is thanks for being a class act Kos.
I think as time passes he will be remembered fondly as a player who gave his all for the club when he was on the pitch. The goal against Hull was a prime example as he sacrificed himself to get that goal in before being run through. Without that, Ramsey’s goal doesn’t happen and maybe we would still be in a trophy-less drought.
Lots of love for Kos for the FA Cup final goal alone. Such a shame he leaves under a cloud. More broadly, it’s sad that yet another of our better players leaves in such a way…
Scored twice in consecutive seasons to get us in the CL. Scored the equalizer to get us our first trophy in years.
Stayed when Barca and co wanted him and when everyone was abandoning ship.
Will always be a hero for me.
We’ll forgive him when he comes back as backroom staff in 5 years.
Feel bad about how it ended but the lad gave almost everything for Arsenal. Yes the last few months are not befitting of our club captain but he has played through pain for the cause time and again. Should be fondly remembered in my opinion, but soured by his actions of late.
We put too much of a burden on him. He was playing through a lot of pain but did so as there were no other quality CBs to call upon. He put his body on the line. It shouldn’t have been that way if the club had invested in a quality centre back earlier. Disappointing that he behaved as he did. Not happy with the manner of his departure but will always be grateful to him. A class player.
Thanks for your time. This is a blessing in disguise because we have to buy a centre back now for sure. One who actually wants to be with us.
We can hope…..
We might get Courtinho from Barca on loan. He’s a great defender…
Yes but we have to keep Mustafi too…!
And don’t forget he was our best CB since the invinicbles
Gallas was better.
I’d argue it was our head of academy
Per.
If we’re being honest, that’s not saying much. But I did rate Vermaelen for the most part.
Metersacker was our best defender. Cool head every time. His lack of pace only got d better of him on very few occasions.
So sad to see Kos leave like this. I hope we’ll one day find out what really happened. No matter what though, I’ll always have fond memories of his time at Arsenal, and in time I hope we’ll be able to give him the proper send-off he deserves.
So how do we appraise the Koscielny era? Onwards and upwards hopefully…
Sad ending but, as you say, we don’t know the full story. To judge the facts, he was a fully committed and excellent player for us and I won’t ever forget the cup final equaliser.
Yes it’s possible he moved back to France for family reasons. Nobody can berate a man for that.
How very sad that it’s ended like this. He was always a favourite of mine. I wonder what must have happened for it to come to this? But now it’s over to the recruitment team to use the cash we have available + any extra generated by sales and sell-on-clauses. My dream would be a solid Centre Half and a Full Back. But with Wolves, Leicester, Sp*ds… etc all looking for defenders too, it’s a highly inflated market. Plus teams know we’re desperate. Not the best situation to be in. But lets see if we can pull it out of… Read more »
Why are Spuds looking at defenders? Their back line – though not an impenetrable force of defensive mastery by any means – is twice as good as ours and got them to the UCL final. I’d feel fairly secure with Toby and Jan in the back, personally, at least for now.
They have got Foyth, though…….
It’s just that they’re getting on a bit in age and one of them might be out of contract soon. I think… I don’t really keep track of what they’re up to.
Apart from the gentleman’s agreement, according to The Orn sounds like Emery had plans to not just use him, but use him quite a lot, and apparently Kos wasn’t happy with how he was handled last season and seems Emery wanted more of the same and clearly Kos didn’t want that. Can’t blame him because it’s easy for fans to forget his injury was caused by arsenal mis-handling and overusing him, when he first had the tendintitis yet we kept playing him with cortisol injections and went into a new season with just 3CBs. Shame it’s come to this, but… Read more »
Just like that, my Cyborg is gone… Au’revoir Mon Ami. Definitely a club legend for me. Would have preferred a testimonial game for him though… Good piece of business by the club to get €5 Million for him as well. He will be missed for sure.
Upamenco just moved from an option to a necessity…
COYG!!!
The fee was about as much as we could expect for a 33 year old player with injury problems. It will be interesting to see how many games he actually manages to play for Bordeaux. I hope that he would have got a testimonial in other circumstances.
Latest reports suggest no bid was made for Upamenco apparently, and time is running out. Doesn’t mean we won’t bring in a centre back but it will be a (very) close run thing.
I’m just relieved we got a fee for him, the idea of letting our contracted club captain leave for free due to player power made me a little sick. Thanks for the memories Kos, odd that you didn’t ask to be released while we paid you during your injuries but there you go. A good player for us but nothing more. Time to move on.
On a side note, french L’Equipe wrote one hour ago that Arsenal was about to welcome Couthino on loan… which sounds crazy…
sounds even crazier when we need defense reinforcements more than attack reinforcements…Still hoping we can get a CB and maybe Tierney (now or in January, or get some sort of pre agreement to let us get him in January, I don’t know, something!). Maybe even a RB!
Initial reports a few days ago suggested a) the loan fee for one season would be around £27 million and b) he wanted to stay at Barca anyway, or at least not come to us. Given our desperate need for a proven centre back, spending anything like that kind of dosh on Couthino seems, to use the technical term, completely bonkers!
We won’t have the money for both.
CBack (a truly good one) will cost.
For one I’m sad to see him go. Was still one of our best (if not the best) defender we had. I won’t have ill thoughts about him nor being mad about this, one bad thing doesn’t erase all the things he lived with us, all those important goals, those moments when he was our best defender in ages (alongside Mert), etc. Just sad it ended like this, but good luck to him.
Now can we please get a CB? like for right now, pretty please? I dread the thought to enter the season with our current defense.
Thank you Kos for your service.
See you and so long. I rated Mertesacker higher than Kos. Mertesacker suffered from extreme anxiety before matches – often vomiting before games he was such a bag of nerves. However, he always gave his best.
Koscielny vomited at the the prospect of another year in London. My heart bleeds for the poor mite…
Ah well, life goes on. There will be no statue built for him and rightly so.
Finally, a conclusion to the fiasco!
Yes, it had to be ended in this window – we just couldn’t have him sitting in the reserves for another half a season at the least. Shame it was so acrimonious but we’ll probably never know the full facts.
We really need to get out of this Banter Era. With that said, all the best in Bordeaux Lolo.
Good luck in France, Bosscielny!
He’s been a great player and warrior for us, sad to see it end this way. 5 million is more than I thought we’d get for him.
Yeah but what about Coutinho and Upamecano!? This transfer window is not good for my health, all I’m doing after work is sitting home, refreshing Twitter and drinking beer, I want this to stop.
I think there’s very little chance of Coutinho arriving at a reported £27 million fee for a single season’s loan. Also, he’s rubbished a move, preferring to stay at Barca than join Arsenal – is he mad? Latest press reports suggest Arsenal did not make a formal bid for Upamecano after all. The fee quoted seems a tad high for us anyway unless we’re very creative with repayments etc.. and Leipzig are prepared to play ball. There will probably be more fevered speculation as we near the deadline, often put about by agents. Whether we’ll manage to bring in a… Read more »
That’s probably the case on Coutinho, I made a mistake of getting excited after the L’equipe report. About upamecano, let’s see. The option seems to be rugani.
You don’t live in the real world. Why do we need Coutinho? We already have Ozil, Smith-Rowe and Ceballos. The bloke is also 27yrs and will cost when we need to really be fixing Cback issues now. PLus just FYI, Unai debunked that rumour himself. We do not have the money to go chasing for LB RB Coutinho. This is fantasy stuff. The cost on a TOP END Cback is very high due to lack of supply. Plus they know we need one. We will likely have to put all our resources into it and there is still huge possibility… Read more »
In my ”real world” a report from a moderately respected journalist is more reliable info than anyone’s personal guess about what the club wants to do. And for me coutinho would have been great, an upgrade for iwobi, micki and maybe özil. But it’s not happening, let’s hope for that CB
Thank you, Kos, and all the best!
Good luck Kos. Bordeaux is a lovely city. I am not sorry he is leaving. He has regressed in recent years through no fault of his own (injuries + age + Mustafi can test anyone). That he remained our best defender last season says more about our defence than it does him. All of this unpleasantness does feel unavoidable though considering we all kind of got what we wanted in the end, regardless of who is most at fault.
Agree totally. But Bordeaux should be ashamed of themselves. Got a good player to rebel against his contract to try and steal him on a free…and they are loaded with cash. Really poor form..fuck them
Mercí Kos
Merci Beaucoup. He has done us great service and a massive favour this summer and deserves our utmost respect. Too many naive (and frankly ungrateful) people can’t read between the lines. Club would have likely pointed to Saliba as the future, hobbled a long with Koscielny as a spare one more season pointing to Holding and Chambers as LANS. Sure they’d then use the spare money to spend on Tierney but we would not have addressed outstanding issues at CBack. Arguably we are still in danger of not addressing them. BUT Laurent has forced their hand and made them reconsider… Read more »
If you think Koscielny has engineered a move because he wants Arsenal to improve and sign a quality centre-half you’re way off the mark. This was all about what Koscielny wanted, not what’s best for Arsenal.
I don’t hold a grudge against him. I think the way he’s behaved this summer shouldn’t really overshadow the 9 years, but don’t make out like he was trying to do us a favour!
Add the ‘France to lose the World Cup’ statement into the equation, and maybe we’re seeing a man who is overly selfish. That may be adding 2+2 together and getting 17. But these two incidents don’t fit with my previous angelic perception of his character.
Good news – it was certainly the best outcome for both him and the club.
I’m glad we managed to get a deal done at a sensible fee according to earlier reports and weren’t holding out for the fantasy money (around £10 million) quoted initially.
Let’s move on now and concentrate on the next problem that needs sorting – the fact that we have very few quality (key word) centre backs available for next season and even less time time to do anything about it!
Yes that was just face saving effort.
We should have just let him go start of summer.
This whole thing is a bit farcical.
Koscielny is correct to call time with us. He has been a great servant but we need to fix our issues properly and he knows he is not the answer.
Koscielny-Sokratis against wolves leaked 3 goals without Mustafi.
Ditto in Europa finals (actually four with Torreira culpable for the 4th)
He’s been a phenomenal player for us but he is in waning years (arguably we should have replaced him last summer)
I’m pleased that the club didn’t make it easy. In the last years of AW there was far too much sentiment shown to players and they repaid us with running down their contracts or leaving after long injuries (I’m not talking about Cazorla btw). I think we lost appetite and fight and I feel that playing hardball on Kos sends a good message and rebalances the status quo a little between players and the club.
And I do wish Kos well, he put it on the line for us many times
Extending on Koscielny would have sent the message that we are lazy.
Relinquishing Koscielny without this ridiculous fight would have sent a bolder message reinforced with a proper and immediate replacement at Cback.
The way forward now must be a CBack. I mentioned (as we should all know) start of window priority is Cback, Winger and CM. We’ve done two of them but Cback is still unresolved. Saliba deal is a bit perplexing solves nothing in immediate term, has risk. Looks like Umtiti is a no go. Rugani for me has more questions than answers. Upamecano seems the best option (or Konate his compatriot) but is priced very high at rumoured 72m (considering De Ligt) BUT we can and need to be creative. I heard rumours that Mustafi was offered as makeweight. I… Read more »