According to The Athletic (£), Arsenal have parted ways with Steve Bould ending a relationship that dates back 33 years.
The former centre-back, 58, has been coaching the under-23s for the last two seasons having returned to academy football following six years as Arsene Wenger’s assistant and a further year working with Unai Emery.
Bould’s first stint with the club’s youngsters lasted from 2001-2012, during which he oversaw two Academy league title wins and success in the 2008/09 FA Youth Cup.
This season his under-23s finished 10th.
When others were sacked or chose to leave in the aftermath of Arsene Wenger’s departure, Bould opted to remain at London Colney to provide a level of continuity.
Having won domestic and European honours with the club as a player and been in the dugout for three FA Cup wins, he can leave with his head held high after so many years of service. We wish him well for the future.
It is understood that Per Mertesacker, the manager of Arsenal’s academy, led the decision and will be charged with finding a replacement.
We’ll.probably never know the reason why, but I’m disappointed to read this news 😔
He actually had it coming, in fact, it was overdue IMO. Never adequately replaced Pat Rice and never done well in the youth coaching. Could be a nice club representative at some level but coaching is not really his thing.
Even so, I can’t see the club detailing why. Just seems a shame given his 33 years service.
Arsenal losing so much DNA that they might have to find a mosquito preserved in amber that bit Herbert Chapman.
Mate, there’s probably only a few of us reading your post who even know who Herbert Chapman was.
He was the one who got the best out of what was available to him by revolutionizing the role of wingers into an attacking force not depending solely on the strikers making the whole league to change and take notice. 3 league titles before his sad demise.
He also invented the 4-4-2 system, advocated floodlights, numbers on the backs of shirts and undersoil heating. People may scoff at these now, but in the 1930’s they were unheard of.
That’s the problem, fans of Arsenal who have no knowledge of club history.
They can’t be bothered with it. It means nothing to them. What’s more, they couldn’t give a shit. Arsenal, as far as they are concerned might just as well have been founded in 2006, not 1886. They think Arsenal is all about here and now. It’s that very attitude that has been assisted by an indifferent owner and a current rookie manager too stubborn to take advice from the greatest manager this club has ever had. It’s killing the very fabric of this club. And it’s going to take more than a large blue canon facing incorrectly on a lemon… Read more »
I hugely disagree with that. He had a brilliant record at youth level, furthermore, the very fact that so many Arsenal players made it from the academy into the first team on such a consistent basis was testament to Boulds efforts recently and down the years. Had some of those youngsters been treated a bit better and fairer this term by Arteta, we could have nearly field half a team with players from our Academy which is basically unheard of these days in top flight football. I can’t really disclose why I think this, so you can take it at… Read more »
Remember when everyone thought Steve Bould would be the hero to our defensive issues?
Pepperidge farm remembers
Possibly a good youth coach. Not management material
Well you’ve contradicted yourself there, as that’s literally what an U23’s manager is — he is a youth coach, not a ‘manager.’ This is a huge part of the Arsenal fandom that I really struggle to deal with. People have these hugely callous opinions on people and topics around the club that they don’t really understand themselves. People have no concept or understanding of the EPPP, U23’s and PL2 football, what it does, its purpose and importance in player development. And I get it to a degree, why would anyone? Its nuanced stuff that you would only really have a… Read more »
The under 23’s manager is not a manager eh?
Maybe that’s why the u23s were on the verge on relegation. Because they had a youth coach as a manager..
See this is exactly what I am saying, you don’t know what you are talking about. Your opinion is completely misguided and sadly widely inaccurate. You cant get relegated from the league in a traditional sense of relegation. To explain briefly, U21’s football was scrapped and they made the Premier League 2 in order to help bridge the ever widening gap between first team football and academy football. The Premier League 2 is comprised of 26 teams (off the top of my head) And all of those teams are considered ‘Cat 1 academies,’ which was a status they applied for… Read more »
Top post, well said.
Bould has been a magnificent ambassador for this club, both on and off the pitch.
People knocking him now are either too young to remember Anfield’89 or too thick to acknowledge a decent man when they see one.
Largely fans and journalists don’t understand football, especially outside of the first team. Some of the stuff doing the rounds regarding Bould and the U23’s is ridiculous, from Arsenal fans no less too. Must’ve lost count of the amount of times I’ve read stuff like ‘Bould hasn’t got a clue tactically,’ When in reality, there is literally zero focus on any tactical principles and philosophies in that environment. As an example why would Steve Bould, start shaping and coaching players how to play in a 433 system, when that player could be loaned out to a League 2 side where… Read more »
Absolutely. 👍🍺
“coaching is not really his thing.”
hey delusional check, then what about the guy who brought arsenal to 9th, who has “training” under Pep.. and with superstars under his management?
Never adequately replaced Wenger, when are we going to address this?
We won’t, not with Kroenke at the helm.
A cheap novice with a ‘nice’ haircut who parrots shit from dawn to dusk is about the going rate.
quite ironic for you to be making comments about parroting shit
Yes because clearly our academy players haven’t been our best 1st team players this year …oh wait
My sentiments exactly.
Fuck this club’s hierarchy. Cunts, the lot of them.
The only important measure of youth coaching success is how well they are prepared for the forest team when the chance comes. Seems these kids have been pretty well prepared. Youth titles really don’t mean squat and focusing on them instead of actual talent results in too often a kid who never really fulfilled his potential.
A bit like Arteta then….
Any insight into why coaching isn’t his thing?
Been at the club for three decades and part of a youth development team that’s delivered us world class and potentially world class players. He must have got one or two things right along the way…
And he was never the defensive coach, that wasn’t his job.
Well said. 👍
A little knowledge isn’t just a dangerous thing.
It can be a fucking hilarious thing too…
The best bit is the fact this guy calls himself ‘Reality Check’…..🤣
Ermmmm ’08 and ’09 Academy Premier League titles and ’09 FA youth cup? Brought through Jack Wilshere and Francis Coquelin.
We have to sometimes deattach ourselves from the emotional aspect of the decision and look at the situation objectively and think what’s best for the club, and a 10th place finish isn’t good enough. It’s like that time I had to break up with my ex-girlfriend. I cared for her dearly but she was a salty and overdramatic c**t that made me feel constantly unhappy about myself. I had to let her go in order to feel and know what’s it like to feel happiness again. It was hard not to call her back after she called me 23x a… Read more »
Yeah?
Well I hope Mr Ruthless falls on his fucking sword when his shite brand of boring football condemns us to mid table again next season.
10th place for u23 is not good enough to retain the manager… 9th place for 1st team?
This comment is gold
Glad you’re over it!
No offence, but you might not be completely over your ex if you’re calling her a salty overdramatic c**t in a comment under an article about Steve Bould.
Also worth pointing out that by far the brightest spark this season was the academy players, imagine how dour this season would have been without them. Not sure why you’d blame the under-23s coming 10th on Bould but not give him any credit for that. I don’t think anyone here has enough information to know if this is a good or bad decision.
Don’t think these guys developed under Bould though, they developed under Freddie while Bould was with the first team
First team finish 10th and therefore…. you sack the youth team coach? Doesn’t make any sense.
A club legend. He will be missed. Always loved his song…
Steve Bold, Steve Bold, Stevie, Stevie Bold
He’s got no hair, but we don’t care
Stevie, Stevie Bold.
🙂
While the results weren’t good, Bould was a club man. All this feels like somebody at the club taking a hammer to the club’s past. Is this similar to the Graham-Rioch-Wenger transition? I dare say that was a bit successful. I only ask because I wasn’t old enough then to totally understand what went on.
To clear up the past for you, it absolutely isn’t like that. Wenger came in and maintained continuity through the back 5, coaches and academy, very much evolution as opposed to revolution.
He educated those already there, rather than just chopping and changing every time there was a not great result. Ah simpler times.
This is true. Wenger just had vision no one else had and wanted to share it not force it. We were blessed to have him.
Many thanks!
However apart from Paul Davis and Steve Bould and Giles Grimandi Wenger didn’t exactly provide platform or welcome or use experience of ex players who played under him. did he?????
I would defend Wenger here. I think after 2004-5 the vision of the club and the goals changed. It was to build a big stadium like Man Utd to have more funds for transfers (everyone thought that was the way forward before Russians and Americans destroyed the competition). Not everyone including the brilliant David Dein agreed with the newer vision and that’s what it led to. Still listen to all the ex-players talking about arsenal and you find it is about the transfers only. Not about how to make the most of the facilities etc. Not everyone has the vision… Read more »
Won’t come as much of a surprise to anyone that’s watched any U23s matches this season. They’ve been pretty chaotic at times.
Great servant to the club, of course. Best wishes Steve for whatever comes next.
What a shame. 33 years of your life working in one place is not easy to achieve.
My take is that the player turnover at youth level is just too high for the boys to gel in less than 12 months. If our new youth pathway is set-up to emulate Chelsea, we can only hope it pays dividends.
I don’t know if it’s just me but I haven’t felt as hopeful for the academy lads since Freddie left.
So Bould finishes 10th and is sacked. But Arteta finishes 10th and maybe 7th and he’s staying… Funny that
Dunno why you’re getting downvotes, a very fair point.
Saddened by this. Not because it’s the right or wrong decision but because he’s a club legend and about the last connection for us older fans. I hope he has a happy retirement, he will be remembered Findlay.
fundly
Fendly?
Finland?
Friendly
Fondles?
*finally
Fun oodles?
Baldly?
Profoundly
🤣🤣🤣
I liked all of them.
Good old Findlay.
Out with mertesacker , a useless player and the worst academy director ever at the Arsenal
If Spurs was a comment
I know right… It’s like someone smeared shit on a wall in esperanto
Imagine how hard one has to try to get so many down votes without a single upvote.
Dumbness can truly be fascinating sometimes.
What is the proof that Mersacker is a great academy director? Doesn’t he have to be accountable for the bad performance as well?
Gary? Is that you Lineker?
He’s made a bad decision, no doubt about it.
Great servant throughout the years. Hope he enjoys his retirement.
As a side note, it was good seeing Pat Rice on the telly the other night and hopefully Bouldy has something to do with the club in the near future
No
Sleep
‘Til Brooklyn!
Shame. Given Smith Rowe, Saka and Nelson graduated to the first team you would think it was actually a success. Of course the under 23s would suffer when the cream of the crop rose right to the top. Good luck to Bouldy whatever he does from here. Perhaps it was his lack of desire to be the senior team manager that did it. Who knows?
Bould got nothing to do with those players getting into the first team. It was mostly because of freddy.
Bould has been there years before Freddy the back stabber
Tell me when both joined the youth side
Isn’t not Freddy who went to West Ham and said bad things about the club at his first press conference
Arsenal is becoming unidentifiable
Yep.
You don’t know what you’re talking about mate.
Sadly I think it’s been coming for awhile though always a shame to lose such a club icon.
We’d have had Invincible team years earlier if Bouldy hadn’t been injured during Chelski game in 1991. Most underrated CB of his time, solid without flash alongside TA.
Great point – a lot of people don’t realise how close we came to an Invincibles side in 1990/91. Just that one defeat to those Kings Road cunts.
Steve Bould is an Arsenal legend through and through. I’ve nothing but gratitude for his years of service and the memories. Part of that ’89 team at Anfield. The 2 goals against Sampdoria. The through ball to Adams in ’98. One would hope this is a footballing decision and not because he was on a high salary. But with Arsenal, you never know. Presumably Mertesacker has a candidate already lined up, or at least a shortlist of interested replacements. But with Arsenal, you never know. Isn’t Edu’s kid in the youth team – at least that means Edu won’t settle… Read more »
For anyone following the u23s, this is not surprising news. The youth team has been very poor for a while now. They only narrowly escaped relegation on the penultimate match day.
With that being said, I wish him all the best.
A club legend. There is know doubt. However Steve truly has been lucky to retain a job when you consider the latter Wenger years of where is our defence. Where was his input
All good things come to an end. Time for a refresh.
Jack Wilshere was doing his coaching badges. Given how he’s not able to get in bournemouth first 11, he might as well retire and resume his badges here? One of the greatest prodigies of our youth program in the last decade.
Let’s put someone in with zero experience – Raul is that you?
Let’s become a retirement home for past players.
its great to have some continuity but that’s not the same as giving a job to an6 past player doing his badges. Brilliant as Wilshere was, there has to be evidence of the mindset and maturity required to impart knowledge. It’s easy to be a pupil . Very very hard to be a teacher.
If he comes to do his training badges wouldn’t he still be a pupil whilst he does that
So our biggest problem is the academy. We needed that big prize, youth champions.
I’d bring back Freddy Ljungberg at U-23 head coach or have Dennis Bergkamp.
Can we stop hiring based on what one has done in the past and instead focus on what one can do in the future please
Freddy did well with under 23, finished second, I guess and many of the current players were being trained by Freddy and the previous Dutch manager who won the PL2. However, I assume Freddy would not want to go back to an old position.
Freddie left the academy because he wanted a manager job at senior level, but nobody came calling for him
This.
The youth players did seem to love Freddie and he seemed to have a good working relationship with Per.
Steve Bould sacked by arsenal.
Honestly this site has become a steaming pile of click bate shit
I’m done with you bullshit
You are no better than AFTV
Do you promise?
It’s an arsenal fan site. A manager was literally sacked by the club? Why would you be surprised arseblog is reporting it? It’s actual Arsenal related news. Get a grip.
Bye bye.
A very sad day when the last of our old guard is made redundant. Wishing you well in your retirement Bouldy.
An absolute disgrace, especially when you look at the number of players who have recently graduated from the academy and made their way to the first XI. What a way to treat such a loyal servant to the club. Fuck you Kroenke, this guy is worth a million of you. This fucking club is burning effigy of its former self. Thank fuck I remember the days when it had standards. Yes, Kenny Sansom liked a bet, we then had the Tuesday club, Tony Adams was done for drink driving, Merse had his problems with gambling drink and drugs and George… Read more »
Sad to see a true legend depart like this, I hope this is because we have earmarked someone who is better and nothing else. As our u23s have been very useful to us of late so it makes sense to try and take that team to another level.
I think with the struggles of this year, it seems a reasonable decision. Maybe they just really wanted some new “fresh” energy in the building from their perspective. Of course decisions like bringing in Dinzeyi, Akinola in and loaning out our most important player makes it difficult for him. But even then, securing safety at the last day is a bit much. But it could get even harder next year, with the likes of Cottrell and all of last years loanees also going out. I expect. And I expect Sheaf, Bola, Osei-Tutu and the “oldheads” to leave. Let’s hope that… Read more »
People saying youth titles don’t matter. They absolutely do. Winning matters. It’s important they get used to the idea of that and build that mentality.
Until they’re commanded to relentlessly pass the ball backwards and sideways.
I wouldn’t say sacked. Let’s say parted ways.
Or….Arsenal stopped mailing his paychecks
Due to “a glitch in the system”
David Luiz spends 3 years with the club with his hit or shit performance and every one gets teary eyed when Arsenal post Thank You Luiz. Meanwhile the real legend of the club who spend 11x times more than luiz, 3 decades of service, part of the golden era gets sacked for one bad season for the u-23s … Like u-23 is bigger than epl. Was happy with Raul getting sacked but you don’t do that with legends of the club. The sooner the Kroenkes are out the better.
Top post.
This ‘It’s All About Now’ attitude sickens me to the core.
This club is now Arsenal in name only.
Absolutely 100% correct. Wtf is happening to the Arsenal?!
So, let me get this straight.
One guy who finishes 10th at youth level gets the sack.
Another guy who has taken the first team down to 16th and scrapes home between 7th and 9th keeps his job.
Yes but you forgot the critical difference; it’s not Arteta’s fault. Everything else is everybody else’s fault but nothing is Arteta’s fault.
“Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” Change is inevitable if we want to improve. Thank you Steve Bould for all your service and for helping us get to this point. Now for the future…..
Oh, we’ve had ‘change’ alright….
And, but for Bould’s Academy youngsters, that ‘change’ might well have resulted in relegation.
Steve Bould is such a dour character I’ve never understood how he managed to relate to the young players, and the best Academy graduates have come through while Freddie was there. Times have moved on from the old school approach and I think this is the right decision.
Once again you excel yourself….
Times have indeed moved on though.
We now fuck around 16th at Christmas and crawl into 7th to 9th on the final day….
Oh dear! Sounds liie a classic corporate backstabbing. Terrible PR for the Arsenal FC. Feelling sad for Steve…
😡 scapegoat. per what has he done?? #spotifyin
For those hating Mikel, hes won two trophies as a complete rookie, we have the 3rd best defensive record this season after an awful start, and on league form since December were are second behind only city for points gained since. ‘Fans’ need to listen to facts rather than mug pundits, repeating their hate isnt helping our club.
Finishing mid table doesn’t help either.
Neither does football to slash your wrists to and pressers straight out of Fairy land.
“Points since December” is the new “fourth place trophy”.
Remember Villareal? I guess not.
Backing a manager who clearly isn’t up to the job isn’t “helping our club” either.
Kroenke sent a memo to sack the underachieving Arsenal manager but Vinnai got confused.
We have big problems with leaks, this should have come from the club first, the clubs communication sucks
Steve Bould was a big part of teams that won 3 top flight titles, 2 FA Cups, 1 league cup, 1 cup winners cup, and has over 350+ appearances for Arsenal over 11 seasons
Won 2 titles and a cup managing at youth level, and we won 3 FA Cups with Bould as our Assistant manager
Steve Bould = Arsenal legend ❤️
Yeah I think this is a really important point. The decision might have been made this wake with the club planning on announcing it after the season, or bringing him on the pitch today, or presenting it as an amicable parting of ways like Wenger. Somebody leaked it and now it’s ‘Club legend is sacked’ when we should have controlled the message much better
Legend Gooner & that chipped pass to Adams to smash it home for 4-0 Wow !!! Thanks Steve Bould sad to see you go big man
We want the club to take the hard decisions and move forward. This might not be palatable to us, but let’s hope this means they mean business at last.
Bould move
Breaking news: Arsenal sack former-player-turned-coach after disappointing season.
Goodbye, great guy and unbelievable servant to the Arsenal. For over 30 years too! Godspeed.
i remember he was supposed to be a defensive genius that was going to help Wenger! no issue with him going but board need to grow a spine and sack Arteta.
What do you mean ‘supposed’…?
Put him in his prime and he would walk into any Arsenal side since the time he actually played for us.
Agree with you regarding Arteta though. 👍