Arsenal still have a feeder club mentality and need to stop allowing their players to join their Premier League rivals. Guest post by Sarah Rohan
As we know, there’s a few of our players possibly up for grabs in the two coming transfer windows. Aubameyang, Lacazette, Nketiah, Pepe and Balogun.
Over the years our club has had a habit of losing our top players to our rivals! Do you think it’s going to happen again? Is there really no way to avoid this from happening?
Take a look back at some of our best players who have left us and done well with their new clubs going on to win league titles and cup competitions:
Robin Van Persie to Manchester Utd.
Ashley Cole to Chelsea
Samir Nasri to City also.
Oxlade-Chamberlain to Liverpool.
Giroud to Chelsea as part of some sort of three-way deal with Michy and Aubameyang all moving clubs.
Clichy, Bacary Sagna & Adebayor all to the Etihad also.
It is a little early to be worrying about losing any of our current crop to our rivals however, with only whispers of such a possibility at present, but it only takes an injury or drop in form from a player for our rivals to want to bring in reinforcements.
Obviously we haven’t had the best last few seasons and can’t really class the likes of Liverpool or Man City ‘rivals’, and being out of Europe we can’t really complain that a player would want to follow their dream and play for the likes of Real Madrid.
Hopefully now Arteta is progressing with the team and we clearly have some special talents emerging, this will change, and we’ll be back in top-four contention next season and back in Europe.
Can I see any of these clubs coming in for our players? Unfortunately, yes I can…
I already think some have got their eyes on them and are waiting for their opportunity to strike. Could Tuchel want Auba back in his team after managing him at Borussia Dortmund? Very possibly…
Could the likes of Spurs or Manchester Utd come in for Pepe or Nketiah or even our present captain Alexander? I couldn’t see Auba leaving for them as he trolls them too much but the others I can.
Will it come back to haunt us? Yes. I believe our loss would be their gain.
So no more selling to our rivals! This feeder club mentality has to stop and you shouldn’t even consider selling our young stars of the Arsenal future. In fact their contracts should have a clause that they can’t be join any rivals in the next ten years. Here’s wishing!
What do you think? Are rival clubs going to poach our players? Will we end up regretting it once again?
Enjoy the Xmas festivities Arsenal family and stay safe!
No I have no fear clubs will poach our players.
If they did buy a Saka an ESR or a Martinelli we would make 70m+ a piece so we would win.
My biggest concern is clubs will only offer peanuts for Auba (age /salary) Laca(age/salary) Pepe (not worth 30% his 72m fee) Torreira (worth only 5m of his 27m fee). Bellerin (3m)Kolasinac, Elneny, Mari Cedric impossible to get a fee. Losing Nketia (free) or Niles (10m) is no loss except as home grown quota but Saka, Martinelli and Saliba will be home grown soon. Losing Guendouzie is no loss. Losing Leno is no problem except we probably struggle to get 50% of what we paid for him.
fairfan, I asked you a question that you may not have seen.
When MA gave Aubemeyang his contract, did he make him a prima donna?
I was one of the few people that didn’t want Auba to be rewarded with a £300,000 a week contract.
I was saying £220,000 a week would be about right.
But as always we have a very overly emotional fanbase that were crying for the club to pay him what he wanted.
I saw another Ozil situation. Over indulged fans threatening to boycott the club and it’s merchandise if prince Ozil was not given whatever wages he was asking for.
I hope the club has learnt from their mistakes. Don’t always give into our overly emotional fans demands on player contracts.
KEN in life, as in football, no one save THE PLAYER HIMSELF can ever MAKE you into a prima donna.
If you are SERIOUSLY asking did MA make him a prima donna via that contract, then you cannot know as much about human nature as I had previously thought.
I do not think Auba is a true prima donna, as his time here shows its not the case, but is simply ill disciplined and far too laid back in his ways.
Jon, this question was posed as part of a reply to fairfan on another subject.
This was a watered down version in order to get some kind of response – it doesn’t seem to have worked!!!
@ken1945.Just seen your question. Ken I believe
The Aubameyang issue is all part of a horrendous era of vast spending on expensive players given long term contracts on huge salaries who have not lived up to their billing.
Almost all of these players are pre Arteta except Willian. Ozil 350k p/w, Ramsey Mustafi Socritis all left on frees. Lacazette 50m 182k p/w likely to leave on a free. Kolasinac 120k p/w leaving on a free. Pepe 72mill and yet to come good.
Who reccomended Willian on 200k p/w I don’t know but the EDU Brazillian connection comes to mind? Aubameyang is pre Arteta coming to Arsenal in January 2018 under Wenger as a result of the Sanchez debacle. Remember City offered Arsenal 60m when Sanchez was burning it up in the league. Sanchez wanted to go to a club who could win trophies but Arsenal wanted more and City finally looked elsewhere. Sanchez sulked and went on strike so was let go for free and Mourinho paid him 400k p/w to go to United where he flopped. We got Mkhitarian in a swap who eventually went on loan to Roma and left on a free. The club unnecessaritly spent 60m on Aubameyang as a sop to the angry fans. First Emery and then Arteta inherited this mess. Not wanting to lose another player on a free especially one who was prolific (at the time) forced Arsenal to give Auba the extension like Wenger felt he had to give Ozil an extension after losing RVP. The Guendouzie and Saliba loans are down to Artetas new ultra disciplined approach under the new process of recruiting young totally loyal players with good resale futures. Arteta has not lost control of Auba who has only minor misdemenours and their relationship will be fine. Auba is not a prima donna but any player being paid 50,100,200,let alone 300k p/w is living in a parallel Universe to 99.999% of the rest of us. I fear for Saka ESR Martinelli earning huge salaries and being lauded by millions at such a young age. Keeping them grounded is going to be a test.
Auba has been a supestar 12 years and to be fair has an excellent conduct record overall.
The fact that Artea played Auba constantly despite his ten game goal drought would indicate a lot of trust and faith between coach and captain. Auba will do penance then be reintroduced slowly and I hope still has a lot to offer the club. Cheers
I don’t think we are. Feeder club at all. We haven’t lost anyone we didn’t want to let go since we got back on top of the new stadium financing 5 or 6 years ago. We were happy to sell the Ox for £40m just good business. We have the finances not to need to sell anyone we want to keep.
Depends on the players. If the player is kinda useless like Ozil, I wouldn’t be worried at all
It depends on the team where they may be going. If you have a team that plays 2 DMs and has mobile attackers which allows Ozil to be a free man without have to track back…I’d be very worried.
If he was still dangerous, top teams in EPL, La Liga or Serie A would’ve competed for his signature before he signed his big contract extension at Arsenal
I could name a list of players, I wouldn’t worry about, who they join as long as we get them off our wagebill, and maybe even get a bit of transfer income for them.
But there are also a few players, I wouldn’t like to lose to PL rivals.
The most valuable players we have atm are the kids.
Auba, Laccazet and Pepe are not the kind of players they used to be and I doubt any of our ‘rivals’ would be interested in having them.
I’ll say let’s make some money out of Newcastle, if any of them is willing and with right offer
In wenger time as a manager his policy of giving players over 30 a one year contract was a good idea,
If a player gets a one year contract and he proves his worth another one give it to him,
If he doesn’t play well let him go or offer him a lesser contract simple….
I cannot believe that Auba ,Laca or Pepe would be of interest to the current top three.As it is, Lacca brings a different dimension to our team when he plays and clearly brings out the best in ESR, Saka and Martinelli.In the first half against Leeds ,we played like Liverpool, with a deep lying C.F linking with wingers who stayed wide and high up the pitch.I am not privy to what is going on behind closed doors, but I would not be averse to offering Lacca a one year extension, on his current salary.As for Auba and Pepe we will be hard pressed to find a Club to take the former off our hands even if we made him available for a nominal fee of one pound.The situation with Pepe is one which completely frustrated me.The lad is talented with attributes of real quality.Unfortunately, in the EPL he does not have the time nor space that he had in the French League where he caused havoc in his role as an inverted RW.In the EPL, the only hope is to play him on the left where he can be effective and where he can cross on the run.An opportunity exists for Arteta to play him on the left against Sunderland tomorrow with Nketiah in the middle and perhaps ESR on the right.That is what I hope happens, but I suspect Arteta will rest the front three which did so well against Leeds and play Pepe on the right. With respect to Sunderland, if he does not shine against them, the writing is on the wall for Pepe as far as his career with Arsenal is concerned.I really hope he has a stormer, wherever he plays, and proves he still has a future with us.
Grandad, though I much agree with the thrust of your post and also agree that Pepe should always have been played on his natural left side, I have aways maintained that any talented player without a fierce and constant will to win ; ie to show them who is boss, so to speak, is doomed to failure in our Prem.
The French league, as you have outlined now and previously, is VERY different from our Prem.
I truly think Pepe has now run his course at our club, despite his undoubted ability, and we will be actively seeking to move him out asap for whatever fee we MAY, or more likely may NOT, be able to get.
A huge and unnecessary waste of all that £72 mil, plus wages. Sigh!
All the players listed as possible outgoings – Pepe, Nketiah, PEA, Lacazette- are arguably not part of our future core. No point hanging on to them.
It’s a far cry from when we were losing the likes of Cole, Sagna and Van Persie.
Obviously it’s a game change if one of our young core gets his head turned. But Garland seems to be doing a good job of getting the tied down.
This is a pertinent observation, not to sell our players to rival teams in the PL because it will come back to haunt the club very much.
God bless Arsenal FC
The irony of the question is bitter sweet.
Our most successful manager ever, was FORCED to sell his best players, but still managed to achieve top four and Cup success for two decades.
I hope MA is never put in that position, but if he is, then I expect him to be as successful as AW was.
A simple reason. For how many years have Arsenal been selling their top players. If Arsenal wants to be Top Top and be ambitious u dun sell Yr best players unless u can find back the same quality or better at a much cheaper price.
Players do have ambitions. So if a team is challenging for CPL or Epl hardly players will wana leave.
Ofc all teams regardless of how good they are there will come a time some of them will leave if not for their ambitions or homesick or trying a different environment or best Keep on challenging and became legendary players in the same club which I believed if Arsenal keeps challenging. Most of the lads here we have now will one day become another group of exciting lengenday generation.
If Grealish is worth £100m, then Saka & Smithrowe in a years time (the way theyre developing) will be worth at least that or more.
Both English/Homegrown, both u20 and lighting the league up but on long term deals along with Martinelli & Martin Ødegaard will all be £60m+ in value come years time.
Tomi, Taveres, Ramsdale & Gabriel are worth alot more than what we paid now for sure.
I dont see any of them leaving the club any time soon, they are Arsenal boys through the Academy along with Balogun when he gets a chance, boys a goal scorer. Our Academy will save us millions and make us milli9ns in the long term, Patino another fine little magician we have found who we will see more of in the summer.
Just need to cut the old guard out at whatever cost and build around what we have now in the starting 11.
Sean, agree with all you say, except that last paragraph.
First of all, you need senior players, such as Lacazette, to show, encourage and help.
Secondly, if we keep wasting kronkie’s money by selling or giving away players, he will eventually want to stop tossing good money after bad.
Mav is a classic example of giving talented players away for peanuts, just because we have an excess of CB’s.
Time for the club to wise up, otherwise the goose will stop laying the golden egg.
depends on the player(s) involved