Rio Ferdinand has sniped that Arsenal should be used to losing their best players, amidst the likelihood of Alexis Sanchez’s probable summer departure.
The Chilean has supposedly told his team-mates that he is looking to leave the club this summer when he enters the final year of his current contract.
Juventus, Sevilla, Atletico Madrid, Chelsea and Paris Saint-Germain have been most strongly linked with his capture at the end of the season, and Rio Ferdinand has claimed that Gunners fans should no longer be surprised when their best players ask to leave.
He said: ‘I think we’re at a place where Arsenal football club and Arsenal fans are used to being, where their star player wants to leave for pastures new to win trophies.
‘We’ve seen it with Cesc Fabregas, with [Bacary] Sagna, with Robin van Persie, with [Gael] Clichy with [Samir] Nasri.
‘They were all integral parts of this football club left to go win trophies and we’re here again with Sanchez.’
And Ferdinand does not think it is possible to convince the Chilean to stay.
‘No I don’t,’ he said when asked if Sanchez could remain at the club.
‘He’s someone who’s winning with Chile – he wants to do it with club football and he doesn’t see that happening here.’
Do we really have to accept that we are a selling club, and that we are no longer a top side who can challenge for the big trophies?
Has the big-spending nature of other clubs belittled us?
Who could possibly replace Alexis Sanchez this summer?
Pat J