Arsenal have amazing players but the sad reality is they won’t remain loyal forever.
Since his appointment in December 2019 Mikel has done a pretty good job in his first managerial appointment of his career so far, despite the ups and downs, no one can argue against the fact that we’re currently on an upward trajectory as a club moving forward.
This has been helped, not just by the great job he’s been doing, but also by the clever recruitment and development of our players by the club. This has seen us not just improve collectively but individually as well, in this never ending search for major silverware.
The improvement has been there for the whole world to see over the past few years with us now being consistent title chasers, in arguably the best league in the world, against (in my opinion) the best team in the world,
This has been possible by the help of the quality players we’ve had at our disposal for some years now. We must not forget however that this much attention we’ve been getting will come with the risk of potential interests in our stars from European giants, (I was tempted to use “bigger clubs” but my ego is too fragile for that and most gooners can say the same!)
We’ve already seen interest from one of these European giants in one of best players already, with reports suggesting them to be planning a move next summer, the club in question being Real Madrid and also the player in question being the ever impressive William Saliba.
Though it is only ‘interest’ it has got me thinking of the possibility of these so called “European giants” enticing our players with their never ending stream of wealth and European history, this is a huge worry to us, especially if we don’t start winning major honours soon, because these players can only stay loyal for so long.
They are all sold on the project, but anything can still happen when Europe’s elite come looking for you.
Do you all think that failure to win anything major soon will lead to some big exits in the squad?
KENNETH BENJAMIN.
ADMIN COMMENT
So here are some simple rules which I must insist commenters follow….
You agree not to give any personal abuse to other Arsenal fans. Everyone is allowed to hold their own opinions even if you disagree with them. It COSTS NOTHING TO BE POLITE TO OTHER ARSENAL FANS.
CALLING ALL ARSENAL FANS! Anyone who would like to contribute an Article or Video opinion piece on JustArsenal, please contact us through this link…
Modern players do not care about trophies and individual honors. How much they earn is the primary and most likely the only factor.
I don’t agree with that at all. If you want just one example, look at Harry Kane – he clearly didn’t move to Bayern Munich for any extra money but for the prospect of winning silverware which he couldn’t get at Sp*rs after many years.
You seem to forget that all top players (and these are the ones we’re talking about) are already millionaires by their early twenties in many cases – it goes with their status of “stars”. It’s natural, therefore, that they’ll want more than “just” that.
The extra is the honours – the winners medals, the team photos with the trophies etc. to go with the personal awards and the international caps. That’s what you’re remembered for as a player – what you did, what you won – not the size of your wage packet!
That’s why Arsenal needs to start winning trophies or the pull of clubs which do win them (and some on a very regular basis) will inevitably become greater as time goes on. I fear some of our players won’t be anything like as patient as Kane was before looking elsewhere.
Kane Spurs salary 200k per week.
Kane Bayern salary 400k per week.
He has been a great player for England but has nothing by way of trophies at club level. Bayern Munich has won eleven of the past twelve league titles, never mind about other cups. Coincidence? Come on.
I don’t agree HH. While there may be the odd mercenary out the (rare) players want trophies.
I agree. What will players be remembered for? Trophies or their wage packet?
“Reports” are just modern-day twaddle, written by journos trying to satisfy (and benefit from) a 24-hour news cycle.
Ad Martin here has the unenviable job of re-reporting all the guff that’s written on other sites around the world, which leads to a self-perpetuating cyclone of made-up cr*p.
If you look at all the “reports” of interest in players that have appeared on this site over the years, how many came true? 1%? I’d be interested in the numbers – in fact, I’d be surprised if it even reached 1%.
Some people are calling it a “Woozle”, named after the Winnie the Pooh story when two of the (less intellectually gifted) characters are following footprints in the snow, the trail gets bigger and wider as time goes by… they name the beast a Woozle. Along comes Christopher Robin and they tell him what they are doing. He points out that they are walking round in a circle in the wood and the footprints are their own…
That’s what the internet does these days. One article gets written, it gets linked to from other sites, more sites link to those sites and so on… eventually, one article (which may have been true or false or just made up on the spot)… leads to a widespread belief that something is true. But the reality is that it’s like a Woozle, a wide paper trail of apparent evidence which is actually not much of anything at all.
The internet is a dangerous place, especially for those without the life experience to understand it.
A Woozie. I like that!
I believe we need the coming in now to compliment the effort of both the team and players individually. I read a Saliba quote saying the only thing stopping him from being called a world class player is lack of trophies.
Player like Saliba, for example, won’t hang on for long without trophies I believe.
I do not think lack of trophies is a problem at Arsenal. For the last two seasons, we have busted a gut to compete for the league title but that effort meant we were always going to fall short on domestic cups. I can see us picking up a few now we have a squad to compete on all fronts.
Some players may move on and the motivation will be a mix of money, success and different challenges. Saudi Arabia would bring the most money but the trophies are not worth much. Real Madrid would bring the most glamour, there are rumours they want Saliba but they rarely pay defenders the best wages and we could compete on that front for a player of his quality.
Ultimately, these players are only on contracts of a few years and if they want to move on then there is nothing we can do, little gained from pointing the finger and questioning their motives.
We need to be winning trophies to keep our top players look at for instance Henry / Fabregas and so on we lost great players like them because we couldn’t compete in Europe like Barcelona/madrid/ Bayern and other big clubs like them we won 3 premiership with great players but we need to be looking g for bigger things with this group of players and I think mikel has the vision for this