Tony Adams has slammed Arsenal for their summer business, in particular, the signing of Willian.
The Gunners signed the 32-year-old in the last transfer window for free on a three-year deal and the Brazilian has not been useful to them since.
He is yet to score a goal for the club this season and he has set up three goals in just two of his league games this season.
As Arsenal continues to struggle, the club should be able to call on an experienced player like him to help them out, but he looks worse than the younger players in the team.
Adams said Arsenal signed him purely because he was recommended by Edu’s agent.
He also says that Arsene Wenger would never have signed an attacker as old as the Brazilian because he didn’t have the physiological capability to deliver anymore.
Adams told Stadium Astro: ‘That’s lazy recruitment for me. You’ve got to really question the recruitment process at Arsenal at the moment.
‘We’ve had some wonderful players and wonderful principles under Arsene Wenger. He went for a young player, you wouldn’t have even considered Willian if Arsene was still in control at the club.
‘For him a forward over the age of 30, physiologically he doesn’t think he can get that player to consistently to perform to the levels that Arsene would want him to get, it wouldn’t even have been on the agenda.
‘This is a straightforward agent recommendation, he’s got the same agent as the sports director [Edu] so it’s an easy option for him, three-year contract, there we go. I think it’s really poor recruitment.
‘As a coach, you’ve been given this player, you wanted this player. You don’t have to play them. He’s not playing [Mesut] Ozil, one of the greatest creative players there is.
‘And to have someone like Willian, one shot in 12 games. I’m like, “hold on put [Joe] Willock out there”, we’ve got [Gabriel] Martinelli back in there. You’ve got other options.’
Cant find anything on him bashing the player when we signed him, hindsight is a wonderful thing.
Semantics aside, just ask yourself, is he wrong? Putting aside his commentary regarding what Wenger would or wouldn’t do, as that doesn’t matter anymore, why would a club, operating under the guise of resurrecting the brand by building for the future, unnecessarily burden it’s already bloated weekly wage bill by bringing in a player of his advanced age…furthermore, we didn’t even bring him in to assume a similar “super-sub” role, like at Chelsea, we actually promised him a starting gig, when we already had our most expensive recruit ever and a long-term academy project to fill that position…so if you want to fixate on the fact Adams may or may not have spoke publicly about his disdain for this move at the time, that’s your prerogative, but I would much rather focus on the facts at hand…the situation requires the fans to adopt a steely 100 yard stare, so we can devote our collective energies on much more lofty pursuits, like finding a way to get our pox of an absentee landlord out of North London
“the situation requires the fans to adopt a steely 100 yard stare”
I think you are vastly overestimating the the fan power generated by commenting on an arsenal blog… I agree with what hes saying but me parroting that back is not going to change the club.
Furthermore I’d hardly say one comment on this topic once can be regarded as “fixating”
“so we can devote our collective energies on much more lofty pursuits”
Good luck with that our fan base is as divided as ever 👍
I would have thought signing Partey (apparently one of the best DM-CM in world football)
Gabriel-been absolutely solid for us and looks a steal
Willian -one of Chelsea’s best players over the last 3 seasons .
That would be a good summer of signing for us .
2/3 are what every fan as been crying out for for ages , so I don’t get what Adams is talking about .
I for one was super excited with the transfer business,I’m not sure what else the club could have done , you can’t sign countless players and hope for the best ,you sign what you need and then build from that .
3 players signed was a massive start ,and all 3 are (or can be ) top notch.
As much as I grew up watching Adams(one of the best I’ve seen live )when it comes to talking about football he as no clue .
I watched Arsenal on an American stream a couple of weeks ago and he was a guest and his football knowledge was on par with Stan collymore .
Great player but not one I would take his word as gospel.
Thank you dan 👏👏
I don think too many fans were excited by William coming to Arsenal something which was also pointed out. There were more urgent priorities that the club didn’t address. My own feelings were that his addition to the squad wouldn’t hurt, however making him central is shear stupidity. At his age offering him a three year contract for such money was currupt. Expecting him to be better than Ozil only adds to the insult.