You Can't Convince the People that you're a Big Club

These were Wenger's words last summer:

"Imagine the worst situation - we lose Fabregas and Nasri. You cannot convince people you are ambitious after that. You can't then pretend you are a big club because a big club holds on to its best players and gives a message to all the other big clubs that they can't come in and take our players."

Unfortunately we lost both having said that, at the same time, to lose Fabregas and Nasri, and RVP a season later after the type of season he has will be a major statement for the people, especially Arsenal fans, that this club does really lack ambition, and is not a big team. Arsenal need to stick to their guns no matter what, and keep RVP.

It wouldn't even be good business for Arsenal to sell RVP, because we would get nothing near the amount of money he's worth in this inflated transfer market. RVP's worth to sell, realistically should be anywhere from 35-50 million pounds, but no club will offer that much money because they know he is available for free next season. This isn't a Fabregas situation where he still had years left on his contract, and we did not need to sell, hence we controlled the pricing (and still did a very **** job at that). If we do sell RVP, we'd get a max of 25 million, and that at the end of the day, that's not worth a price to sell RVP for. Secondly, it's not like someone will be able to come in and just take RVP's place and do what he did for us, so it would all in all be a loss rather than a gain, plus it would mean starting all over again after losing another star player.

So it is really make or break for Arsenal, sell RVP, then we as fans know it's the same old crap, and nothing is ever going to change with this current establishment. Keep a hold of RVP, then we as fans know the establishment is getting serious, and is showing real ambition as well as showing some balls.

Lastly, I will say this too, out of all the stars we have lost, Henry, Vieira, Fabregas, Nasri etc. RVP will be the BIGGEST one of all, this is a man playing at the peak of his power, entering into the leagues of your Messi's and Ronaldo's with his stats. When we lost Henry he was past it, the same for Vieira. Nasri was easily replaceable and nothing special without Wenger as can be seen in City, while Fabregas too was replaceable, heck Song has done a masterful job in taking Fabregas' role as the middle play maker to set up goals.

But a player like RVP, who scores week in week out, with the type of goals he scores, is not something you can replace. It's taken us more than 5 seasons to finally have an out and out goal scorer after Thierry Henry, that shows how difficult it is to find a striker who can provide you with consistent goals. Adebayor seemed to have done that in 08 when he scored 30 goals (6 of them btw came against Derby, who had the worst defence in the league, a hatrick at the emirates, and one up at Derby), but as seen, that was just one good season for him. RVP on the other hand, since his return in December 2010 has been banging in goals none stop for us, basically for the past 2 seasons he has been a world class goal scorer, and it doesn't look like ending anytime soon.

 

At this current moment, RVP is pretty much irreplaceable and I think we would be making a massive mistake selling him.

 

Im my opinion the best player we lost in the last 15 years was nicolas anelka, I believed that he had the potential to be the best striker in the world. He had a great season, before we sold him, and took on the mantle as bergkamp had been injured for large parts of the season. Wenger wanted to pair him with henry, with bergkamp playing behind, imagine that. Plus he had so many good years left in him. Even tho we went on to have success after he left, I believe that we would have won at least 1 more title, and done better in the CL if we had kept him. Was such a shame that he was brain washed by his brother (who was his agent) just because he wanted to make lots of money.

I don't believe RVP will be the biggest loss, I remember when we lost overmars and pettit, people were making out we would be mid table, petit was our best player that season, and outshone viera, so while it would be a big loss to lose RVP, I dont believe it would be as bad as people make out, as I said, the amount of doom and gloom around the club when overmars and petit left was pretty bad, but we still survived, we are more that a one man club, and we always will be.

 

To an extent i agree, but the circumstances are different now - our squad has been degraded to such an extent that losing RVP would have a bigger impact than any other player(s) we have lost. If not for RVP we would not have been playing CL football next season. Unless Wenger invests in a few new players, which he will not, RVP is important to us next season. Without him we will continue our decline.

 

Losing RVP, Nasri and Febregas in the space of 2 seasons would basically be the end of the Arsenal everyone has grown accustomed to.

I don't think you play the same caliber of football you once did.

 

He's the hardest to replace from this squad, but keeping him at all costs isn't the best thing we could do. If he really insists to leave, comes out with comments on the press, and we keep him against his will... it's just asking for more drama that could hurt the whole team.

From hero, to "still-captain" that would **** on the whole team's morale. Not worth it.


If we do enough to make him choose to stay, great. But seeing his contract through against his will is the worst we could do to the team. He is the captain, and if he has to be forced to sit through a season, what can you expect from the rest of the team.

 

I think it's appalling that's it's come to this. The squad is of much lower quality than it used to be. Last summer we effectively lost Fab, Nasri AND Wilshere and relied on a sublime season from RVP to avoid a humiliating end of season position. It's about time the squad was given the investment needed.

 

Although I think Fabregas was a bigger loss than Van Persie would be Arsenal cannot claim to be interested in anything other than MONEY if they sell Van Persie.

 

Some of the debate has shifted, it doesn't matter if you think RVP will be a bigger loss than player X, fair enough I do, but the MAIN POINT is that if we lose him, then that would be another major player gone 1 season after losing Fabregas and Nasri. That ultimately shows we are not a big club with major ambitions. You can't continuously go season after season selling your best players if you have big ambitions of wining things, and it's not the best message to be sending out to the fans.

We need to keep hold of RVP, that's the bottom line, he cannot leave Arsenal. He's the best striker in the country, and one of the top 3 in Europe. His goal to game ratio since December of 2010 has been MAGNIFICENT, and you couldn't ask more from a striker.

 

The bottom line is, RVP was instrumental in getting us Champions League Football this season, and will most likely be the deciding factor next season too. The funny thing is, if we end up selling him for around £20m-£25m and if we consequently don't qualify for the Champions League, we automatically lose that figure and more. So it really makes little sense selling him.

 

Exactly, investing in the team would be better financially in the long run anyway. Companies like to offer large sponsorship deals to winners, not also-rans.

 

The biggest problem i see is us getting consistent top 4 season after season. This justifies the current administration's selling of our best players year after year, then investing in cheaper/younger alternatives thus making more money. Why do they need to fight for the likes of RVP if Wenger is able to get us into the top 4? We've been the victims of our own success. Only when we drop out of the top 4 will this current administration get up and take some notice. The huge money that the Champions League carries will be a huge hole in their revenue market, this is something they can't do without. Just imagine the massive profit drop they'll take....

 

I get your point, but we had no success since 2005. When the fans en masse make it clear that a top 4 place is not success, then the board may listen. Whilst the team get plaudits for their failures, I can understand why the board and Wenger feel comfotable with what they are doing. They must be laughing their assess off. They can hoard a pile of cash and have the fans on side.

 

Agreed. The power is with the people, it always has been. Only until people realise this, will change ultimately happen....

 

Your problem is that the leading revolutionaries do nothing but alienate those you need to convert. Whilst there is some merit in the cause, it's message is overshadowed by the destructive, anti social personalities trying to champion it.

The revolutionaries need a revolution in order to change their spokespersons if they are to have a hope of succeeding.

 

Spoken like a true sheep . Let the people I disagree with go away and the revolutionaries can then be people I agree with

 

^^^ Point proven

 

I think you are mistaken in the belief that I want you to agree to anything - I prefer your outbursts

 

Lol, you have a good point. Jayram you've clearly missed COYG point. You can't hope to get your point across if you end up insulting your intended audience. This will only create revulsion and natural distaste, even if your points are valid and agreed upon.

 

Except COYG is not my intended audience... there are some that will never change thier views, so they just have to be 'hung from the rafters' when its all over.