[emergingstar]

Originally Posted by Quazzie

That still doesn't explain why there was no effort made to replace them with all the money that was available to them.

I agree that we should have spent more, but I'm not having we sold them to make money

[FUNKY LOVER]

One thing I will never forgot is letting flamini diarra and Gilberto go only to replace them with denilson,total mis management,everyone could see how bad he was years before wenger.and his policy of not giving proper contracts to players over 30 like pires only to sign silvestre on a 2 year contract.seriously.

[gosplan]

Originally Posted by tayto lover

Any good players we had were sold to make money for the board. I don't need to list them. The same thing will happen in the future with the good young ones coming through now. History repeats itself, especially at Arsenal.
A friend of mine in London who lives close to the ground and who is a lifelong supporter says that anger is mounting with the fans. One point out of a possible twelve in the last four games is not good enough. If that's not bad enough you have many players not even trying and management is doing nothing about it. No replacement for RVP and no second proven goalscorer bought. There are rumours that some of our experienced players are not happy and might want away in the summer too, not just RVP.
And some of you don't buy that at all ??

That's a totally different point and I actually agree with what you're saying.

my point was that there's ambition at the club but the boards ambitions are

1: finances
2: success

The end result is that our squad isn't good enough, we promote inexperienced players who are played too often, have no-one to learn off and can't be dropped because we only have about 14 players you feel comfortable taking the field in the first place, and that's before you include injuries.

I gave the example the other day of Nani, played decent in his first season, became frustrating and as a result had totake a back seat for a season watching Tevez, Ronaldo, Rooney, Giggs, Berbatov, Park etc show him how it should be done.

Walcott has been totally inconsistant since arriving at the club and the only really consistant thing about him is that when he's fit, he plays - regardless. That's because we never ensured that we had a plan b in place. Throughout his career, he's had no-one to really learn off, a team around him that's constantly in transition, and every poor performance is rewarded by a start the next week.

[emergingstar]

Originally Posted by FUNKY LOVER

One thing I will never forgot is letting flamini diarra and Gilberto go only to replace them with denilson,total mis management,everyone could see how bad he was years before wenger.and his policy of not giving proper contracts to players over 30 like pires only to sign silvestre on a 2 year contract.seriously.

Flamini ran down his contract nothing can be done and Gilberto was past it been honest

As for selling diarra and buying silvestre even I can't explain them they were crazy decisions

[Frisbee]

Gilberto could certainly have given us another season of good service at least.

[gnfnrhead]

Diarra pushed his way out. Flamini was in great form that season and Diarra decided after less than six months that he wanted to leave again. Had he shown even a little patience, he would have ended up being first choice the following season when Flamini took the money and ran. We didn't have many options with him unfortunatly. He wasn't willing to fight for his place (having done very little to earn a start by the way) so decided to demand a transfer again to somewhere that he would be an automatic starter. Meanwhile Gilberto, I think, would have only been any use as a back up. He didn't have it anymore to be first choice for us.

[emergingstar]

Originally Posted by gnfnrhead

Diarra pushed his way out. Flamini was in great form that season and Diarra decided after less than six months that he wanted to leave again. Had he shown even a little patience, he would have ended up being first choice the following season when Flamini took the money and ran. We didn't have many options with him unfortunatly. He wasn't willing to fight for his place (having done very little to earn a start by the way) so decided to demand a transfer again to somewhere that he would be an automatic starter. Meanwhile Gilberto, I think, would have only been any use as a back up. He didn't have it anymore to be first choice for us.

I didn't no that bout diarra, good point

[tayto lover]

Originally Posted by Quazzie

That still doesn't explain why there was no effort made to replace them with all the money that was available to them.

Clichy was another I can think of.

[Royale with Cheese]

Just in the airport waiting on my flight to London. Got a ticket for the front row behind the goals tomorrow. If I shout loud enough the players should be able to hear me. Anyone got any particular abuse they want me to direct at Theo walcott? I think arshavin is going to start too.

[Frisbee]

Originally Posted by Royale with Cheese

Just in the airport waiting on my flight to London. Got a ticket for the front row behind the goals tomorrow. If I shout loud enough the players should be able to hear me. Anyone got any particular abuse they want me to direct at Theo walcott? I think arshavin is going to start too.

Do it like the janitor in Scrubs:

Royale: "You're stupid!"

Theo: "That's it?"

Royale: "It'll get to you"

Theo in three days: "NNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO"

[Fuzzy_Dunlop]

Originally Posted by Royale with Cheese

Just in the airport waiting on my flight to London. Got a ticket for the front row behind the goals tomorrow. If I shout loud enough the players should be able to hear me. Anyone got any particular abuse they want me to direct at Theo walcott? I think arshavin is going to start too.

"You're fuckin ridiculous" a la Mitch Hedberg at 3:22 in this video

[cson]

Just reading through those names... It's actually ****ing galling how many players we've just let go without any fight whatsoever. Had we kept half the players we've sold the past few years and added a select one or two we wouldn't have an empty trophy cabinet at The Emirates. Fair enough we might not be as profitable but surely theres a price somewhere we can pay for success.

Gilberto - forced out, could have done a job for another season as Frisbee says. The guy was a huge influence too - really experienced and professional. I'll never forget the night he single handedly dragged us to penalties against Doncaster Rovers in the League Cup one year.

Flamini - When you see the money being burned on the likes of Arshavin, the fact we wouldn't give him the contract he wanted after he proved himself in that season partnering Cesc in midfield was criminal. Even more so as the guy was a very useful utility man who filled in at LB and RB for us on the Champions League run iirc.

Cole - A lot of hate toward Ashley Cole which is natural I guess but the guy didn't exactly hold us to ransom. He wanted £5k more and employed the Roy Keane tactic of waiting it out. Of course we blinked; we'd never break our wage structure to keep him. He subsequently turned in about 5 odd years as the leagues best left back. We got a hormonal Billy Gallas. Only one winner there.

Adebayor - Yes City came calling. Yes it was a huge amount of money. But did we have to? No we didn't.

Eduardo - Never the same after his injury but he'd have been better to have as a squad striker than Chamakh let alone Park. He still had the flashes to brilliance even after the injury [see his goal v Burnley in the FA Cup].

As for the rest; I'd have kept Bobby Pires for another season. Cesc and Nasri goes without saying. I'd also have kept Vieira - solely for the fact that in hindsight he was never properly replaced and it took until the last couple of seasons until Alex Song fully developed as a player to fill that void.

It was the right time to sell Henry I think, Hleb and Toure were good sales for the money we got. Clichy was absolutely needless considering we got **** all for him anyway. Diarra wanted to go so whatever. The Gallas deal should never have happened.

So yeah; if we'd have kept the players I've outlined above and added the select one or two - i.e. Goalkeeper and a DM if Vieira wasn't kept then we'd have a trophy or two in the bag at this stage.

Instead we sold, created an incredible situation contractually where we're happy to have 10 mediocre players on 50k rather than pay a world class one the money it takes to keep him.

Thats the most frustrating thing; its not as if we would have required any major surgery to take the next step to winning trophies. The template was there, it needed a tweak here and there. But now its come to the point where we do need major surgery. And thats ****ing inexcusable considering where we started from.

[keano_afc]

Not forgetting Fabregas. Probably the most spineless transfer I've ever seen the club partake in. To roll over and basically let Barca set the price was gutless.

[cson]

Originally Posted by keano_afc

Not forgetting Fabregas. Probably the most spineless transfer I've ever seen the club partake in. To roll over and basically let Barca set the price was gutless.

I didn't

Originally Posted by cson

As for the rest; I'd have kept Bobby Pires for another season. Cesc and Nasri goes without saying.

[Redzer7]

Originally Posted by cson

Just reading through those names... It's actually ****ing galling how many players we've just let go without any fight whatsoever. Had we kept half the players we've sold the past few years and added a select one or two we wouldn't have an empty trophy cabinet at The Emirates. Fair enough we might not be as profitable but surely theres a price somewhere we can pay for success.

Gilberto - forced out, could have done a job for another season as Frisbee says. The guy was a huge influence too - really experienced and professional. I'll never forget the night he single handedly dragged us to penalties against Doncaster Rovers in the League Cup one year.

Flamini - When you see the money being burned on the likes of Arshavin, the fact we wouldn't give him the contract he wanted after he proved himself in that season partnering Cesc in midfield was criminal. Even more so as the guy was a very useful utility man who filled in at LB and RB for us on the Champions League run iirc.

Cole - A lot of hate toward Ashley Cole which is natural I guess but the guy didn't exactly hold us to ransom. He wanted £5k more and employed the Roy Keane tactic of waiting it out. Of course we blinked; we'd never break our wage structure to keep him. He subsequently turned in about 5 odd years as the leagues best left back. We got a hormonal Billy Gallas. Only one winner there.

Adebayor - Yes City came calling. Yes it was a huge amount of money. But did we have to? No we didn't.

Eduardo - Never the same after his injury but he'd have been better to have as a squad striker than Chamakh let alone Park. He still had the flashes to brilliance even after the injury [see his goal v Burnley in the FA Cup].

As for the rest; I'd have kept Bobby Pires for another season. Cesc and Nasri goes without saying. I'd also have kept Vieira - solely for the fact that in hindsight he was never properly replaced and it took until the last couple of seasons until Alex Song fully developed as a player to fill that void.

It was the right time to sell Henry I think, Hleb and Toure were good sales for the money we got. Clichy was absolutely needless considering we got **** all for him anyway. Diarra wanted to go so whatever. The Gallas deal should never have happened.

So yeah; if we'd have kept the players I've outlined above and added the select one or two - i.e. Goalkeeper and a DM if Vieira wasn't kept then we'd have a trophy or two in the bag at this stage.

Instead we sold, created an incredible situation contractually where we're happy to have 10 mediocre players on 50k rather than pay a world class one the money it takes to keep him.

Thats the most frustrating thing; its not as if we would have required any major surgery to take the next step to winning trophies. The template was there, it needed a tweak here and there. But now its come to the point where we do need major surgery. And thats ****ing inexcusable considering where we started from.

Great post, sums it up really.