Thierry Henry’s departure has most people scared to death that Arsenal are going to be destroyed. I for one have to argue that I believe Henry’s departure to have been the healthy option for the club. Maybe I am just trying to remain optimistic but I believe that more at Arsenal will benefit from his departure. Firstly, Henry was becoming too big of a star and was becoming synonymous with Arsenal Football Club. He was a great player, at one point I believe he was the best player in the world without a doubt, but he was becoming a problem. I felt he had to be involved with everything Arsenal did, and this would be a problem when it came to goal scoring. Look at Adebayor, who couldn’t even celebrate scoring a goal without Henry. I feel his presence in a locker must have been daunting to players and it seemed like some players were playing to impress Henry (Adebayor) and not the manager as they should. Secondly, because of his stature, I feel Arsenal was excused from their goal scoring problems because he was injured. Man Utd continue to score goals no matter who is in the side, and we have a problem with that. Henry for me made everything tense, because if he was around, everyone thought everything was taken care of. When he wasn’t, everyone became nervous about where goals would come from. I feel Wenger is getting rid of a big problem. He is building a team with a number of players on it that can all score. Next season we could realistically have 4 players with 10 goals or so each (Hleb, Rosicky, Fabregas, Walcott) and hopefully 2 players with maybe 15-20 (Van Persie, Adebayor). Coupled with a goal scoring surprise like Gilberto of this season (Diaby maybe) and maybe a few goals of the bench from Bendtner and Eduardo, I feel Arsenal should do better. Arsenal were amazing a few years ago because the goal scoring burden fell to the entire attack; Pires, Ljungberg, Henry, Bergkamp, Wiltord all shared the goal scoring duties. This is what Arsenal needs, a collective atmosphere. Pires and Ljungberg made each other great, Bergkamp made Henry great. Arsenal needs this atmosphere in order to get back on track, and Henry would no longer be able to help. He was not looking to become a second striker like Bergkamp did and this was a problem. If we could one or two offensive signings, I think Arsenal will be fine in the long run.
PS – I do not doubt Wenger either, if it was Henry’s time it was his time. Look at all the other catastrophic departure from Arsenal: Petit, Overmars, Vieira (not counting Anelka); none have done a thing since they left Arsenal.
8 Responses to “Goalscoring”
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July 10th, 2007 at 6:49 am
Well, Vieira won a couple of Scudetto’s and helped France to a World Cup final in the past two years since he’s left. I don’t consider that as having not done a thing.
July 10th, 2007 at 6:53 am
Anelka was on the squad the European cup at Real Madrid, in fact if I remember rightly he scored the goal that got them through the Semi-Final. Reyes has just won the title with Real Madrid who are looking to sign him permanently. Not everyone who leaves has a disaster, and why wish on them they have a disaster? It’s immature.
July 10th, 2007 at 8:24 am
well, i dont think he was dissing em really….vieira has just one (not two!!!) scudettos actually playing in the only big team in the league that was not relegated or battling points deduction! i dont think he is very happy over there really….i think he would rather be playing for barca or madrid….cos lets face it inter aint gonna win the CL anytime soon.
anelka has gone downhill ever since. he cant even get a decent club to buy him these days. he was available for 10 million but Man U plumped for 30 million Tevez instead! that says all about him really. he definitely left arsenal way too early.
reyes is a very good player who didnt like england. nothing anyone can do about that.
July 10th, 2007 at 8:32 am
Josh,
Vieira won the Scudetto by default since Juve was relegated in the scandal. He was part of the French world cup team but not a major force, in my opinion. Now a days, the only press Vieira gets is when he talks about Arsenal…nothing more.
Danny,
To be fair, Anelka did not have a meteoric rise as he expected after leaving Arsenal…..Reyes has been a bit part player at Real and the only thing going for him (and Arsenal) now is that he scored twice to give Real the La Liga title. That gives Arsene a bit of bargainig power, but all in all Reyes has a been nothing more than an after-thought at Madrid.
As for Henry, I wish him the best, and feel he will do very well with Barca because of an extraordinary cast of players in that squad (and obviously his extraordinary talent)……All I know is that I will be watching more of Gol TV come August, but I completely agree with Gerard, it was time for Henry to go…….we will eventually be a better TEAM for it.
July 10th, 2007 at 10:45 am
Reyes didn’t play much this year at Madrid because of Capello. Capello likes to play with several holding midfielders (Diarra, Gago, Emerson) His style of play is very pragmatic and defensive, much like that of Mourinho. Unfortunately for him (and one might say unfairly) he was run out of town by the Madrid press for not putting an attractive product on the field. I think Reyes will do quite well next year under Schuster. And I hope that is the case because I am sure his eventual transfer to Madrid will have escalating clauses based on appearances, goals, trophies, etc.
I think we should all be a little less worried about the amount of goals each player gets. The goals will come. Especially if we can limit the amount of times we concede first this year. If we can keep our opponents from scoring first, it will open up the field and the goals will flow easier. Last year, it felt as if we were constantly 0-1 and we had to break down 11 players just to get a chance. If we can score first or not concede the first goal, opponents will have to come forward some and we can hit them on the break as well as with a solid build up. It looks as if the Sagna deal is almost done. But I would still like to see AW pursue another defender. Particularly one who plays centrally. Although I am not sure who could be had at the right price.
July 10th, 2007 at 12:51 pm
The original poster said “none have done a thing since they left Arsenal”. Ok, Reyes and Anelka didn’t set the world on fire, but they did a lot more than nothing - not many players in world football even played for Real Madrid let alone won European Cup/Primera. Vieira seems to be doing ok. There seems to be a tendency to beat up on players who have the gall to leave Arsenal - well try and remember Arsenal has absolutely no pedigree in Europe whatsoever and is still seen as a stepping for players who want to advance to the biggest clubs in the world.
Hopefully that will change in the next 20 years, for now you’ll have to get used to not having total control over who leaves the club to better themselves. Some players want to play at the very very top - why shouldn’t they? And that’s not Arsenal - although the club is getting closer thanks to Wenger.
July 10th, 2007 at 2:40 pm
What I meant to say is that Ian Wright, Petit, Vieira, Overmars are the three players in my mind that Wenger decided should go. Anelka and Reyes did not want to stay at Arsenal and therefore Wenger let them go even if he didn’t want them to go. But the others I believe he thought was their time to go and since they left Arsenal, they have faded considerably from the limelight in my view. Yes they all still played, but never reached the same heights with Arsenal. Wright was finished once he left Arsenal and no one can argue against that. Petit couldn’t settle in Barcelona and came right back to England to play for Chelsea back when they were a borderline team. Vieira gave up the captaincy of Arsenal and left the club as their most prominent player, to be a regular at Inter. I think he plays and wins but if you ask the Inter fans now who they love, Vieira doesn’t get the same response as when he was an Arsenal player. These are just examples of players I believe wanted to go and Wenger also agreed should go. Henry I think fits this mold. He said he would stay at Arsenal and probably wouldn’t have complained the way Reyes and Anelka did if he was told to see out his contract. Reyes and Anelka cried to leave the club and Wenger had to resign to letting them go. All I was saying is that the players Wenger lets go may be huge at the moment for the club but from past experience, they do not go on to have the same amount of stardom as they did at Arsenal.
July 11th, 2007 at 8:46 am
Greard could you please break up you text a bit. Your opinions are good but one huge block of text gets to be a bit much. Your enter key would work wonders for my eyes.