Way I see it, there’s only four ways for this shit to resolve itself.
1.) Cesc and Nasri stay.
The least likely of the three, but I wouldn’t mind if it happened.
2.) Arsene sells Cesc and Nasri, then takes that money and buys Mata, Mertesacker, Parker, Gotze, one of Jagielka/Cahill/Samba/Dann, and someone incredible that we’ve never heard of.
Basically pull a Dalglish after selling Torres. A little risky, and not necessarily in character for Arsene, but hey, what do desperate times call for?
3.) Arsene sells Cesc and Nasri, then buys 37 teenage French and English wingers from the lower divisions and Barcelona’s B team.
No. Shit. This is going to happen, isn’t it?
4.) Arsene sells Cesc and Nasri, and then nothing.
I’m genuinely scared of this. I think I’ll be waving the white flag if this happens.
I’m grateful for Arsene, and his commitment to his guys has always been amazing, but sometimes it borders on the delusional.
Hey, I realize that this about more than Arsenal.
Cesc has always been a Barcelona guy at heart and I can appreciate that.
The guy gave his best (and his best was, quite frankly, the best) for eight seasons.
He’s earned the right to leave if he wishes.
With Nasri, it’s a little harder to let slide, since it’s pretty much about money.
Arsenal spent a lot of money on him, waited three seasons for him to develop, and then watched him have one great half-season and then completely disappear when the team really needed him most.
Arsenal won’t pay him more than $150,000 a week (a week!), and so it’s off to City, the bumpkin flush with oil money. Arsene sticks with his guys when they slump a bit, but if Nasri disappears for half a season, Mancini’s going to strangle him with that scarf. Ask Adebayor, Bellamy, Given, Wright-Phillips, or Johnson how that’s working out.
It’s a bad economy.
I can understand the importance of getting everything you think you’re worth.
I still don’t have to like it.
What bothers me most, I think, is that I could never imagine Arsenal as a place where someone might actively want to leave. That these players have to go elsewhere to feel like they can contend; that Arsenal is just another club, or–worse yet–a selling club. And that weird, inescapable feeling that Arsene, the mighty Professor, is just fiddling away while everything around him burns.
Posted on August 11, 2011
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