July 15th
So it was fourth time lucky for Paddy as he finally got the move away from Arsenal he’s tried to engineer every summer since 2001. This time, however, it looks like Arsenal have pre-empted his own attempts and packed him off to Italy to play for Juventus. We receive something like £14m which in the current climate and given the state of Paddy’s knees Juve’s finances isn’t a bad amount of money.
In a statement released via the Arsenal website our former captain said “I made the decision to leave because I felt it was time for me to have a new challenge. But that does not mean I was unhappy or that I was having a problem at Arsenal. It was just that I had the feeling I needed to grow and meet a new challenge, and I feel Juventus was the best challenge for me.”
“I’d like to thank the Arsenal fans. They have been fabulous. I can go with my head held high. I did my best every day in training and in every match, and I left shaking the hand of Arsene Wenger and Mr (David) Dein. That was really important to me.”
Arsene Wenger said “Patrick was a great player for us, one of the greatest in the club’s history and I feel I had a special relationship with him because I made him come here. I think his impact, not only at Arsenal but in English football overall, was just tremendous.”
He went on to say though “I share the sadness with our supporters that Patrick has left us. But on the other hand I would say to them trust us and support us.”
And that to me is the important thing. A lot of people will be looking at this as a seriously negative thing, another piece of short-sightedness by the club and the board, but make no mistake, this deal would not have happened if Arsene Wenger had a problem with it. Arsene is the person who gives the board a green light to sell a player and for whatever reason he feels now is the right time to sell Vieira. He works with him every day, he knows his motivation, his physicality, if he decides that now is a good time to let go then that’s good enough for me. I mentioned yesterday that it’s very rare he lets a player approaching 30 go only to see him set the world alight elsewhere. There’s no doubt Vieira can still go a good job on his day but to my mind those days were too few and far between. He was a great player for us, no question, but except in patches we haven’t seen that rampaging, unstoppable Patrick Vieira for at least 18 months, if not longer. I wish him luck in Italy but his departure excites me.
It excites me because it means there’s a plan, it means Arsene Wenger has a vision for the future that for the first time in 9 years does not include the talismanic Vieira. Like most of you I feel he must have somebody lined up to replace Vieira. Perhaps not a big name star to fill his boots but a quality player nonetheless. It’s exciting because we’re going to have a new captain, it’s exciting because so many people will say ‘Arsenal sold Vieira, they’re finished, they have no ambition’ but people said the same thing when we only signed a mentalist German goalkeeper and young French left back the summer before last.
It’s obvious there’s a rebirth in progress at Arsenal. We’ve got a core of young players in the squad who are as promising as any I’ve ever seen. We’ve got experience in the right positions and I’m sure we’re going to be adding more. We have a transfer kitty which has now been bolstered by the sale of Vieira and, unlike some people, I think the manager is going to do some serious shopping before the season begins. In the past he has been accused of erring on the side of experience too much, perhaps not giving young players enough of a chance and being too favourable to regulars. The sale of Vieira shows that has changed. We have to think the manager knows what he’s doing here, he’s studious and doesn’t make rash moves in the transfer market just for the sake of it.
The inevitable talk of replacements has started with Newcastle’s Jermaine Jenas said to be top of the list but other names mentioned include Lyon’s Mohamadou Diarrhea, Michael Essien and I just have a feeling that the reason we were after Baptista was to set him up as Vieira’s replacement in a new powerhouse midfield role. There have been whispers all summer about Sol Campbell’s future at the club, I was told some weeks ago that Arsenal would not be averse to moving him on, and that speculation is set to increase now. Firstly Graeme Souness mentioned him when asked about the possiblity of Jenas moving to Arsenal, Myles says he’s heard that Sol wants to leave and The Sun says we’ll use Sol as part of a bid to bring Jenas to Highbury.
It’s no wonder Arsene Wenger’s phone was heating up. I think we’re in for a busy couple of weeks girls and boys. Now, this is what summer’s all about, eh?
