PL25 – The moment Arsenal became a feeder club
“We don’t sign superstars, we make them,” once quipped Arsene Wenger.
The problem Arsenal have faced, however, at least over the last decade, is holding onto the superstars they’ve created.
Amid an era in which every major Premier League club believes they can win the title and every fan base demands instant success, ‘feeder club’ has become a definitively pejorative term, insinuating there’s a glass ceiling in world football’s grand pecking order separating you from a superior, inevitable power you’re helplessly subject to.
Jurgen Klopp has already sought to dismiss the notion this summer amid rumours of Barcelona lingering around Philippe Coutinho, but the ultimate issue with being dubbed a ‘feeder club’ is that it’s an incredibly difficult label to shake off. Liverpool’s biggest talents have been leaving for higher callings since Steve McManaman controversially took advantage of the bosman ruling to sign for Real Madrid on a free transfer in 1999.
Placing a date on when a team of Liverpool or Arsenal’s enormous stature becomes a ‘feeder club’ for Europe’s top-end elite is always going to be a subjective, inconclusive debate. But in the case of the Gunners, logic suggests it happened some time between Ashley Cole’s controversial move to Chelsea in 2006 and Thierry Henry’s more heart-wrenching departure to Barcelona around a year later – which took place a decade ago today.
During his eight years in north London, the Frenchman won two Premier League titles, three FA Cups, reached a Champions League final, twice made the final three of the Ballon d’Or and thrice won the FWA Player of the Year award.
During the ten years since his departure to the Nou Camp on the other hand, Arsenal have finished, on average, 12.7 points behind the Premier League champions each season, surpassed the quarter-finals of the Champions League just once, produced just one FWA winner in Robin van Persie (who left in the subsequent summer) and haven’t had a single player make the last three of the Ballon d’Or.
Henry’s departure was a real cut-off point in terms of success for Arsenal, signalling the start of a slump that culminated in them failing to qualify for the Champions League for the first time under Wenger last season. Perhaps most damagingly, however, it created a precedent of not only the club’s biggest stars needing to leave to find greater footballing fortune elsewhere but also Arsenal lacking the grit, desire and finance to keep them in north London.
Indeed, over the last decade, Arsenal have surrendered four more players to Barcelona – Aleksandar Hleb, Cesc Fabregas, Thomas Vermaelen and Alex Song – three after arguably their best seasons in Gunners shirts, one player to Manchester United – Robin van Persie – after he won the FWA Player of the Year award – and five players to Manchester City – Gael Clichy, Bacary Sagna, Emmanuel Adebayor, Kolo Toure and Samir Nasri – all of whom, barring Adebayor, won at least one Premier League title during their time at the Eithad Stadium.
Of course, selling to a team like Barcelona is one thing, but handing over players to direct divisional rivals is another altogether, a real statement of how Arsenal have become viewed by not only their contemporaries but also the shining stars they seek to keep hold of.
Overall, that’s six who saw enough both internally and externally to jump ship to another Premier League title challenger – Liverpool are the only other top-end English club to have lost so many players to direct competitors in that time.
In fairness, over the last four years Arsenal have kept suitors domestic and foreign at bay, although how much that’s down to the club and how much it’s down to Arsenal’s players being of generally lesser calibre remains open to debate. But how long that situation continues for remains to be seen; if recent speculation is to be believed it could be a matter of weeks, as Manchester City continue to circle around contract rebel Alexis Sanchez.
That’s perhaps why Wenger has already insisted Sanchez’s situation isn’t about the money Arsenal would lose by letting his contract wind down until its expiration. Like it or not, the last ten years have seen the Gunners slump down a bracket in world football’s power elite and, like it or not, they’ve become a feeder club for those above them.
Henry was begrudgingly allowed to leave for Barcelona, in part due to the gratitude for what he’d achieved at Arsenal, but it built the perception that the club’s best players can always be lured away.
As mentioned previously, the ‘feeder club’ tag is a difficult one to shake off. But refusing to sell Sanchez this summer, in a deal that will most likely make Manchester City’s next season’s champions by default, will at least corrode the idea that Arsenal can be dictated to.
Although it likely won’t stop Sanchez leaving next summer, it could be one of the most important steps yet in reversing a tide that has seen one-time English champions become a common recruitment pool for domestic and continental rivals.