Wenger Slaughterhouse

[Cripps_orig]

Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger believes the future looks bright for China, and that they have all the tools to become a major force in football.

The Frenchman's comments come prior to Arsenal's pre-season tour of Asia, where his side will take in matches in Hong Kong, Malaysia and China.

Wenger drew comparisons of China to Japan, a country he managed in prior to his role in north London.

"The China league is a bit like the Japan league, where I was in 1994," Wenger said on his club's official website. "That was the third year of professional football in Japan and it is similar in China, but it is not enough.

"To make a sport popular you need the elite and you need a strong basis of the number of people who practice the game."

The Arsenal chief points to China's growing role both politically and economically on the international stage as a major reason for why he thinks the sport will grow.

"Usually, sport follows the economic power, and the economic power is moving at the moment from Europe to China and Brazil," he added.

"These countries, if they have the desire, they will have the players. The history is in Europe - but how long can we resist the power of China if they really want to develop football? The future will tell.

"We have an organisation that starts at a very young age, with the same ingredients in our coaching lessons. They are all based on intelligence of movement and, of course, passion and motivation.

"To make a career at the top level you need a fantastic motivation. Maybe only two per cent of the population has the required motivation to make a massive career. You can love football without being ready to give everything for it.

"But if you want to be a great football player it has to mean everything for you. This kind of motivation comes naturally if you have a good basis of education in football."

http://www.goal.com/en-gb/news/2896/...tballing-force

We'll probably buy some Chinese Pub Teamer this summer

Hope hes as good for us as Park and that Miyachi dude have been

[She Wore A Yellow Ribbon]

yeah but the board bought park for marketing reasons

[Cripps_orig]

http://www.talksport.co.uk/magazine/...arsenal-176164

[Letters]

http://www.talksport.co.uk/magazine/...arsenal-176164

Indeed. What awful analysis. The best they could do is list 5 players we 'stole' from other clubs the eldest of whom was 21, nowhere near the finished article. The only player we spend folding money on was Nasri. van Persie was £2.75m according to that article, he was 21 and in his last season for Feyenoord he'd scored 6 goals in 33 games.

Crap WUMming all round

[Injury Time]

Wenger is also thin.

[Joker]

It's not really Wumming. It's true that a lot of the young players we sign spent a lot of their developmental years in the youth systems of other clubs. You say 21 is not the finished article, that's true, but most of the groundwork on that player has already been done, and it was Feyenoord who did it.

The way Wenger speaks, it's as if we mould and develop players from the age of 13 onwards, and we build them up step by step. For some players this is true, like Wilshere and Gibbs (although Gibbs started at Wimbledon, he left when they disbanded and joined us at 15, so I think we deserve most of the credit for his development). But for most others, we sign them from other clubs who aren't fully compensated for their efforts.

Apart from Gibbs and Wilshere, name a first team player at Arsenal who's been at the club throughout their life, or joined our academy at a very young age (14/15)?

Letters, you frequently complain about City buying players and say it's unfair on the selling clubs who can't compete with their wages, but doesn't that reflect the relationship between us and some of these French and Championship clubs from whom we take players from? They're much poorer than us, and having spent so much money developing these players, they get poached by big clubs like Arsenal who offer the players wages that these clubs can't match.

[Letters]

OK, other clubs have often done the groundwork but there's still work to be done.
Henry was 22 when he joined us but there's no doubt he developed under him. To deny Wenger credit for that is pure revisionism.

I agree with your last paragraph. We are, relatively speaking, one of the 'haves' in football. We cherry picked Walcott and Ox from Southampton. We can offer wages clubs like that can't. The whole of football is unfair because of the increasing gaps between the haves and have nots. At least though our money is earned from previous success which has built history and fanbase. And we still have to live within our means. We can't go round spending more than 100% of our total income just on wages like City have done because our owner is a rich sugar-daddy who will write off any debts.

[LDG]

I don't blame other clubs tbh. I blame the players. They all have their eyes on the money, and ultimately it's them that make the choice. Loyalty is non-existent in football.

So, in that respect, given the time we have invested in players (and by that token, the time their youth clubs invested in them), I can understand why Wenger is pissed off. And as far as the clubs we bought them from at a tender age?? Gimme a break. They wanted the money, and I don't remember any of them kicking up a fuss. Feyenoord practically bit our hands off trying to get rid.

As far as I'm aware, Wenger wanted to keep Cesc, Nasri, RVP et al. Maybe the board felt different, but Wenger didn't want to sell them.

[Power n Glory]

You talk about the gap in football between the rich and poor clubs but without outside investment, clubs like City don't have a chance of breaking into the top four. They can't keep their best players because the top clubs keep poaching them.

[Letters]

You talk about the gap in football between the rich and poor clubs but without outside investment, clubs like City don't have a chance of breaking into the top four. They can't keep their best players because the top clubs keep poaching them.

I know. The whole system is wrong where the financial rewards throughout the game are so ridiculously skewed.