Arsenal FC, the systematic dismantling of a champion, and possibly a legacy.

Today, we are all responding to the news that Arsenal and Manchester City have agreed to terms for the sale of Samir Nasri for an estimated fee of £24 million. In itself it is a shrewd piece of business for a player with 12 months left on his contract. Taken in the broad scope of the last six years at Arsenal and you have to ask yourselves, what is the leadership of the club doing to this team and organization?

When I say leadership I mean the board, Arsene and those advising him basically, anyone who has some sort of role in managing the club’s affairs. This group taken in their entirety has led to what I can only describe as the systematic dismantling of this storied club all in the name of financial prudence.

Since 2005 and even part of 2004 this club has sold off or let go its prized assets – players all in the name of a failed youth policy and a crippling wage structure.

In 2004 we saw the first departures of the invincibles with the likes of Kanu, Keown, and Parlour let go for free. Sure you could argue that Keown and Parlour were in the final stages of their career but like I said it was only the first sign, things would get progressively worse.

In 2005 we saw the departure of Patrick Veirra, the team’s heart-on-sleeve Captain. Vierra left, and realistically part of it was likely due to his constant dalliances with other teams. Ultimately the reason cited for his departure would be that he was entering the twilight of his career. I think someone forgot to tell Paddy as he go on and would win trophies with his new clubs. Was he a starter?Not in all cases but he was effective and managed to play into this last season. Would he have been a starter at Arsenal? Again, not likely. But he could have been the necessary leadership this club needed in its darkest moments.

The summer of 2006 was one of our worst in terms of departures. Bergkamp retired. Incidentally, Bergkamp I believe is the last player to retire at Arsenal. Players don’t retire here any more. They move on in the name of some asinine policy that says players aren’t effective after they turn 30. But I digress. The other names out were Cole, Campbell, Pires, Larsson, and Lauren.

At this point we started to see some of the younger players come in and certainly they looked like they could provide suitable replacements. Fabregas would start playing more as would Van Persie. Others who had been signed earlier would get play too. But we were still bleeding invincibles.

2008 more bleeding and probably one of the hardest to take was the departure of Thierry Henry. The club’s leading scorer and an absolute legend. As much as Bergkamp was loved so was Henry – maybe more so. His sale to Barcelona hurt the most for Gunner’s fans, as we all thought – here was a player who would retire here and continue to provide the continuity and leadership we needed. The fact that Henry continues to play to this day shouldn’t be lost on anyone. While not as effective as before, he still can do wonders – at times. Reyes and Ljunberg were also sold during this time frame.

It was at this point that the heart of the Invincibles would be gone. Initially, it looked like that the likes of Hleb and Flamini along with Fabregas and Van Persie would be the future and would carry the club forward. Certainly the 2008 season looked like our best bet to win silverware again since 2005 until we were sidetracked by Eduardo’s injury. Then an indicator that not all was right in Arsenal land rose up as Matthieu Flamini did not sign a new contract and the club let him go to AC Milan for free. Additionally, Alexsander Hleb was sold to Barcelona and while seemed like good business at the time – it is a player like Hleb that we still continue to need and are looking for. We would also see one of my favourite players Gilberto Silva leave for Greece.

Transfer business in the summer of 2009 was a mixed bag. Emmanuel Adebayor was sold to Man City for £25 million. There are a lot of stories about how Adebayor fit in with his teammates. On the surface it looked like a good deal but there was concern we had sold a strong player to a leading contender. Initially his performance also showed that.  Especially in our first tie together where he scored a goal, agitated fans and stepped on Van Persie’s face. Eventually his scoring prowess would leave him and now he finds himself on the verge of loan move to Tottenham unable to make Roberto Mancini’s squad. Kolo Toure sale was a real surprise to me. But rumour is that there was a problem between him and Gallas who was Captain at the time. Whether Wenger kept the right defender on the squad is up for debate but Kolo Tourem another part of the Invincibles was sold for £16 million.

The biggest name in the 2010 transfer market to leave was William Gallas. Gallas had not endeared himself to Arsenal fans due to his petulant behavior on the pitch at Birmingham. And it was the mindset of the staff that Gallas was past his prime. He was not offered a new contract and was allowed to leave to Tottenham for free. Gallas had a pretty decent season last year by his normal standards but he is once again broken down so in the end this may not have been a bad move. But if we were going to let him go for free – can someone let me know why we sold Toure a year earlier? It just doesn’t make sense to me.

Finally, we come to this summer’s transfer market and the one that really makes you question the direction that this club is headed in. The summer started with the sale of Gael Clichy to Manchester City for £7 million. Not bad considering he was player on the last year of his contract. Too bad he’s not a projected starter. Clichy wasn’t a player we were going to keep. He was however the last player who was here during the invincible era. Then after 3 summers of innuendo, tapping up and will he or won’t he, Cesc Fabregas was sold to his hometown club at a discount – £34 million. This sale was particularly troublesome in light of comments made by Wenger that they would not sell. It’s also troublesome in that was the last hope we had (for now) that we would still have the talented (read as special) players that make us a club to watch out for.

Then we come to today and the sale of Samir Nasri for a reported fee of £24 million. I am mixed on the sale of Nasri. He has been here for 3 seasons and has only had about 6 months that were notable. He is player that when he gets stood up by a defender gets taken out of his game. But he also has a lot of promise and you don’t want to hand a player like that off to a team you consider a rival. But it was clear that Nasri didn’t want to be here and that he had his head turned by the promises of City’s riches.

Players come and go. On its own the sale of these players should raise concern but not wide spread panic. Where the panic comes from is that when you sell players of the caliber of those listed above, you have to replace them with suitable players. When you don’t  you get panic. They don’t have to be replicas of whom you have sold. You don’t just find the next Henry or Bergkamp. But you find players that keep the the club at a similar level of competitiveness. For a while post-invincibles we seemed to be fine. That 2008 squad, had it been kept together would’ve been special – at least I feel it would’ve. But those kinds of players aren’t being signed. We are getting some quality in as, Gervinho and Vermaelen surely seem the part. But they don’t make up for our other shortages we are experiencing based on sales.

All these sales point to a disturbing trend and quite possibly a disturbing mindset at the club. We are told on a repeated basis that we should trust Wenger and the board. We are told they really do have the best interests of the club at heart. But when our best players are sold, competitions are taken lightly and the only principle they hold to is financial prudence there have to be legitimate questions raised about the goals of the organization.

Financial prudence is an admirable quality. And if UEFA’s financial fair play actually comes with any teeth, Arsenal and most of the Bundesliga look set to make out handsomely. If the rules don’t come into any level of enforcement, Arsenal has operated under a false principle that no other club will operate under. As a man of morals I get the desire, I just don’t think it makes sense.

The over-reliance on young talent as replacements for players lost raises some questions about whether the team can still attract proven signings. Arsenal will always get young talent. At least they over pay for that. But what happens when you over pay for young talent that doesn’t come true – you have players you can’t move on because they are either not good enough or their salaries are too high.

By selling our most skilled players over the last few years we have left the club on a precipice. A match against the likes of Udinese even to qualify for the CL was looked at in the past as a formality. The match tomorrow is a lot larger now based on the failed policies of this club’s leadership. Should Arsenal fail to advance they risk losing about £26 million in revenue. Additionally, their ability to attract top talent with Champion’s League football will be hampered. This match should never have been necessary if we had suitable talent on the squad or quality leadership been retained. One or both of those and we might not have crumbled like a plastic cub in the last 3rd of the season.

If the board hadn’t placed such harsh financial constraints on the club maybe we could have paid more to retain our best players and attract players. If Wenger hadn’t been so stubborn and myopic in relation to his youth policy maybe he would have seen the need to keep someone like Vierra around longer.

Should this season go out as some pundits speculate, out of the top 4 and no Champion’s League it will likely result in the removal or retirement of Arsene Wenger. He will then become of victim of both the board’s and his own policies. His removal while not the end of the club – will complete this dismantling and likely tarnish the legacy he built from his signing through to 2005.

That’s the sad end note to all of this isn’t this? If the club fails to compete this season (let’s keep our goals realistic right now) then a man who should be regarded as a conquering hero will more likely be remembered as Nero fiddling as Rome burns. The board will have their money and while the fan view of them will be one of anger and contempt they will remain unscathed for the most part.

The financial side of sports is a necessary evil but it should be done in the context of the ultimate goal of sports – winning. As my friend Tim Payton said – when was the last time a cheque book kept a clean sheet or scored a goal.