No togetherness, no success… The Captains role?

Hello all, and Fabregas the King is feeling very positive today you will be pleased to hear. Many Arsenal fans across the blogs have been discussing my article “The riddle of the missing Millions solved” and the consensus is that when all is considered, Arsenal have to do things the Arsenal Way in order to avoid transfer inflation. I can accept that, but at least the Board will be less likely to use spin in the future, to present it’s agenda.

I have a theory that the huddle was rather counter productive last season, the togetherness appeared superficial when the post match huddle disappeared as soon as results went against us. The Captains role was vital, and perhaps next time, players should realise that the huddle is needed more AFTER things go wrong rather than just to celebrate victory, but more on captains later…

It does seem likely that Hatem Ben Arfa the 21yr old Lyon striker will be Emirates bound after Arsenal TV presented a review of the striker last night. This is the worse kept secret after Le Boss travelled to see the player play for France against the Faroe Isles last October under the guise of media duties, and Hatem is typical of the breed of player that Arsene likes to bring to the club. He is agile, with excellent technical skills. The most important asset is his ability to play as a left winger, the position that Arsenal have never really replaced since the loss of Pires and Reyes. This would be a coup after the very public wooing of Ben Arfa by Alex Ferguson who presented the Lyon striker with a ManU shirt after the Champions League fixture. Ben Arfa graduated from the ClaireFontaine academy of football excellence along with Abou Diaby. Who will win the race, we must wait and see, currently he seems Premiership bound, but to which team?

The clamour to resign Thierry Henry took a further twist as Le Boss decided to comment in depth over our Titi. Arsene made the clearest indication yet that he has not ruled out a return for Titi to his spiritual home.

Opinion is split upon whether the possible return of Thierry Henry would benefit out squad or not. When I put the question Would you welcome Thierry Henry back to the Emirates? to Arsenalinsider readers last week the results were Yes – 409 votes or 56% of the vote and No 189 or 26% of the votes cast. One in six of you believed that it would be better to sign him than allow him to go to Chelsea.

Has Flamini won his battle to stay at the Arsenal with an increased salary?

The wage structure at the Arsenal is very rigid, but there are hints that it would appear that common sense has prevailed and Mathieu could be putting pen to paper very soon, once the fine details have been ironed out. The cause for optimism was reinforced by Arsene’s grin. He announced to Richard Clark of Arsenal.com that when there was news he would let people know. The last time he remarked in this matter, was over the speculation about Arsene extending his own contract. So Fabregas the King is very happy about this development, but advises Le Boss never to take up Poker. If Flamini is sincere about his desire to stay at the Emirates, then news will be released in a matter of days.

Finally a reminder that  over the next few weeks we will be updating the site making it bigger and better than ever before including a new site design. I have increased the potential number of new contributors 6 after an amazing response from you guys out there, so if just in case you missed the original post, Arsenalinsider requires a contributor to be an Arsenal nut and able to give our readers their slant on events, email me: tony[at]arsenalinsider.co.uk with your name, email address and a little bit about yourself and I shall email you back all the details. Today one of the respondents Erten, who impressed us here at Arsenalinsider, presents his take on the possible next captain. Sit back and see what you make of it.

Fabregas the King. 

Future Captains………….

Good day ladies and gents.

If this piece is accepted this will be my first blog on Arsenalinsider so please be gentle with me.

Lets cut to the chase, what I’m here to talk about is the looming captaincy debate that we are no doubt going to be going to war over in the summer about.

Will he? Won’t he? Is he? Isn’t he?

I’m under no illusion myself that none of us have a clue what is going to happen, we can make educated guesses and argue about it till the cows come home, but the fact of the matter is, we haven’t got the foggiest what Les Prof will be doing with the captaincy. I doubt hardly any of us envisaged Big Willy captaining the side after Gilberto had done such a great job, and not only that, but with so many others in the pecking order who would of thought it would be handed to someone that had been at the club barely a year?

I’m not going to lace you with hard facts and stats about how previous captains have performed with the armband on and how long they lasted, because we all know players are a fickle bunch, it is crazy to think that any player can be 100% loyal to any one club as we have seen numerous times over the years.

Captaincy to us supporters is a matter of the heart, to a very few select players this may also be the case, but the cold truth of it is that some players just use it for a platform to showcase themselves and put themselves in the spot light.

I feel right now in the Arsenal dressing room there are only three major contenders for the armband, Cesc, Kolo and Big Willy, but the problem is how and why will one be picked?

There are many different characteristics you need to look at when picking captains, you can pick a captain who has huge experience of top level football, he may not be lovingly attached to the club, but he is a great presence, he is a winner.

You could have a captain based on loyalty, a model professional that has earned the captaincy over the years, and then you could have a firm fans favourite, a captain to appease fans and the player alike. Now if Cesc gets the captaincy I can’t help but think this is the case, I personally do not want somebody to be picked as captain just so he stays at the club, besides we have tried this before with a certain TH14 and look how that turned out. I’m not saying Cesc is not committed to the cause, but I have doubts, his age is a concern and lack of experience is a concern. If he gets the captaincy, what else could he strive to achieve internally within the club (apart from winning trophies). I do not see Cesc as a man that can single handedly gather his troops and assault teams when we are on the back foot, Cesc is not that kind of player, he does not have a physical presence like Tony Adams did or like PV4 did. He does have heart, seems like he genuinely cares. But as the article title suggests, maybe he is a future captain, maybe not too near a future but the future never the less.

Another strong candidate would be Kolo, this guy is probably the closest you will get to Mr.Arsenal, and I can’t help he will be hard done by if he does not get the captaincy at some point during his Arsenal career. He has the heart of a lion, you can see that when the chips are down he is trying to double them up, he brings the ball forward with purpose and you can see he is really trying to make the difference, how many times has he managed to created a goal by marauding forward in the last 20 minutes in a game?

Finally there is Big Willy, lets be honest, every single one of us questioned this decision at the start of the season, and at first it seemed like it was paying off, we were winning, and we were killing games off, Les Prof seemed to have pulled a rabbit out of the hat again. But then came THAT game (yes you know which one). Yes I know a lot was made of it, maybe too much in-fact, but still, should it of happened? Should he really turn his back on his team mates? It would of made me feel like a right mug, it would of drained me of all confidence. Big Willy was picked for his experience, not because he loved Arsenal as a club, its because he has “been there and done that”.

There is a very important decision looming over the Grove this coming season, and I can’t help but feel it is a pivotal one for the future of the squad and the club. Do we stick with Gallas who has served us well this season? Do we hand it to Kolo? Or do we give it to our own little magician Cesc?

IF we take it away from Gallas will it have any effect on the squad? Infact will he even stay?

If we give it to Cesc will it upset any other members in the team such as Kolo?

My personal preference would be to stick it out with Gallas, I don’t like the armband being handed out all over the place. But if the majority of the squad don’t like this captain? Then what?

If Gallas is ousted I would like to see Kolo get the nod ahead of Cesc. Cesc is still young, he still has so much time, and I feel he still needs to earn it.

Whatever the outcome, these questions and more need to be answered, and I will back whoever the captain is 100%.

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