I don’t see what Abou offers the team apart from making up the numbers at the club. Yes he is still young and will supposedly learn and improve his game as the years pass by, but you simply can’t teach football knowledge…you either have it or you don’t. 6 years he’s been an Arsenal player, and in my view, doesn’t seem to have developed since the day he arrived.
Moving swiftly onto Denilson. In my opinion, this guy is just frustrating to watch. The 23-year-old Brazilian lacks pace, desire and above all his positioning, and all round awareness, is appalling. Although his statistics may show that his ball distribution is great, my argument would be – 5-10 yard passes aren’t exactly hard to pull off are they? Like Diaby, I don’t quite get what Denilson offers to the team. It’s come to the point where by when I see him in the starting line-up I know we will struggle to get a result. Reports suggested that Wolfsburg were plotting a move for him during the January transfer window. However, nothing transpired as I believe (in my opinion of course) that the Bundersliga side realized they would have wasted £12 million on a very, very average player.
Thanks to official statisticians on Twitter I was able to find out that Arsenal’s win percentage with Abou Diaby & Denilson starting (since June 2008) stands at 41%. Whilst with only one or neither starting is vastly superior at 64%. This ultimately proves that the Arsenal team suffer when both or either one of them start.
As stated earlier, I think Arsenal must offload a number of players during the upcoming summer, but in my opinion Abou Diaby and Denilson must be the first two out of the door.
Please Wenger do us all a favour and get rid of the deadweight when the transfer window re-opens. Recoup a nice amount of cash from Diaby and Denilson in the summer (as we don’t need them anymore) and find a proper midfield enforcer to challenge Alex Song, Aaron Ramsey and young Jack Wilshere for a place in the Arsenal midfield next season, or simply splash the cash elsewhere on the team. I’m not really fussed, just as long as those two are not at the Emirates next season.
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very very true. Denilson has simply refused to grow his game and well for Diaby he behaves like a little Kid. He gets the ball waits for two or three players to try go past them then that satisfies him. To be honest i don’t think arsenal need so many French players. I honestly don’t know why we Brought Chamakh. Why can’t they get Llorrente and ship out Chamakh and Bendtner i know Fabregas will be happy
i totally agree with this article, more so in Diaby’s case.
He’s lazy, undisciplined and slows every attack we make by playing keep ball.
The champions league game was the most obvious to me every time we lost the ball, our midield would try to race back, not Diaby he’d jog back… Useless!
PACK HIS BAGS MR WENGER, I’LL EVEN DRIVE HIM TO THE STATION!!
And we should look into selling 60% of the youth team with 30% sell on clauses. people think wenger is a genius when it comes to finances but i see him as a waster… if he started summer tours 15 years ago we would have raked in approx 400 million through 15 – 30 million tour fees and money made from arsenal shops all over the world not to mention increased tv revenue. if we had an extra 400 million we could compete with other teams in the transfer and wages market and not have to put up with the plugging the holes scenario with have now. also why do you need 70+ youth players who will never make it in the arsenal first team. Meridia is a perfect example when madrid offered 9 million for him then we let him go on a free. sort it out wenfger
i totally agree…
I think many would agree with you.
Tony,
Good points, shame you didn’t go into more detail. It’s good to read an article that concentrates on the lack of qualitites of some of our players rather than as is the norm an attack on the club and wenger and the direction of the club etc, after all it’s the players we should be analyising.
I totally agree with your views on both Diaby and Denilson. I personally, along with many of my fellow gooners, have given both players the benefit of the doubt for the past five yrs (and you are right enough is enough, particularly Diaby, we have all realised that Denilson despite his effort (as opposed to the former is just not good enough: pace,tackling,penetration, positional sense etc), because I believe he does try. He is however out of his depth in the premiership or it doesn’t suit his game i.e his endless square/backwards passing. But it is Diaby who frustrates me even more, as you rightly point out he has one thing in his locker, dribbling with the ball going forward, but as for everything else he is appalling. For two years on the trot we have watched these two play major matches for us and we have lost. Of course, it is not just these two players, but there is no doubt in my mind that along with Rosicky and perhaps Bendtner these players are just not top class, good players but not what we need. What amazes me is that Wenger can’t spot their deficiencies (he obviously knows far more than us mere mortals), but I like you identify players like this with our lack of trophies over the past years, it’s blindindly simple to me! Good article, I know everybody will say we know all this already, but perusing the Arsenal Blogosphere, not many are actually addressing this by concentrtating on the actual footballing side rather than pushing their own agendas and venting their vitriol about the future direction of the club etc. Cheers.
mate, you are totally totally spot on, and I have been mentioning these 2 idiots for months. Every time i see Denilson especially, i want to take Cantona kick at my TV … seriously!!!
I hate calling or players’ heads but I have to agree
In order of desire to depart I would say
1. Denilson – bye bye
2. Rosicky – I love you but we’ve outgrown you, you are not good enough for our first 16
3. Almunia – I’d like to see Mannone take place of 3rd keeper
4. Randall – I’m surprised he’s still even on the books (only reason he’s not higher is because we’re lucky not to have to see him in the first team)
I would be extremely upset if Nicky B was to be sold… I am sick of the grief a 23 yr old striker is getting when he’s been very good for us and a lot more to come.
My main worry is how much our arrogant support has contributed to the downfall of these players. Diaby for me is still an exceptional target but he is afraid to take people on and play a cutting pass because he knows the fans will fall on top of him.
I just wish we could have encouraged these people at the ground and debated more online like this blog has. Now our frustration is out in the open and at Home/Away games… there’s no going back.
@Welsh_Gooner
I completely agree about diaby butvi think if denilson goes on loan to Bolton maybe he turn into a real Brazilian midfielder ( an outstounding midfielding asset to the premier league) he has the potential to be a good as kaka if he is consistant enough but diaby is a liability and kneeds to be replaced by arteta or even better snjeider or someone of that quality because fabregas is going to barca soon and we need a new top quality midfielder and getting rid of diaby would add another £5-7million which is a nice sum of money to a new creative player that is not as injury prone as fabby but he is called fabby for a reason