Ex- Gunner Stewart Robson believes the sale of Cesc Fabregas will not rob Arsenal of an influential leader and has blasted the Spaniard’s contribution over the past year.
Reports suggest that the Arsenal captain’s proposed move to boyhood club Barcelona could take place in a matter of days with a €40 million deal supposedly agreed with the La Liga outfit, including €5 million to be paid by Cesc himself in instalments over the next 5 years.
However, despite the potential loss of yet another senior player and Samir Nasri looking likely to follow Cesc out the door, Robson believes the Spaniard’s leadership qualities and influence on other players will not be missed.
The former Gunner told talkSPORT:
‘Thierry Henry wasn’t a leader. He was, in my view, a poor captain. When things were going wrong for Arsenal he never stepped up.
‘And when things were going wrong for Arsenal, Cesc Fabregas didn’t always step up either. There was that game at Newcastle last year where Cesc Fabregas was brilliant in the first-half and you didn’t see him in the second-half.
‘That’s where Cesc Fabregas won’t be a loss as a leader because the feeling I get is that he’d lost interest in the club for a whole year and he wasn’t a good influence on some of the other players.’
While I agree to some degree with Robson, I think Fabregas will be a major loss to us, perhaps not in the leadership department, but because he is a player that can change a game.
However, I do believe his time is up at Arsenal because it seems that his heart and passion for the club has deteriorated over the past year – just my opinion of course.
Whilst I believe we could have got a better deal for Cesc, as he is a great player, I think the club should just accept the latest deal proposed by Barca and end this 2 year saga once and for all.
I will not begrudge him his move to Barca, purely for the fact that he has served us well over the past 7 years (last season was a bit of a disappointment).
Anyway, I for one wish him well for the future and hope that he achieves his footballing ambitions.
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While he should be commended for his 8 years at Arsenal i will not wish him well at Barca. I hope he stays healthy but that’s as far as I’ll go with that. His silence the last couple of months on this issue have had a negative affect on the club and supporters but while his captaincy was not a great one you can’t blame a 22 year old kid for lacking those leadership qualities. You blame the Manager… The extremely experienced one at that. Also these “issues” that we have in the transfer market I believe are multiplied by the reporting of such news outlets as the Sun who only sensationalize the story to sell copies of their publications. To sum up my comments:
1:Cesc should of handled this transfer situation much better.
2:Arsene has got the captaincy wrong the past 7 years TH14,WG10,CF4
3:We still need defenders.
should have…..not should of