According to several sources in the media, Arsene Wenger is ready to risk losing Robin van Persie on a free transfer if he doesn’t sign a new contract.
The Daily Mirror reported three days ago:
Arsenal are prepared to take the risk of Van Persie running his current contract into next season before it expires in 2013.
The Arsenal board know selling their captain, talisman and star striker would cause fury among the fans.
Van Persie would be 30 in 2013, is four years older than Nasri and so it will be a different dilemma for Arsenal this summer making it increasingly likely they will take a gamble on his contract situation.
Firstly, I don’t really see how anyone can compare Van Persie to Nasri, but I do get where they are coming from, and it is really the only reason I can partly accept what is being reported. It is very easy for a club to say at this point ‘we will let your contract expire if you don’t sign a new contract’, but it is an entirely different thing for a club to actually back it up and risk losing a potential £30-40 million sale.
Don’t get me wrong, I really hope that Arsenal manage to persuade him to stay. However, based on our performances this season so far it is difficult for me to envisage.
There were several rumours floating around that the club are due to increase the wage cap so that we were able to give better weekly wages to our star man and top players, but this remains to be seen.
Arsenal fans may recall that we did manage to persuade Thomas Vermaelen to sign a new contract, despite the wage cap, by offering a large signing on bonus. If Arsenal were able to do the same with Van Persie then it would be a touch of brilliance from the club, but we still need to look at the wage structure because it is obviously causing us problems.
But should we run the risk of letting RVP see out his contract and potentially lose him on a free next summer? Hell no!
Let us know what you think on the matter by leaving a comment below
Like what you read? Then follow me on Twitter – http://twitter.com/UKVampire
Visit and Join our Facebook page, click HERE to do so.
Gunnersphere is currently looking for new writers to join the squad. Contact via twitter or at Gunnersphere@snack-media.com for further details.
The problem with your strategy is that it is one which has Arsenal developing players and, as soon as they reach their potential, we sell them on.
It means we are, de facto, a selling club.
For a start, we are not going to get £30-40 million for him, at his age. Second, what is the point of raking in more money to see it lost in the black-hole of the Arsenal bank accounts? If we are really on the breadline, then our leaders should come out and tell us that, so that our expectations are properly set.
If we sell Van Persie, at any price, it is a statement that we have given up trying to be one of the top clubs in England, let alone Europe. I certainly would not expect top quality players to want to come and play for us.
Yous sure we can’t get 30-40M for RVP? I mean Eto’o was valued at 35M when Barca sold him plus 40M for Ibra to Inter and Eto’o was a year younger than RVP is now when that deal happened. I don’t think it’s out of the question that there’s clubs out there who would drop 30M+ for RVP even at his age. David Villa went for 35M at age 28 so the valuation being proposed isn’t ridiculous
Lets sell him and as usual chew the money. Do we need new players? Are we a big club? We surely dont need players nor are we a big club.