Much has been said about Robin van Persie this season – will he stay or will he go?
There is no doubting that this season the 28-year-old has been in the form of his life.
Just recently, Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain had this to say about his captain and team-mate:
‘It’s clear how important he’s been for us with the goals he’s scored, he’s one of the best strikers in the world. He’s a massive part of the dressing room. I don’t know [if he will stay] but I hope he does.’
This season there has been nobody in the Premier League better than Van Persie, this is evident after he walked away with the Premier League Golden Boot, PFA Players’ Player of the Year and the Football Writers’ Player of the Year awards. In addition, He was also named in the PFA Premier League Team of the Year.
Having taken this into account, is he irreplaceable to Arsenal? The media believe so, the opposing fans believe so, and even some Arsenal players believe so, but for me he isn’t irreplaceable, and here’s why.
There is no doubting his talent. This season the Dutchman has been his best since joining the club and this has been largely down to him being able to miraculously avoid injury, which brings me onto the reason I think he is replaceable.
On average, over the eight years at the club, RVP has played 35.5 games a year (the lowest being 20 in 2009/10 season) and the most being 47 (this season). Now 35.5 games a season seems, on paper, to be pretty good, but when you take into account Thierry Henry, who in his eight seasons at Arsenal, averaged a total of 48 games, or Dennis Bergkamp, who, despite not travelling abroad, still managed an average of 38 games a season (in his last eight seasons at Arsenal).
If we look at goals compared to Thierry Henry it looks even worse, with the Frenchman averaging 31 goals a season, while Van Persie averaging just 12.
Don’t get me wrong, I think Robin is a fantastic player, I really do. However, to say he is irreplaceable is an overstatement, especially considering who it has been said about in the past. Ian Wright, Dennis Bergkamp, Thierry Henry, Cesc Fabregas, Patrick Vieria, Tony Adams, David Seaman and Patrick Vieira are just some names of players who the tag of ‘irreplaceable’ has been given over the years, yet here we are with Robin and once again the opposing fans are saying ‘if it wasn’t for him you’d be relegated’.
The fact is our great club survived with the departures of all the abovementioned great names. We have stayed in the Champions League every year without these players at the club and we will do so regardless of if Van Persie leaves or stays.
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No one is irreplaceable.
May it just did not occur to you to find out that it took more than a couple of years to get someone who could replace Henri.
That’s why we say Robin is irreplaceable. If he leaves we would take again a couple of years to find someone who can lead us to a title challenge.
And it is also true that he can be replaced easily if as always Wenger does show any ambition.
i bet you do not have any ambition also and may be you are one of those mercenaries paid by the AFC to write blogs that mould fans opinions.
So it took 2 years to find some to replace Henry did it? I think you will find that Adebyour socred 30 goals the season after Henry (not henri) left.
Twat!
And NOBODY gets paid by AFC to mould the minds of ANY Arsenal supporters you muppet! What do you think this is? The Prisoner!!!!!!
Go to Hell
u bl**dy a**hole, you are paving the way for Arsene to sell Robin.
Adebayor was already playing for AFC when Henry left and the latter was past his best also.
That is not the case for Robin. Playing another striker next season will mean another trophyless season as the said striker(Podolski) needs to adapt himself to arsenal’s style of play and also to the EPL. So use your small brain and do what is necessary for the club to fill the emirates empty cabinet instead of your shit and nonsense.
no one is irreplacable…we had got better than van persie in the past.let him go if he wants.arsenal just need to buy a good deffensive midfielder,a goalkeeperand two good forwards ….can win the tittle…for me my best player is arteta and kochielny
He’s not irreplaceable if we sign Falcao, Cavani or Benzema as a replacement, but I couldn’t see us signing anyone better than Giroud to replace him. While i’ve been impressed with him whenever i’ve seen Montpellier, there’s no doubt it’d be a step dowm from RvP. The other 3 could make a similar goalscoring impact to Van Persie, I feel.
Podolski-Giroud-Walcott is not bad, but Podolski-Van Persie-Walcott could be outstanding when all are in form.
No one is indipensable,not even RVP or Wenger.When Ronaldo left,it was thought MU would struggle.But they continued to win games and trophies.
If RVP is gone,the others including anyone bought, has to start scoring and winning games.
Whene Arsenal are on a winning run and have finally won a trophy,RVP will be forgotten.
The thing is the gunners have to start winning games. Trophies will then come.
Replacing him with Podolski and Cavani would be awesome. And if we just throw M’villa into the mix, then we could challenge on all fronts.
Mvila and giroud
or
song and rvp. its a tough call. but what isnt a tough call is this
kalou hoilett dempsey nzonzi gordon
or
vela park bendtner denilson gordon
Gordon = fabianski
well this a better blog than usual so well done you have stayed away from slating the board and wenger which is unusual you must be ill, lol. Anyway RVP is not irreplacable the problem is attracting players who want to win trophies quality players who will make that possible we have lost that pull a bit recently. so could we get a top striker in to replace him thats the difficult thing there are plenty out there its just getting them to come. I would like to see wenger go for Dempsey not because he has extra quality but aside from the goals he gets he is a grafter and a workhorse a battler who gets stuck in. with arteta wilshere and to a lesser extent rosicky who do the dirty work then against teams who fight and make life difficult aka stokes wigans then we would have better chances of getting results against them. We need other options up front and though not a favourite of mine he does bring something to the table and that is drogba he is a handful can score and has a couple of years top flight in him and he would get on the end of crosses. Downside he is arrogant sullen and an ex chelsea player but you can’t have everything lol.
When people say he is irreplaceable , what they really mean is that you can’t replace him Wenger style. Arsen Wenger’s way of replacing a player is to bring in a new player at a fraction of what he got for a player sold. Is RVP the best striker in the warld? , not by a long shot. He just had a break out season and most likely he won’t repeat it. If he wants to go, Wenger should let him but not for 20 mill. The problem isn’t RVP but Wenger, for no matter how much money RVP transfer brings in (if it happens), you can be sure Wenger will try to find his replacement at a bargain price. Case in point, Fabregas and Nasri debacle.
And how much did he cost when we bought him. I beleive it was something like £2.1m. So do you now think we should automaticaly spend £40m one players? The cost does not guarantee sucess.
Wenger paid 2.75 mill for RVP, who was a promising prospect with a questionable temperament, and some eight years later he menaged to become a prolific striker. If your idea of replacing RVP is buying a young prospect for 2.7 mill , well by all means, but don’t you think there’s some middle ground between 2.7 mill and 40 mill. Besides, judging by Wenger’s sidelines antics I don’t think he has another eight years in him to develop another talent.