The Best Team Won

Vieira back to Arsenal? July 30, 2009

It must be tough to be an Arsenal fan. For the past few seasons, Arsenal have had to fight off widespread opinion that the team is too young to win anything, too slender to put up any semblance of a title challenge. And every season, the critics are vindicated. With the departure of Adebayor and Toure, Arsenal fans have little to believe that the upcoming season would be any different.

Bringing Vieira back into the Arsenal fold might seem a logical move, except that it simply isn’t. Although Vieira might carry with him the stature and experience of a footballing great, he is a spent force, featuring little for Inter over the past few seasons due to his injury problems. I can’t see him as anything beyond a very good dressing room influence, like Gary Neville’s role at Manchester United now.

It would also be interesting to see how receptive Arsenal fans would be to this move, especially considering how Vieira openly admitted that he would consider a move to Spurs, a cardinal sin for any Gunner.

If this move materialises, it would be seen as an admission by Wenger that his policy of putting faith in the youngsters have failed. Even the most ardent Arsenal fan would have see enough by now to realise that the plan is just not working. However,Wenger would be better off investing in players in their prime.

Looking at how the other big clubs are shaping up in the transfer market,the upcoming season can potentially be a window of opportunity for Arsenal to be genuine title contenders. Both the squads of Manchester United and Liverpool have arguably been weakened, while there seems to be not much going on at Chelsea. Manchester City have thrown themselves into the mix by throwing money at other clubs. Even if they do not put up a title challenge, they would definitely have the wherewithal to make lives difficult for the “Big Four”. At this point in time, it seems that the playing field has been levelled somewhat.

Now if Wenger can just bring in some quality players, Arsenal fans would be less reluctant to say “In Wenger we trust”.