Core Values

Its been a slow couple of days in Arsenal world, if not weeks. However, recent events are making me feel a sense of great disillusion.

I am not a modest man, but I am good at my job and could probably earn more if I moved employers. However, I am relatively happy where I am, like most of the people I work with and the stuff I do. The point is that I feel a sense of loyalty to what I do and the people who helped me get where I am.

However, as a football fan, I see a lot of stuff in the game at the moment that is really hard to like. Gareth Barry's move to Man City is about one thing, namely money. The same goes for the crazy fee that Real have paid for Kaka today. Likewise, quotes today from Yaya Toure's agent show that the only thing on his mind is getting the biggest wages possible in a move from Barca. A move that cannot make sense for footballing reasons from a team that has just done the Spanish treble.

Well I have reached a point where I don't want to be part of that. Its not quite the crossing of the Rubicon, but I have no time for players whose only interest is their pay packet at the end of the week. Adebayor fits right into this category and his performances this season have been very poor after his massive payrise last summer. That is just not good enough. That said, I feel that underneath all the crap, there is a good player in Adebayor that struggled at Monaco and thrived for a season at the Emirates, before getting the massive deal he wanted. I can also imagine that earning £100k per week as a young man from Togo can do funny things to the brain and only the most level headed, or stupid, players would go through that with no side-affects.

Newcastle are a disaster, Liverpool are on the brink of disaster, Chelsea could not exist if Abramovich pulled the plug, even Manure's long term financial model is highly dubious as they are not making any effort to repay their debts. But Arsenal are different. And right now I am proud of that.

I know almost nothing about Vermaellen, but having spoken to a group of Belgian's last Friday night, he is viewed as their best defender for a generation, is strong and good in the air and is learning the art of being a dirty bastard well from Jaap Stam at Ajax. That sounds pretty good to me for £11m.

So I say stuff Gareth Barry, stuff Kaka and massively stuff Alonso. Give me a shit-kicker from Romford who wears his heart on his sleeve, has a stupid haircut and works his socks off any day. The day we moved beyond players like Ray Parlour, the Romford Pele, we lost our soul.

If we keep this squad together, then we might just get it back.