Up Yours Barcelona

I can imagine Barcelona's dressing room before their players left for the World Cup. Pep Guardiola must have entered and said to his players, "Well done boys and thank you for all your hard work this season. But like every year, the president has homework for all you guys this summer! Now I know you will be busy with the World Cup this summer, but it will not take too much of your time, and will save the club an incredible amount of money. This year, your task is to destabilize your Spanish team-mate Cesc Fabregas! Most of you already know how to do it, but for those who are new, Carlos Puyol will explain how to do it! It's simple!"

And the Barca players have done their jobs beautifully, haven't they? But it's not about the Barcelona players alone. Barcelona Football Club, as a whole, is running probably the biggest disinformation campaign in the whole world right now. "Cesc belongs to Barcelona F.C." is the biggest load of garbage I have heard for a long time. The interview Puyol gave after Wenger basically told Barcelona to go to hell shows how despicable Barcelona are. Here's the interview, and my thoughts.


"I wonder how intelligent it is keeping a player who doesn't want to be there."

It is very intelligent, Carlos Puyol, believe me. He is a great player, is under contract for 5 more years and is very important to us. If your club is as desperate as it seems, it will pay the market price - your already huge debts may swell further, but who cares? And losing Fabregas to that laughable, derisory offer of 29 million would be less intelligent than keeping him unhappy at Arsenal.


"After seven years of great service, I thought Arsenal could have granted him his dream move."

The most annoying and unintelligent of all comments. So let's get this straight once and for all. Cesc hasn't 'served' Arsenal for 7 years. Arsenal has served him for 7 years. Arsenal got him when he was 16, and was not sure about his own ability to break into the Barcelona team. Fabregas came to Arsenal because he was sure that Wenger would make him the player he is today - as good a player as anybody at Barcelona could make him. He would not have come if he did not trust Wenger. And Arsenal, with one of the best (if not THE best) academies in the world, nurtured him and helped him be an exceptional player.

'Barcelona DNA' is absolute hogwash. Does anybody really believe he got more from Barcelona from the age of 10-16 than he got from Arsenal after that? Yes, he came with a good technique, but majority of kids from the continent do. Do they all become great players? They don't, unless a very very good academy is there to nurture them. And how does age even matter? Was he even one-tenth as good as he is now when he came to Arsenal? No. Arsenal has made Fabregas. Just like Arsenal made Vieira, Henry and many more.


"Cesc has given everything to Arsenal to try to win a trophy but they haven't matched his expectations"

Cesc has only started to repay Arsenal. He is quite a few years away from completely doing so. A player in Fabregas' position can hardly have higher 'expectations' from a club like Arsenal. The club has given him everything, so let's not even talk of 'expectations'. Also, does Fabregas not share responsibility for the team's performance? He appeared in only 27 out of 38 league games last season (many of the appearances were as a substitute). And Arsenal was fighting for the title till the last 4 games. Had he been available to start more games than he did, we could have won the league. We can consider his 'expectations' when he fulfils ours, at least partly.

"I won't say he is in a prison, as we know how privileged we are as football players.
"But after how clear Cesc made it that he wanted to be in Barcelona, I thought they would have granted him that."

At least the first line makes some sense, but Puyol is back to his half-witted talk in the next line. If Fabregas was so keen on moving, he should not have signed a long term contract. Arsenal showed great commitment to him by making him the club's highest earner and offering him such a long term contract. The contract means that even if Fabregas suffers an injury that leaves him useless for the rest of the contract period, Arsenal still pay him those 80,000 pounds every single week. That is a big commitment, when made for as many as 5-6 years.

Fabregas knew what he was doing when he signed the contract, so there is no use weeping like a baby to Spanish fans and creating a soap opera. He should stop acting like a little girl with statements such as 'I wish to see you (Barca fans) more often *sob**sob*sob*'. And if he does not realise how much Arsenal has done for him so far, and still wishes to go, we can grant him that, provided Barcelona pay the right price. Barcelona cannot expect to get Fabregas cheap with their dirty, abject, absolutely loathsome tap-up campaign.


"We all thought a deal would be done this summer. But Arsenal have refused to talk and we are going to have to wait another year to get Cesc home."

I hope Barcelona has to wait more, even if it means Cesc not playing his best football at Arsenal. Arsenal is under no financial pressure to sell.

How I wish Ramsey wasn't injured. Ramsey was as classy as Fabregas and was very close to being a great player, till that hatchet man broke his leg. Maybe it would have taken him another year to actually be as influential, but he was almost there. Now we can only hope for Ramsey's recovery. But thanks to Wenger and his network of scouts and coaches, we have an assembly line of amazingly creative players. So there is a good chance we can make very good use of that one year if we get it.


"He is far too classy a guy to say it but the truth is he doesn't want to be at Arsenal this season. His heart is already in Barcelona, even though we must wait another year for his body to be here"

I thought he was classy too, but apparently not. He has had to come back to Arsenal after Wenger refused to even consider the sale, but we all know he wanted to go. And he has gone around declaring his wish to play for Barcelona to his Spanish teammates, who obviously are doing the talking on his behalf. He has been influenced, as expected with more than half the Barca team playing for Spain. And jokers like Pepe Reina have been only too happy to be a part of this nonsense. But how much can you influence a person who himself doesn't wish to go? Fabregas was already at the edge, in my opinion, and Barcelona pushed him off it. One cannot absolve Fabregas from this affair at all.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love Fabregas and I know he loves Arsenal. But I am really aggrieved because of two reasons. First, because he is turning his back on the club that made him into what he is, at a time when he is close to fulfilling what the club worked hard for. Despite all the speculation for the last few years, I never thought he would do that, because I always believed he knew how indebted he was to Arsenal.

And second, because he has acted in the manner that he has. If Arsenal really really mattered that much to him, he would have stayed. If not that, he at least would have kept his mouth shut all this time. He would not have gone around talking about Barcelona with his Spanish teammates. And he at least would have refrained from his weepy speeches talking of his Catalan roots, acting like a victim here.

Instead, he has gone ahead and done all that, and keeps sending out mixed signals all the time - I am captain of Arsenal but Barcelona is my home; I love Arsenal, but I love Barca too - it's tiring. He knows his going would be a big blow to Arsenal and what they have stood for for so long. He could have at least chosen to give Arsenal a few of his peak years. Yet it seems that he has started to believe that every year he stays at Arsenal, he is doing a favour to the club.

"We know he is arriving next season. Barcelona have a whole year to sort the deal out.

More Barca talk - arrogant and disrespectful.

"He is professional enough still to have a great season and also because he has a lot of respect for the Arsenal fans.
"But anybody who tries to convince themselves he wanted to stay at Arsenal is wrong."

I agree. Arsenal have to accept he wants to go, but that needn't mean letting him go cheap.

I feel that keeping an unhappy player is not entirely wise, but a line has to be drawn somewhere. If a club like Barcelona work all year to create an unhappy situation in a player's mind, and then come to the table with a disgraceful offer of 29 million knowing that they have succeeded in destabilizing the player, there is no way a club like Arsenal should bend. It would be inexcusable if Arsenal allowed this to happen and I, as a fan, would be extremely hurt if it did happen.

I must mention one thing here. The way Arsenal have responded to Barcelona's pettiness makes me proud to be a Gooner. Arsenal have been dignified, even when dealing with contemptible behaviour. And Arsenal have shown great strength and resolve. They have been so strong that Barcelona have been made to look helpless.

This situation has made me look more optimistically than I did when the first indication of Fabregas' desire to leave came. I still think that if Fabreas does leave anytime soon, it will be a big blow to Arsenal's youth policy (real youth policy, unlike that of some clubs who only claim to have one). But Arsenal have a choice, and Arsenal alone will decide Fabregas' future. They can choose to not let him go at any cost.

Even if he does go this year, we must remember that the focus on youth has helped Arsenal go through tough times incredibly well. Competing with the likes of Chelsea and Manchester United at a fraction of their budgets was no mean feat, and it was made possible by our philosophy of youth. It helped us when it was needed the most. So even if it takes a moral blow now, we know it helped us survive. We now have an infrastructure of youth that is ahead of its times, and extremely difficult to set up. With better times approaching, our policy can be suitably tweaked, in a way that will make us more competent without deviating significantly from our core.

Essentially, though we are in a difficult situation with respect to Fabregas, we hold all the aces here. Arsenal will decide when, if at all, to let him go, and at what price. And Arsenal can recover from such a situation better than most people can imagine. As has been the case for years, the academy will take care of the club. In Nasri, Ramsey and Wilshere, we have three potential replacements. Most clubs will be lucky to have one Fabregas. Even if we lose one, we may create three. That is how Arsenal Football Club has been under Wenger. And that is how it will continue to be.