When Juventus were relegated thanks to Calciopoli, Vieira did what any good mercenary does. He left for their biggest rival, Inter. He joined a list of names such as Ibrahimovic and Cannavaro in leaving the Juventus ship, neither of whom is particularly known for their loyalty. Nedved, Buffon and Camoranesi, not exactly one-club players, stayed, and became immortal. Immortality was never quite what Vieira was aiming for. He could have been immortal at Arsenal had he stayed. He could have been immortal at Juve for being loyal. He didn’t do that. When he played for Inter, he sounded out Wenger for a return, firstly as a player, and then as a coach. Wenger at that time didn’t have space for another coach and Vieira decided to play for Man City, and when he offered himself to Arsenal again
Warning: may contain controversy
Between 1996 and 2005, there was a force of unbridled power strutting around on English and European football pitches. A very tall man with impossible broad shoulders and insanely long legs was absolutely bossing midfields with his movement, tackling, passing and sheer momentum when he got going. He wore the Arsenal captain’s armband with passion from 2002 on and made Gooners all over the world forget there ever was someone called Tony Adams. This man, of course, was Patrick Vieira, one of the greatest central midfielders this world has ever seen. He had the makings of an absolute Arsenal legend. Yet now, here, I really dislike the man. Patrick Vieira is an Arsenal legend no more. A quick poll on twitter revealed to me that most Gooners (albeit a small majority) agree with me.
Back in the early noughties this was the player Arsenal relied on. His playing style was so distinctive, so incredible, that he took the whole world by storm. Boys all over Europe wore a wet patch on their football jersey, around about on their sternum, because Vieira did that. Medically, it had absolutely no effect, research told us. But no-one cared. Such was the influence of Patrick Vieira. A cultured hardman, a box to box leviathan who could do the most intricate, delicate things with his feet, he was two players in one. He was pivotal to the title wins, the doubles and the Invincibles season. Still to this day, to me, he was the most important player in that team, and that team is widely ranked amongst the greatest ever. The same goes for the France team of the turn of the millennium, one of the most exciting and talented international teams in recent football history, and Vieira was the fulcrum of those teams as much as Henry or Zidane were. We will always love him for picking fights with odious twats like Van Nistelrooij and Keane, for crunching tackles, for lifting trophies and for gorgeous assists, including some of my all time favourites. He should be up there with Henry, Adams and Bergkamp. Yet to me his isn’t.
So where did it go wrong? What makes me feel a droning pain in my heart whenever someone mentions him or talks about his current role? Maybe I should see a doctor… But in all seriousness, too much has happened for me to still love the man like some people do. For starters, every season since 2000 he was flirting outrageously with clubs all over Europe. Arsenal were not rich enough to offer him the riches he so desperately desired, and for that reason every summer became a transfer saga of epic proportions. I will never forgive him for that. Bert Cooper in Mad Men describes Don Draper as a ‘productive and reasonable member of society and above all entirely self-interested’. This Ayn Randian description of a person who strives for his own importance and financial wellbeing is one that fits very well with Patrick Vieira. Even though he was captain of Arsenal, winning titles and personal plaudits, earning very good money, he wanted more. He claimed to want to win the Champions League. To me that was a very specious argument, because this was before the time of the big money, and clubs were far closer in level. Liverpool and Porto won the CL and clubs like Bayer Leverkusen reached the final. The only club that could guarantee involvement in the latter stages was Real Madrid and they already have a midfield packed with players. He was quite close to joining them in 2003 and 2004, but in 2005, he eventually joined Juventus. Not exactly a team who were not exactly setting the world on fire the same way Arsenal were doing, not filling up their stadium, and were involved in some very dirty business. But hey, he earned more money there.
When Juventus were relegated thanks to Calciopoli, Vieira did what any good mercenary does. He left for their biggest rival, Inter. He joined a list of names such as Ibrahimovic and Cannavaro in leaving the Juventus ship, neither of whom is particularly known for their loyalty. Nedved, Buffon and Camoranesi, not exactly one-club players, stayed, and became immortal. Immortality was never quite what Vieira was aiming for. He could have been immortal at Arsenal had he stayed. He could have been immortal at Juve for being loyal. He didn’t do that. When he played for Inter, he sounded out Wenger for a return, firstly as a player, and then as a coach. Wenger at that time didn’t have space for another coach and Vieira decided to play for Man City, and when he offered himself to Arsenal again after his retirement and was told we were not ready to have him, he decided to ‘wrap his lips around the giant member of the Abu Dhabi owners and suck hard, like a good whore should. And was told not to orphan the balls’ (to paraphrase Californication). So far, in his capacity as Football Development Executive, he has helped convince Arsenal players to sign for Man City, he has used his knowledge of our training and scouting and helped copy it in Manchester, and was seen doing a cool handshake with Samir Na$ri. As far as Arsenal sell-outs go, this was pretty bad. His subsequent comments made on his twitter account may have been written by some PR employee, but the sentiment is still there.
There are things to be said for Vieira’s behaviour. For years, Sir Alex wanted him to drink wine with him over at ManU. Whilst odious little shits like Nasri and Adebayor would have killed people for that honour, Vieira at least sought his payday in foreign countries. Also, by the time Vieira left Arsenal, we all saw that he had lost a yard of pace, he was slightly injury prone and for the amount Juventus offered, letting him go was the right decision. But the fact that he openly sought this move for years beforehand left a bitter taste in our mouths. To see him not do very well at either Italian clubs certainly helped, because I always thought that keeping him for one or two seasons more would have helped us avoid those terrible seasons of 2005-2006 and 2006-2007 (and maybe helped swing a CL final that was lost in midfield). That moment when Cesc dominated Vieira and Robert Pires, hardly the most tenacious player, tackled him superbly showed Vieira he had made a mistake. According to him, however, he had made a mistake by not leaving Arsenal earlier. A comment influenced by his bank manager, no doubt.
Maybe I am exaggerating. Maybe it is not that unusual for a player to be motivated by money. Maybe captaining a club on the rise was not that special to him. Maybe he was just like every player is now, basically self-interested and without too much love for a club. Vieira can not be accused of not loving Arsenal. Indeed, his attempts to join us after his time at Inter shows just that. But he has made too many mistakes in his career to be worthy of the status of legend. Back when the 50 greatest players in Arsenal’s history were chosen, he was fifth. In terms of ability, leadership and influence this was absolutely right. In terms of loyalty and the way he was outspoken on his intentions to move on, he always let us
down. His move to join Man City, basically the bad guys in the ‘good fight’ to keep football football, has shown us what his interests were all along. Hopefully one day he will be back at Arsenal, a desire he always expressed to want, but when he comes back, he will have to earn his status as legend back. Then again, that might just be me.
Check out Guest poster Aeroberg’s response: Patrick Vieira Still A Legend To Some
EXAMPLE OF AD POSITION
