The miracle man « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. Supporting the Lord Wenger; coach of the decade

Woolwich Arsenal, the club that changed football.  Have your name in the book as an official sponsor.  Updated information here

By Walter Broeckx

When Wenger brought Thierry Henry to Arsenal he wasn’t a complete unknown for Wenger. Wenger had insisted that Henry would come to Monaco as he could see the big potential of the young lad.

And I can imagine (and this time my imagination is taking over) Wenger talking to Thierry Henry who had been a bit of a failure at Juventus. A failed winger one could say. And I imagine Wenger saying to Henry: “Son, if you listen to me I will make you the best striker in the world”. And maybe Henry will have nodded in agreement but maybe inside he was thinking: “are you kidding me?”  He was fast, he could dribble but nothing in the early days of his career pointed at him being a top striker and finisher.

But Wenger took the failed winger under his wings and slowly created the Thierry Henry we all have seen in his first spell at the club. One of the most amazing strikers ever to have been on a football pitch in the world and the best striker that ever has worn an Arsenal shirt. Breaking all kinds of records with an ease that still is amazing looking back at it all.

Him leaving Arsenal in tears was something hard to take. But after all he had given to the club we understood his personal dream and the fact that he wanted to go to Barcelona to win his Champions League medal. My only sour note on Henry is the fact that he should have won it for Arsenal in the final against Barcelona but for once his deadly precision let him down when he had the chance to put us 2-0 in front in the second half. I still have nightmares of him shooting wide and I think that it will have haunted him in his nightmares also. Maybe it still does haunt him?

The warm welcome he got whenever he returned to the Emirates was a testimony of the eternal love from the fans for their favourite player. Like the warm welcome he received when he played for Barcelona in the CL against us and which raised eyebrows in Barcelona and got them thinking he still was more an Arsenal player than a Barcelona player. No player of a visiting team will ever receive such a warm and well meant round of applause when he started warming up that day. Well apart from Eduardo when he came over with Shakthar last year but the relationship between Eduardo and Arsenal has more to do with his terrible injury and the way that people just knew that this was the only reason Eduardo didn’t make it after that at Arsenal.

Now one cannot underestimate the role that Arsène Wenger has played in the career of Henry. Even though Wenger said that Henry would have made it anyway…. I really doubt it.  It was only under Wenger that Henry got to the high levels we have seen. It didn’t happen at Monaco (after Wenger was gone) and at Juventus. So somewhere the magic words ‘Listen to me and I will make you the best striker in the world and in the Arsenal history” must have done something.

Now for a manager to do this trick (turning a player in to a top class player) is something that only a few managers can do. Turning a fast winger in to a deadly finisher is something that only a few managers do in their career. I think most managers never do this in fact.

But now we can say that he has done it again. Because now it is clear to see that Wenger has turned Van Persie in to a world class striker also. Again Wenger saw something in a player that nobody else could or would see.

Okay I knew Van Persie was a very talented player. Very skilful, not as fast as Henry but maybe with much more control on the ball than Henry. But nobody considered Van Persie as a player who could play as a central striker. As a second striker, yes. As a winger coming in from both flanks,  yes. But how on earth could this player who looked so fragile at first (and who was in fact fragile mostly down to bad tackles in fact) could be the main striker of a club like Arsenal.

And not just the fact that he would be played there but most of all the fact that since he played there he has developed in to one of the best strikers in the world. People generally consider Messi and Ronaldo as the best strikers in the world. But all stats point that Van Persie is just as good as those two if not better for the moment.

The way Van Persie has developed under Wenger in the last years is as amazing as the development Henry had in his first years under Wenger. People can be critical about Wenger if they want to. But name me one manager in the modern era of football who has turned two players in to world class strikers in a 10 year period. Maybe some will attempt it in the comment section but for the moment I cannot think of one manager doing it twice in the space of some 10 years time.

Arsenal don’t buy world class players is much heard amongst the fans. Some regret it. Arsenal make world class players is much said by some fans.  Some don’t like it. But believe me I love it. I think no greater pleasure and satisfaction to see the little duck turning in to an amazing and beautiful swan. And how privileged we have been that most of us have not seen it once but are seeing it twice.

Whatever you might think of Wenger as a manager remember that no other manager in recent and modern football has achieved such a thing. Turning two unknown and almost failed (remember the “we must get rid of-lists” a few years ago that had Van Persie on it because he was always injured???) players in to the best strikers of the world. And only God knows what could and would have happened to some and what still will happen for those who are clever enough to stay around under his guidance and let Wenger develop them to the best player around. Could he do it a third time in the future? If so it would be almost a miracle. But if there is one man who could perform such a miracle it has to be Wenger.