Aaron Ramsey and the shroud of Turin

60 comments

1. I’m sad.

2. Good luck to him and thanks for the memories.

   He is swapping a mid table club, for a foreseeable future , for a CL powerhouse and a nailed on league winner.

   I’ll be genuinely interested to see how much freedom Allegri will afford Ramsey in his Juve set up.

3. This is the transfer that very clearly demarcates the Wenger-Gazidis Arsenal and the new Raul-Sven-Emery Arsenal. There is no way this decision would have been made under the previous management. And a huge call it is. Hopefully they know what they are doing. As of now, I cannot believe this will prove a smart move in any way.

4. You would have to have all the facts in front of you to make that determination.
   Facts like what was the exact contract offer to Ramsey later withdrawn.

   Letting players go into last year of their contract was probably Wenger’s biggest error in judgment from a financial stand point.
   This much is clear.

   1. You can’t force players to sign. A bit rich blaming the last year of contract when it is the club that decides to withdraw an offer agreed to by the player. The club, we are told, had decided to honour the contract offer made to Wilshere previously. But then they reneged on Ramsey’s deal. This is on Raul.

      1. Using the same logic one could argue that the Ozil negotiations were text book how to resign a player from a club’s stand point.
         Allowing players going into last year shifts the advantage into their corner.

         Wilshere and Ramsey might’ve been £200k apart for all we know.
         We are in a different financial reality now.

      2. True, but we may be at the beginning of the “sign or get sold” era, although, even in this scenario, a determined player could string things out (because, precisely as you said, you cant force them to sign. However, 2 or 3 years out from the end of a contract, the player has less leverage, and the club more).

         The Ramsey decision is footballistically bone-headed; financially not much better. If they have identified a replacement who would make a Torreira-like impact, on Torreira-like wages (not a lot more than Jenkinson) with a Torreira like age profile, it would be somewhat mitigated. But you’re losing a valuable, experienced player and a great squad option for nothing, and, as Tim shows, not really improving your position financially

         A number of bad management decisions got us here. The decision not to put Ozil and Sanchez on the market the summer before their contracts ended. So we lost 60m on Sanchez (he was worth more with more time on his contract), whatever we would have got for Ozil, and ended up paying Mesut the equivalent of 3 players’ wages. Because Sanchez destination was United, we not only took a (not very good) United reject to save face in the deal, we paid him a boatload because he held all of the leverage at this point… big money or no move.

         So we were faced with a devastating combination of lost asset value and bloated wages on old players whose transfer value was on the point of plummeting. We should see the decision to shaft Ramsey for what it was… a harbinger to fiscal belt tightening that has nothing to do with the actual needs of the squad.

         All of this is great argument for why the coach should never get involved in transfers. Arsene appeared to believe that given his personal good relations with the Sanchezes and van Persies of this world, he could get them to re-sign at any time. That clearly will not be allowed to happen again.

         1. Well, we sold players in the past when they wouldn’t re-sign. It was when we entered the new sponsorships era that Wenger tried to risk the financial part and keep his best players. (He did say his focus will necessarily be more short term)

            And you know, I disagree that Ozil got a deal way above what we should pay him. Forget about your frustrations with him. He is a marquee player, a statement signing at the time and we’ve won 3 FA Cups since (Trooopppphhiieeesss) and given us some sublime football. AND he’s a bonafide global star, probably the only one we have. He’s getting paid 350k because he’s worth it. He’s only not worth it if you’re trying to go a new direction of getting the wage bill down and build for the future. (I just realised how crazy it is that Arsenal fans are happy at this development)

            I agree we should have sold Alexis, and I know you argued for it. This is where I just want to add some nuance. This new found narrative of prioritising income from player sales. For years the club was under pressure for doing exactly that. Which is why I think they wanted to sell only after having a replacement lined up, and they just couldn’t get the deals over the line in time.

            I also think we should have put a deadline on negotiations with Ramsey and sold him in August if we couldn’t reach agreement. But.. we didn’t do that, and maybe it was clear that Ramsey wanted to stay and so we weren’t fussed. I really do believe Ramsey would have stayed too. You’re right, the new management is tightening the purse strings.

            And we’re going Project Youth 2.0. I’m almost certain of it. I don’t mind, but I don’t buy the poverty or FFP line from the club. They’ve got the money, they’re just being cautious with it at least until we get back to the CL.

      3. Isn’t it established fact that Ramsey had his offer for a good period of time before it was yanked? It takes two to tango. I don’t think this is all on the new regime, it sounds like Ramsey didn’t leap on the contract when it was offered.

         My theory – Arsenal made an offer in good faith. Ramsey sat on it because he wanted to use it as leverage in discussions with other clubs i.e. “I’m interested in coming to you guys, but here’s this offer from Arsenal… can you match?” The new brass caught wind and decided to send a message to all future players – don’t try and take advantage of us. Offer rescinded, leverage gone (hence the fairly mediocre deal from Juve afterall). You may have been able to squeeze Wenger & Gazidis, but we’re not going to (or can’t) play that game.

         I’m on record wanting to sell Ozil, Sanchez, Wilshere and AOC last summer and Ramsey and Welbeck this past summer. If a player doesn’t re-up (with signing bonus rather than huge salary bump would be a great idea) by Aug 1 on any given summer – out. Get any cash you can for the player and move on. A few years of this and players that really want to stay at Arsenal will stop trying to play games in contract talks.

         Wenger really did mess up the last few seasons.

         1. The deal from Juve is far from mediocre. His gross weekly is in the region of 280k. And the narrative from you is pure conjecture, or guesswork if I’m being less diplomatic

            1. Oh absolutely. I say as much. I have no way of knowing what went on, it’s only my theory. One day we might know. Until then conjecture is all we have.

               But…. similarly you are guessing at what deal Ramsey is getting. The 280k a week is also conjecture, all we know is the amount being reported – we don’t know if that’s gross or net, with our without signing bonus, etc.

            2. Jack. Contract figures in Italy are reported net. It’s true the Guardian said that Ramsey’s on 140k without specifying net or gross. But they also said he’s going to be their second highest earner ahead of Douglas Costa. Costa’s reported wage in Italy is 8m euros. Roughly 140k pounds after tax.

               Either Costa’s reported wage is way wrong (unlikely), the Guardian got specifically bad info about Ramsey being 2nd only to Ronaldo also unlikely), or, the Guardian for whatever reason did not specify that the wage is after tax (Maybe they weren’t sure and played safe, or they assumed wrongly)

         2. I don’t know where you’re getting the info that he was sitting on the offer. I know a lot of people say it, but there’s no evidence of this.

            All I know is that Ramsey said he thought they had agreed on a deal and that the club said they’d get back to him but he heard nothing, and he found out through the media that they had pulled the offer, which is when he decided to speak out.

            The club didn’t contradict him. Instead they put out Raul to talk about smart contract management or something. (In my mind this essentially confirms Ramsey’s statement)

            Then Ramsey said he had since been contacted by the club to tell him what happened.

            I think you’re being extremely generous to the club here that Ramsey was playing them. It was a change in CEO that caused this, not Ramsey’s duplicity.

            1. But where did you read or hear that Ramsey “agreed” to a new deal, only for the club to “renege”?

               And no, the club didn’t contradict him, because even Ramsey didn’t imply that the ‘agreed deal’ was withdrawn, he was asking why the ‘offer’ was.

               It’s laughable how many different elements of this story you’re either making up or not well-read on.

               If your version of the story was true, (it isn’t, but hypothetically speaking) Ramsey wouldn’t have gone to the press, he’d have hired the most expensive lawyers in the land to sue the hell out of the club.

               Surely you didn’t fall victim to the twitter ITK accounts who were falling over themselves to #announce Ramsey’s new Arsenal deal during the summer? Even AVID Group, who rep Ramsey, used their official acct to LOL and advise them to stop making stuff up.

            2. “Everything has been going great with the club – we thought we were in a position where we had agreed a deal but that’s no longer the case,”

               “Am I disappointed? That’s a decision they have made and things happen in football and you just have to get on with it.”

               Ramsey’s words.

               Why do you think agreement means a signed, legal agreement? Neither I, nor importantly Ramsey, ever claimed that. But you agree on terms before drawing up a contract, no?

            3. Oh and not that it’s relevant here but, you should know there are severe consequences for players who decide to sue clubs. Fifa strongly dissuades this, and logically, a player is not going to risk his career over a legal battle unless he is desperate and has no real choice.

               So this argument in general that if they were wronged they would just sue doesn’t work. Not in football, and very often, not in real life either.

            4. Oh now you’ve checked the records it’s Ramsey “thought” some stuff.

               And he would sue but he doesn’t want the heavies at FIFA leaving a horse’s head on his bed. Okay mate.

            5. Oh Ramsey said ‘thought’ so it must be entirely in his head with no basis. And I very specifically said it (suing) is not relevant in this case. It’s clear you want to twist words (mine and Ramsey’s) to simply argue.

            6. Umm, I suggest you read back to where I said “hypothetically speaking, Ramsey would have had hired a lawyer”. Then ask yourself why you responded as if I was stating as *fact* that he had a legal case.

               You should both read more carefully, and resist the urge to invent storylines like “Arsenal reneged on the deal agreed with Ramsey”, which is such pure unadulterated BS that even Ramsey & AVID Group themselves didn’t make such a claim.

            7. Kaius

               If you’d like to recap, let’s do it. You came in taking umbrage at my usage of the words ‘agreed deal’ and ‘renege’. I’m not sure why the latter bothers you. It’s just another way of saying withdrew. But you believe that isn’t true because you don’t believe there was an ‘agreed deal’.

               When pointed out that Ramsey’s statements used the words ‘agreed a deal’ you then said it was just something he ‘thought’.

               You’ve also constantly implied that I’m lying, making things up, or just an idiot who believes in the ITKs. You also decide to nitpick every word rather than the assess their import.

               So yes, Ramsey never said the exact words Arsenal went back on the deal.

               But what do you reckon the import of saying I thought we had agreement but no longer the case and it’s a decision they (the club) made? Really? Are we to just ignore all of that because it doesn’t fit the exact wording that would satisfy you? But we can then make up stuff about him waiting too long to sign without knowing if there was even a contract in front of him?

               As for your ‘hypothetical’. You insisted that Ramsey would have gone to court if my version of events had any truth. It wasn’t a hypothetical, it was a rebuttal. And my response was basically an aside to say that is generally a bad take, even though I specified that legal action was irrelevant here and you were yet again, misrepresenting my claims.

               You know Kaius, I think you assume bad faith arguments in others so often because that is your own default mode of arguing.

            8. I don’t think you need to be an outright idiot to be taken in by twitter ITK accounts, nor did I say that.

               Some of them are quite sophisticated, so people of average intelligence get suckered by them as well.

            9. Folks – get a room already!

               Also, regardless of who said what,Rambo isn’t going to be here next season. Whatever. We survived Tony’s retirement; we’ll be ok after this too.

               Hope ESR and his ilk can fill those Hull-slaying boots. Else, we’ll just have to buy them guys.

5. I like Ramsey. I don’t think he’s going to cut it at Juve. That’s just my humble (amateur) opinion – the Italian game is built on a base of tactical discipline. In Italian football they talk about the “chain” – Player A passes to Player B who passes to Player C. It’s the Italian game that influenced Guardiola to where he asks players to listen to him about how to get out of the back 2/3 of the field, and then once they get into the final 1/3 they can have the freedom they want. I don’t see Ramsey catching on. He would have been a better fit at Bayern and the more robust running game in the Bundesliga. That said, Turin is a beautiful city, Juventus a great club, lots of great players and a great coach. I’m glad to see a British player cashing in on an opportunity to work and live in another country and get that exposure, I wish more would use their playing skills as a visa to other parts of the world. Good Luck Aaron.

   1. He’ll be just fine. Bet he surprises a few folks.

6. Wow. My club destroyed 50m in asset value, Ramsey, and now says it can’t afford to buy a 20m midfielder, Denis Suarez. That’s a year after destroying 70m in asset value, Alexis Sanchez.

   But you know what I liked about the Emery press conference at which he said the club had no money for buys this month and can only do loans? The straight-up honestly. None of Wenger’s games playing or clever wordsmithery… tell it like it is. And what it is, is shameful for Arsenal FC.

   Im not happy with either regime’s personnel or financial management — Gazidis/Wenger/Law or Sanllehi/Mislintat/Vinai. Emery is excepted, although we don’t know the part he played in the decision to renege on the agreement with Ramsey.

7. Speaking of the Shroud of Turin, I highly recommend Christopher Buckley’s novel, “The Relic Master.”

   Good luck to Ramsey. And good luck to Arsenal, who will need loads of it to ever get back into the top four with current personnel and budget.

8. A very well written Post, imothyt, and shows the various options open to Rambo and Juventus.

   Many of the comments following the Post seem to agree that it does not cast Arsenal in a good financial light, but no one seems able to offer an explanation as to why, even under the FFP rules.

   Even if Arsenal were concerned about breaching the FFP rules, it does not make sense. Man City and PSG have breached the rules relating profits to salaries – and they got a financial smack on the wrist and a rubbish warning — peanuts compared to the money Arsenal have lost on these ‘non’ transfer deals in the last year, or so.

   Maybe someone on here ‘in the know’ can explain it to us – if not, maybe in the years ahead a leak from the club will reveal all??

   Hello, Shard. 😃

   1. Hello Penguin.

      I’d once heard a joke about someone being a ‘penguin erector’. I worry that this might be a real thing in my case 😀

9. Ramsey was a forward?
   What about the potential for him to play a Fernandinho role? Is this just a matter of him not having received the right coaching?

   Super informative with respect to how opaque transfer reports are, and how clubs might cleverly structure a deal to recoup some cost if a deal doesn’t work out.

   I forgot Drinkwater was a Chelsea player.

   1. Ramsey didnt understand his game for a few years. When Cesc left, he fancied himself as Cesc MkII, but although he is a decent passer and a good Arsenal-style combination player (of which Rosicky was the absolute master) he is not in the creative league of Cesc or Mesut Ozil.

      He was not a Cesc-type player however hard he tried to be. His Hollywood balls and flicks and tricks used to drive me nuts. He thrived when he simplified his game, and became Arsenal’s hardest-working midfielder. The thing that separated him from most was incredible stamina. Wenger often commented on that, and opined that he could have been as successful at rugby (which is a more revered sport in south Wales). He has compared him to Roy Keane, but Keane was a better player, if more defensive and far less offensive. Ramsey’s all-round numbers are actually excellent, and mark him out as one of the best all-round midfielders in the premier league, now and for the past few seasons.

      Despite this, he’s the Arsenal player subjected to some of the most ill-informed insta opinions you’ll ever see (it’s why I get so reactive on the subject).

      From a personal POV, it’s a good move, to a bigger and better club, for a bigger pay packet. Sad to lose him, glad it worked out so well for him.

      One more thing… much as we praise him for his professionalism, he’s putting his future at great risk playing tough games for a club (Arsenal) that has already told him it wont be offering him a contract extension. If he suffers a severe injury, Im not sure that Juventus is obligated to take him, pre-contract agreement or not. For his own sake, he should insist on going this month, no matter how much Emery claims that he’s valuable for the rest of the campaign.

      He does not owe Arsenal that risk.

      1. “…….For his own sake, he should insist on going this month, no matter how much Emery claims that he’s valuable for the rest of the campaign.
         He does not owe Arsenal that risk.”

         What a weird comment.
         Sure he owes Arsenal that risk because he’s under a contract.

         Emery Can was in similar situation running down his Liverpool contract and going to Juve on a free but I seriously doubt any Liverpool fan would for a second consider his well-being over that of the club’s.

         If Ramsey wants to go now then he can buy the rest of his contract out.
         There, problem solved.

         1. Emre not Emery obviously

         2. You misunderstand. I don’t give a monkey’s about Can and Liverpool. Of course he’s under contract, but he’s also one bad tackle away from wrecking his livelihood. That’s why a January departure is best for all concerned.

            You’re right about buying out the contract, or Juve can pay a nominal transfer fee. I’m simply being rational. Welbeck, badly injured on the job for us, is not being offered even a temporary contract. Who’s going to give him one in his current state?

            I dunno. I don’t think, or rationally expect, Ramsey charge through walls for Arsenal between now and June, professional as he is. There is simply too much at stake.

            1. How is Ramsey’s January departure best for all concerned when Emery just said Arsenal have no money for new players to come in other than on loan?

               Seems to me getting at least some minutes from Ramsey the rest of the way is more beneficial to Arsenal’s top four and EL chances than not having him at all.

               I think your Ramsey love is clouding your judgment brother 🙂

            2. Bro, he’s not going to bust a gut, is he? Go hell for leather into tackles. Throw himself into 50/50s. That can make a difference to winning a midfield battle or not. Why do you think both buying and selling teams prefer January departures if they can help it?

               For the obvious reasons I took care to spell out. This is “duh” level obvious, I’d have thought.

            3. When has Ramsey’s game ever been about going hard into 50/50 tackles anyways. I must’ve missed that part of his game.
               I don’t necessarily want any Arsenal player doing that btw.
               I think Ramsey will prove you wrong.
               You can’t spend half the season playing professional ball at this level and not try to give your best.

10. Nice work..but mate when players get to a certain age eg Ramsey/Ozil, losing them on a free is not that much of a disaster…let me explain. Even if Ramsey stayed, he wouldn’t play forever..They would have to place him at some point; when his considerable powers start to wane…so they can pay him £200k/wk for a five-year contract and then have to replace him in two years, as he wanes, at which point a replacement mid of his calibre could cost..£70m Or he goes for a free now and we a buy replacement now (Denis Suarez???) for £20m. A disaster would have been losing a young Mid player like Ox on a free..but the club got £50m..for him..I dont think Arsenal did too much wrong here. We like to think players are irreplaceable or we have to find an exact replacement (mythical Viera II)…but very few players, probably only two in world football are truely irreplaceable…

    1. 35m GBP for Ox, not 50.

    2. People are more exercised over getting no transfer fee for Ramsey than what Arsenal would have to pay to keep him. Look we can get on board with letting the player go, for the financial reasons that you state. But fgs, do proper squad-building planning, and set a cutoff for his agreement. A properly managed club decides optimally early that it will sell the player. Not at the point of zero leverage that you won’t. I’m with Jack on setting that as a general policy.

       1. Mate thanks for correcction for ox fee…but listen..what do clubs do when players/agents say no to good offers/delay and protract talks. Sometimes it comes to this. If Arsenal is not a properly managed club who is…?

11. Italians police have applied for access to Ronaldo’s DNA to test if it matches DNA on the dress of the woman that’s accused him of rape.

    Honestly, I’m surprised it gotten this far. Terrible if it’s true.

    1. Yeah, big storm brewing for Cristiano.

       If the DNA confirms what he’s already basically confessed to doing, I don’t see how how he slides out of this one.

       1. Sorry, I haven’t been following this too closely, but if Ronaldo claims consensual s*x, as he does, how does the presence of his DNA help decide “he said vs. she said” regarding the accusation of r*pe?

          1. Agree.
             From very little that know about this case the DNA evidence changes nothing.
             Didn’t they settle this out of court originally?

             Looks to me the “r*pe” victim ( alleged) either blew through the settlement money already or decided she can still get some more out of
             cr 7.

             Who said what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas?

             1. Why would you pay out a settlement if the sex was consensual?

                Huge red flag there, but you’ve ignored that part and leapt straight to the assumption that a woman accepting money from a more wealthy/powerful man indicates that the male party must be a saint, and the female a lecherous money- grubbing tart.

                No wonder people like Weinstein and R Kelly were able to spend decades terrorising hundreds of victims with impunity.

             2. KAIUS
                Why would you accept such a low settlement from a super wealthy, global football star if you were r*ped.
                Isn’t that a red flag?
                I’m no Ronaldo fan in the least (I think he’s a di#k) and I believe every woman should be afforded time and opportunity to present her case against anyone, but unless there’s new evidence that wasn’t available before, I fail to see the reason for a new civil suit other than getting more money.

                Let’s say for argument’s sake the s*x was consensual.
                It makes perfect sense for a wealthy superstar to settle out of court
                for peanuts to make it go away instead of a lengthy public trial.

             3. The fallacy here is you suggesting a higher settlement would’ve passed your smell test.

                Don’t kid yourself – there’s no magic amount that would’ve stopped you painting Mayorga as some kind of gold-digger.

                And this for a footballer you don’t even like. If it were your buddy, brother or father I imagine you’d go full-Brett Kavanaugh.

             4. Dead wrong on all three counts.
                Better stick to your day job, you’d make a $hitty fortune teller, buddy.

12. There seems to be a growing trend of famous men who are accused of sexual deviancy being tried through the media and convicted by public opinion.
    Now i don’t know whether any of the accused are guilty or not of the accusations leveled against them, but to see people lose sponsors, have tours cancelled, music catalogs deleted by spotify etc without even being charged of ANY crime let alone convicted doesn’t sit right with me.
    And some of these doucu-series/channels seem to rehash allegations from decades ago repackage the situations and dramatize everything for monetary gain.

    For example this spring there’s a new documentary series being aired concerning two men who have come out with new allegations against Michael Jackson. The man’s been dead 10 years! How can he possibly defend himself from this?

    I hope this doesn’t come across the wrong way as i’m not defending any of the accused, i just feel that this new wave of ‘Guilty because (S)he said so’ surely can’t be the best way to go about things moving forwards.

    1. I think what’s happening is that more people are just choosing to believe people when they say they’ve been sexually assaulted and are willing to give THEM the benefit of the doubt instead of giving the benefit of doubt to the alleged perpetrators.

       One of the reasons is because false rape claims are an incredibly small percentage of all claims. Research usually puts the number at between 4 and 10 percent……but people still treat accusations as if they’re 50/50 when statistically they’re not.

       Also, people who do lie about being assaulted nearly always have a history of lying in general. Regular people don’t lie about rape because we live in societies where victims are still shamed and blamed almost no matter what they do. For example, didn’t work out too well for Dr Ford after she accused Kavanagh. She’s had to leave her home and hire security because of death threats.

       As for R. Kelly, it’s MULTIPLE women who’ve come forward to accuse him of a whole list of terrible things. What number of people need to speak out before THEY’RE given the benefit of the doubt over him.

       To me, the times up/me too movement isn’t about just believing every accusation blindly, it’s about taking the accusations seriously, having an investigation, and not just dismissing them out of hand.

       And I don’t think anything you say comes off wrong.

13. Regarding the Ramsey situation, going by what Ramsey said in the days following his contract being yanked i was of the impression that the club offered Aaron a new contract to which team Ramsey left on the table dilly dallying for so long that our powers that be withdrew it and tore it to shreds.

    Hence Ramsey’s ” Yeah as the deal was kinda sorted” comment when asked if he was surprised his contract offer was pulled.

    So if the deal was “kinda” sorted why not kinda sign da ting???

    Kinda confusing

    1. Right?

       At least Ramsey’s poor little innocent ol’me act didn’t fool everybody.

    2. Because an offer during negotiations is not the same as being presented with a contract to sign. A contract is drawn up after parties reach an agreement (and drafting and vetting a contract, even with ready templates, takes some time in itself)

       What’s surprising to me is that people seem to discount the change in CEO and how that could impact on negotiations, and would rather assign Ramsey’s greed, of which there is no evidence, as a prime factor.

       1. I don’t mind seeing players get paid. Ramsey deserves to be paid at the market rate for a player of his track record, standing and productivity which is quite a bit. Whether it’s with us or another club is mostly a matter of sentimentality for us fans but for Ramsey it’s also a matter of personal achievement. Would you rather stay and help Arsenal fight for 4th place again next season or would you win a Scudetto playing with arguably the best player of his generation and get a real shot at a UCL trophy? I know what I’d do. It’s painful and should’ve been avoided but here we are, no use crying over it in my opinion. Maybe the club will “learn” but maybe the situation was more difficult than surmised for whatever reason. I’m not horribly bothered. Ramsey hasn’t been a regular starter or integral part in our best performances this season. He’s not the type of player Emery wants to build around, clearly. He has to go and with the Juventus transfer everybody wins except Arsenal’s bank account, for which I don’t have too much sympathy.

          1. Agree with all of this Doc.

             Ever since Bale’s success at Madrid he often got asked if he’d like to play abroad and said yes, so it shouldn’t be a shock to us Gooners. Contract drama aside, Ramsey wanted to test himself at one of the big clubs and that’s exactly what he’s doing.

             To a certain extent Ramsey (and guys like Reiss Nelson) being successful on the continent helps us because our player development rep has suffered a bit in recent years. And it’s crucial to the financial health of the club that we get back to the situation we had in the early Wenger years when our players were coveted by everyone, and we could charge serious money, even for squad players.

          2. I’m ok with Ramsey leaving, and happy he’s going to go to a big club, have a shot a the CL, and be well paid for it (I think the 140k is net) Because I like Ramsey, the player as well as the man.

             My problem with Arsenal is less in the footballing and financial department and more in the values department. And this is where I take issue with people claiming Ramsey was lying, and he was just greedy and waiting too long. It’s clear the club made an offer, and unexpectedly (and Ramsey says after agreement was reached), withdrew it. People celebrating this grates because it goes against the Arsenal I support, and it seeks to paint Ramsey in a bad light.

             I also think a lot of this stems from confusion around ‘contract offers’ being equated with an actual ready to sign contract being placed in front of you. I have no specific knowledge of the football industry and Arsenal in this regard, but it seems entirely unbelievable that every time an offer is sent is with a fully drafted contract document rather than just a soft offer sheet with the terms under negotiation.

14. I think the change of CEO played a MAJOR part in Ramsey hooking up with the ‘Old Lady’. If you look at the amount of times Wenger/Gazidis hae been hogtied over a barrel during player contracts over the last few years i don’t blame Ramsey at all for fancying his chances and ‘having a go’ so to speak.
    At 28 It will be his last major contract after all.

    However, I feel that Raul came in saw team Ramsey’s barrel and hogtie and said ‘not in my house mate’ and the rest is black and white.

    Ramsey has every right to ask for whatever wage he wanted and Arsenal had every right to say no to those terms. Fair game

    1. I agree with almost all of that.

       The only discussion was around Arsenal withdrawing an offer that they had made, and the reasons why.

       Ramsey’s statement is the only first hand info we have. He says he believes a deal was agreed. So why did Arsenal withdraw? You say if the offer was acceptable then why didn’t he sign, and I said because there’s a difference between an offer (and there are different types of offers) and a contract. Ramsey never had a contract in front of him to sign.

       The club withdrew the offer because Raul decided it was not the right thing for the club. He deviated from Gazidis in that regard, and, especially important to me, he deviated from Arsenal’s values too (where our word was our bond).

       If the offer was stated to be time bound then that last doesn’t apply. But that’s not the info we have.

       1. The idea of Raul Sanllehi snatching an offer from the table as Team Ramsey hovered over the stipulations of the latest proposal with a magnifying glass with a gleeful eye sounds totally plausible to me. If true it does show our clubs ‘values’ left somewhat wanting.

          As sad as it sounds, whenever i hear any of the hierarchy coin the phrase “Respecting the clubs values” i naturally link it to the clubs historic record of parsimony as apposed to something that we should be proud of.
          How can we as a club have values when the outright owner of the club doesn’t value it enough to spend barely any of his valuable time watching us play in the flesh (If at all) and whom doesn’t even value the club enough to put a pretty penny into the pot

          Values. What values lie here now at Arsenal? Across the board and sea?

          1. There was undoubtedly some opportunism in the values spiel. But it wasn’t empty. We treated our players with respect. We held to our word. We don’t cheat, either on the field or with our finances. We offered to replay a game we won because it was unfair. We don’t comment on media speculations and don’t talk ill of our ex players (through media leaks, unlike say, Liverpool) and for the most part, we respect our traditions (flowers in opposition room, same sleeves for all players etc)

             Class (or values) is difficult to define, but I believe it was Arsenal’s class that made me pick Arsenal. At least contributed to it.

             And this is why I take the Ramsey decision as a blow. It makes me question the same as you. What values lie here now, is very well put.

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