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Football

11th Mar 2017

Paul Merson says Arsene Wenger would never have signed Roy Keane

Interesting theory...

Robert Redmond

Merse makes a good point.

When watching Arsenal capitulate it’s often interesting to wonder how Roy Keane would react to being part of the team.

Particularly last Tuesday, when the Gunners lost 5-1 at home to Bayern Munich in the Champions League. Their second 5-1 defeat to the German champions in less than a month.

A player like Keane, or his old sparring partner Patrick Vieira, is exactly what the current Arsenal team is missing.

The word ‘leader’ is used an awful lot in British football, and there are different ways to lead. A player doesn’t have thump his chest, shout at his teammates or fly into tackles.

But what has to do is make sure his teammates maintain a certain standard.

Which is why it would be interesting to see Keane’s reaction to playing alongside Theo Walcott, Francis Coquelin or Granit Xhaka.

Seriously, could you imagine Keane’s reaction to this brainfart from Xhaka?

It wouldn’t be pleasant.

However, according to Paul Merson, Keane’s abrasive style of leadership wouldn’t go down well at Arsenal, because Arsene Wenger wouldn’t sign a player who challenges his teammates or coach.

According to the former Arsenal midfielder, there aren’t many modern players in the mould of Keane, but Wenger has bought too many “nice people.”

“Arsene wouldn’t have a Roy Keane playing for him,” Merson told Sky Sports.

“He wouldn’t have a Mark Bosnich playing for him. They have opinions. If players aren’t playing well, they’d get up and say they won’t accept that. This manager doesn’t want that.

“He has surrounded himself with nice people. Nice people don’t always win trophies. There was a fight at training every week when I played at Arsenal.”

https://youtu.be/3_ZL7_GXvIk?t=2m20s

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