Arsene didn’t tell Gilberto to his face he wasn’t captain
1,055 comments August 14th, 2007
Now, Arsene is the manager of Arsenal Football Club, and a very intelligent man. He is free to do as he sees fit. But for me, making Gallas captain was an odd decision which has doubled in curiosity with the news that he didn’t have the front to tell Gilberto face-to-face. Silva speaks:
“Of course I was surprised because I was captain all last season when Henry didn’t play, and after his move to Barcelona I naturally thought I would be this time. Arsene is the manager and it is his decision and I have to accept that. Life goes on and I will get on with my job like I always have. But I was surprised he didn’t speak to me about his decision. He had the time to do it because I was at the training ground before it was made public. He didn’t say anything to me and I just found out about it that evening when I saw it on the Arsenal website. I wasn’t upset about not being captain, but I was about the way I learnt about it.”
This isn’t a whinge. It’s a very decent, honest statement, in which he affirms his committment to the club. Despite the pseudonym I go under here, I am in no way biased towards Gilberto, but I cannot really understand why our best player last season has been treated in this way.
Look at this publicity photo. The undoubted implication here is that Gilberto will be the primary captain. What happened to change that? Did William Gallas do something extraordinarily good, like turn all the water on the Austrian training camp into wine? Or did Gilberto do something extraordinarily bad, like look at Arsene’s text messages without permission? (“I miss you, TMB, Titi xxx”) I expect we’ll never know. But there is something rather odd about the whole thing.
Meanwhile, at least Gallas is talking the talk. He’s changed his tune, hasn’t he?
Right, now for a ten hour journey. Whoooo.
