Winterburn warning

Scrutiny and speculation will now be rife

Last updated: 21st November 2008

Winterburn warning

Winterburn: Wenger let down

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Former defender Nigel Winterburn thinks William Gallas is likely to keep the Arsenal captaincy despite his recent outburst.

Frenchman Gallas has come under fire after he accused an unnamed player of disrupting morale in the squad.

The Gunners travel to Manchester City on Saturday having won just one of their last four Premier League games and a disappointed Winterburn believes Gallas has only intensified the pressure on the squad.

"What he's done is put the suspicion of blame on four or five players," Winterburn told Sky Sports News. "He hasn't come out and named that player. If he was going to say anything he should have said 'this is the player who is causing the problems and we need to deal with it'.

"Now, people will be looking at the Manchester City game and analysing William Gallas' performance, analysing the players who he might have criticised to see if there is a working relationship between them. The pressure on them to go out and win this game is greater than it was last week."

In-house

Winterburn, who made a total of 584 appearances for the Gunners, believes the matter should have been kept out of the public domain.

"Arsenal's inconsistency at the moment means that people are looking and trying to speculate why there are problems. It may be that the squad is not strong enough or it may be that they are not working hard enough out of possession of the ball. We all know that when they have got the football they are a wonderful team to watch.

"William Gallas is the link between the manager and the players and really he should have sorted it out with the rest of the players himself or gone to the manager. He doesn't need to air it in public. Most football clubs sort this out in-house. They don't let the world know about it."

He added: "Arsene Wenger is very, very loyal to his players. He protects them because he believes in them. He's got a difficult decision to make. If he takes the captaincy away from William Gallas then he's almost saying that he doesn't trust him as a player and if he doesn't trust him as a player he shouldn't be playing him within the team.

Whole picture

"We're really going to have to wait to see what decision he makes. I think behind closed doors he's going to be very, very disappointed because he's put his trust in William Gallas as captain and I think at the moment he's feeling a little bit let down.

"Arsene likes to back his players publicly. He will look at the whole picture. Will it be adverse at this time with their inconsistent form to take the captaincy away from William Gallas or does he stick with him?

"Everyone's questioning if they are good enough, whether they are too young, whether they have got a strong enough squad. They just need to pull together. If they start winning week in, week out on the football pitch no-one will care who the captain is."

Comments (1)

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Michael Orr (Arsenal fan) says...

Totally needless for Gallas to come out about the rift. He should have went to Arsene or coaching staff and sorted it out there. You never want uneasiness to come out in the media, as it just adds more unnecessary pressure on the team for weeks to come. Now everyone is going to over analyze each sequence of the next 5-10 matches wondering if drama will arise again. Part of the job of a captain is to keep peace with everyone. Not to be biased. After last year and now this, it is time to change the captaincy to Fabregas. It will only help and may make him decide to stay.

Posted 15:34 21st November 2008
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