Coming January: The Great Thierry Henry sale!

By: Kevin | September 4th, 2008

Ahhhh! Back and refreshed after a mini-vacation from technology….the Web, BlackBerries, e-mail, etc. I’d highly recommend it.

(Edit: Found a suitable image of a bummed-looking, vulnerable Henry.)

Now, here’s my idea, followed by a question. First, the idea: Sell Henry.

As fast as we can. He can go somewhere and be happy, and then the cules can find someone else to hate. It’s that simple. He can’t succeed in Barcelona by any measurable standard.

Match after match, sweat-soaked shirts and playing the whole 90 minutes isn’t enough. Neither are goals and assists, because we’re now parsing performance by “goals that matter.” That’s a rough standard to live up to. A great many players would come up very, very short. As far as sweat, Gudjohnsen sweats more than anyone when he’s in there. He runs and works like a dog. But? Valid question.

So sell Henry. He has to be miserable, knowing that he’s the goat. He’ll be closer to his daughter, and away from the demanding arms of the fans. Wrap him in cotton wool (yes, a Ray Hudson-ism) and leave him until January so that when Man City comes calling, he’ll be all rested and ready to go.

But it’s also a question of professional pride. He wants to be the player that he was at Arsenal. He can’t be, however, first off because of age-based skill diminution, right? He’s definitely lost a step. It happens. None of us are what we once were, right?

Secondly, he can’t be the player he was at Arsenal because he wasn’t a left winger at Arsenal. Why he was signed, when he’s always stank as a left winger, is beyond me. Arsene Wenger figured out pretty quickly that Henry was a crap left winger, made him a striker, and an Arsenal legend was born.

We saw all that goodness, all those goals and said “Hey, we want a piece of that party. How much? No worries. It’s go time.” He arrived with much fanfare, lots of anticipatory love and a paycheck with a whole lot of zeros.

Many asked the question, “If we already have Eto’o….” A valid point. Some said “He’ll be a plan B,” for when the match doesn’t really serve Eto’o’s skill set well. Wrong. Rijkaard wanted all the goodies on the pitch, so Henry became a reluctant left winger.

Now, expectations and his high salary couple with non-Arsenal-like production to put him in the doghouse. He’s never getting out, I think we can all agree. So. Sell him. Right quick like, and replace him with a proper left winger.

So here’s the question up for debate:

Who do you replace him with? Keep in mind that it has to be a player who will lay in (admittedly meaningless, but still….) goals and assists, draw two to three defenders whenever he gets the ball and have the pace and ball skills to help teammates excel.

Here are a few beloved contendahs (statistics from EPSN SoccerNet, by the by):

Arshavin? Pace and passing, sure. Goals AND assists? Not if his Spain/Euros display was any indication. Last year, 2 goals and 0 assists in 13 starts. Extrapolate that over a Liga season, and the numbers aren’t encouraging. But he might blossom in the Liga. After all, the Spain Euro squad was a superteam.

Silva? We already have Iniesta to drift around and disappear during matches, make runs, lovely passes and score the occasional goal. He’s cheaper than Silva, too. But why not, for the sake of argument? 8 goals and 20 assists last season. He’d probably be cheaper than Henry by a Euro or two.

Robinho? He’ll be ready to leave Man City after a few months there. “Hey, where’s the sun to warm my pouty brow?” Perhaps after counseling (as Pele recommended) he’ll be ready again for proper footy. 15 goals and 19 assists last season. Not bad. Think he’s worth his 30+ million transfer fee? Can’t see Man City selling him for less than they paid, so figure 35 million for that little bauble. That’s a little more than the 24 million we paid for Henry. Heck, we might wind up paying 35 million for Dani Alves, which makes Henry seem a bargain, right?

Names go flying about such as Di Maria, Quaresma, etc, etc. Look at the statistics, and none of them measure up. None would be cheap, either. All have big transfer fees. Quaresma will certainly be ready to run for his life after a season of catenaccio at Inter.

So that’s the question. Henry is sold. Gone. Who replaces him?