How Robin van Persie May Have Saved the Club I Love

By: Martin | May 30th, 2009

NOTE: This piece was originally written to be posted on the main EPL Offside page as part of their “Player of the Year” nomination series, and it will hopefully run in that space in the near future. But I figured since I named Robin van Persie my “Player of the Year” for the club this year, I’d go ahead and post it here by way of explanation.

So this award is for “player of the year.” I’m not sure exactly what criteria, if any, there are for determining who gets this award. But my nominee from my beloved Gunners this year is a no-brainer—it’s striker Robin van Persie.

Should player of the year go to the best player? If that’s the case, I’m not sure he deserves it. Guys like Cristiano Ronaldo, Xabi Alonso, and Lampard were probably better, in an absolute sense, over the course of this season than Robbie was for us this year.

But if we’re talking about which player meant the most to his team, I believe with all my heart and soul that the award has to go to Robbie. If you ask yourself, “How much worse off would [Team X] have been without [Player X] this season?,” van Persie comes out on top. Let me explain.

This has been a disappointing year for us, to put it kindly. No trophies, poor showing in the league, couldn’t beat Spurs, got our asses handed to us at home by United, etc. But without van Persie, we would have been much, much worse off. While he hadn’t scored a league goal since January until last weekend, he held the line in our darkest days until others could come and pick up the slack, and for that the club owes him quite a bit.

The fall of 2008 was probably as bad as it’s gotten at Arsenal in some time. We lost to Fulham. We lost at home to Hull City. We blew a 2 goal lead in the 89th minute to give away 2 points to hated Spurs. We lost to Stoke, and got absolutely crushed by Manchester City. We had to strip William Gallas of his captaincy because he came out and publicly said the team didn’t have the required courage to win.
But Robin van Persie pretty much single-handedly kept this period “bad,” as opposed to “complete catastrophe.” Consider the following. Over a five month-period from 8/30 to 1/28, we played 19 league games, compiling a record of 10-6-3. Because of injuries, Robbie was only able to start 16 of those, in which we went 8-6-2.

In those 16 games, Arsenal scored 30 goals. Van Persie scored 9 of those, and assisted on 7 others, meaning he was involved in more than half of the team’s goals during that period. More impressively, though, is that the goals he scored were almost always important. Of his 9 goals, 4 were winning goals and 4 were tying goals; of his 7 assists, 3 ended up being on the winning goal and 1 was on the tying goal. Think about that—in the 14 games Arsenal didn’t lose during that span, van Persie was involved in 12 goals that ended up being the tying or winning goal. Every week it seemed like he was making a big play that resulted in Arsenal taking points from the match.

But numbers don’t quite tell the whole story. It’s the kind of thing that’s impossible to explain to someone who hasn’t watched the games and followed the team. It’s inadequate, but the best way I can think of to explain it is this—it always seemed like he was on his own. The rest of the team was playing terrible. He was getting poor service, and was having to come back way too far to even get the ball. Due to injuries to Adebayor and Fabregas and the inadequacy of their replacements, he was also having to fulfill the role of goal-scorer and playmaker alongside the likes of Diaby, Denilson, Eboue, and Bendtner. For a team that likes to boast about how much talent and skill we have, and what attractive, exciting, free-flowing football we play, there was precious little to be found at the Emirates outside of the skinny guy in the # 11 shirt for several months.

So why was this so important? You’ll remember that during this entire time we were chasing Aston Villa for 4th place. At the end of this period we still trailed Aston Villa by 5 points for 4th place. But my point is this—if we don’t have van Persie, and replace him with Nicklas Bendtner or Carlos Vela, does anyone have any doubt that a lot of those 12 tying or winning goals don’t go in the net? And, if they don’t, how many points would that have cost us over that period? 5-10? Now, all of a sudden, if you imagine us 10-15 points behind Aston Villa at the end of January instead of 5, and in 7th or 8th place instead of 5th, does our season turn out the same way? Specifically, does the squad have enough belief to go on the unbeaten run and finish in 4th with room to spare?

I’m honestly not so sure—no one thought Aston Villa would collapse as they have, so if we had been that far behind I think most reasonable people would say Arsenal wouldn’t have been able to crack the top 4. If that opinion was shared by our board, I don’t think we go out and get Arshavin, who’s been massive for us this spring. If the players didn’t have enough confidence to overtake Villa, and we didn’t make the top 4, we lose out on the Champions League revenue, and we don’t have any money at all to spend this summer. There probably would have been an exodus of players away from the club in the summer—I doubt Walcott would have just signed a new long-term deal, Adebayor probably would have been house hunting in Milan, and Fabregas probably would have seriously entertained the idea of returning to his native Spain. Wenger may not have even stayed at the club. In short, a non-top 4 finish would probably have left the club in shambles.

On the other hand, not to slag off anyone else, but where would United have been without Ronaldo? Probably still in 1st, I’d say—2nd at worst. Liverpool without Alonso? 3rd or 4th. Ditto with Chelsea without Lampard. These are all great players who have had great years, and their clubs would definitely have fared worse without them, but I don’t think their absences would have had significant negative long-term consequences.

Of course all of this is speculation, and no one can know would have happened if we didn’t have Robbie. All I know is what I saw, and I saw a player going out and pretty much single-handedly willing us to draws and wins over a five month period, five months which may very well have, in a real sense, saved the club from complete catastrophe.

He was finally healthy (well, for him) for a full year, and showed himself to be a world-class striker. He played with passion and determination. He surpassed Adebayor as our first-choice striker. But mainly, he was at his best when his team needed him most—and I can’t think of a better criteria for “player of the year” than that.