On Broken Dreams

"It is the principle. It is very important that Arsenal keep these guys. This group is unique. If a number of them leave it will be different. I think of myself as an Arsenal man but Arsenal should also try to make sure that we all grow together."

- Robin van Persie

The thing is, it never works out the way you want.

The problem with introverts is that we spend a lot of the time messing about in our own heads. We create elaborate sequences in which our real-life dramas are supposed to be played out; we tweak them until they sing; we rehearse them ad nauseam until we can't think of it happening in any our way. And then, when we roll it out to play, it's a fucked up piece of shit because we never took the time to work out if it was feasible in the first place.

It's fucking depressing when we find out it's all been for nothing.

I'm starting to realise that our transfer policy may have been built on a pile of the proverbial poo. van Persie's come out in the media about how we should keep the first team together at any cost, to preserve the "unique bond" at Arsenal. Every week, it seems another of our players is discontent, malcontent or just plain under-paid.

I read some interesting comments over at youngguns, about how we can't afford to pay our star players the market price because we overpay our foreign reserve and youth players. In the short term, we save on expensive mature players and nurture a group of above-average youngsters. In the long term, anytime our players become really good, they'll ditch us for big clubs who can afford big wages. Some may stay because of the "unique bond", but most will leave at some point; especially if they're approaching 30.

This is in counterpoint to those visions of brilliance that we're sold every year. Arsenal, on song, play beautiful, organic football with cut-price players. Sometimes, the dream seems so real, and we can almost smell our future dominance. But it's only a dream, and runs counter to the real world of money and agents and greed. Players don't play for peanuts anymore.

It's sad, but it's never worthwhile living your life through a dream. Inner monologues aren't the most constructive of things. They're so damn tantalizing, but when you want to bring them out into the real world, reality snaps back like a broken rubber band.

Things never work out the way you want.