Wenger: International Football's Been 'Destroyed'

Citing such reasons as foreigners coaching the English team and the alleged egalitarian nature of club football, Arsenal coach Arsène Wenger has stated that international football is effectively irrelevant to him, having recently been destroyed...

Sep 7, 2008 3:49:46 PM

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Fabio Capello and Arsene Wenger (PA)

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Speaking to the Daily Star on Sunday, the former Nagoya Grampus Eight boss said that the proliferation of smaller states was partially to blame for the downfall of the international scene.

"I'm not a big fan of international football as they destroyed it," he boomed.

"Take Russia – once it was one country, now it’s 21. Yugoslavia was one and now is six.

"Then you add countries like Andorra, Faroe Islands and San Marino and suddenly three out of four games are of no interest."

He also stated that the nature of a national team means that some of the finest players may never be afforded the recognition they deserve on the big stage.

"Ryan Giggs never played in a World Cup. If Maradona was born in Luxemburg he would never have played in a World Cup – but he still would have been the best player in the world," he argued.

"In club football you get to put the best players in the world together – that is justice."

While he felt that this representation of players was unfair, it is the movement of managers across borders that seems to irritate him the most.

"The national team should be managed by an English guy," said the knight of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire.

"I remember Sven Goran Eriksson playing against Sweden with England. The national anthem is played and what do you do?"

Wenger, 59 years old, speaks seven languages.

Ewan Macdonald, Goal.com

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