Thierry Henry today backed Arsenal to win the Premiership - and
insisted he would go back to Emirates Stadium at every possible
opportunity to see them do it.
The club's old hero, who walked out for Barcelona in the summer,
also revealed he could never play in English football again unless
it was for the Gunners.
After Henry had kicked off a beautiful new relationship with the
Spanish giants by scoring the winner on his debut in a pre-season
friendly at Dundee United, the striker today wistfully recalled his
first footballing love by admitting: "I will always have Arsenal in
my heart."
Though criticised for leaving the club amid their political
turmoil, Henry insisted at Barca's Scottish training camp in St
Andrews his old team could rebound with a vengeance and called on
his old colleagues to rally behind Arsene Wenger.
"Hopefully they can win the league. I don't see why they can't," he
said. "Everybody always talks about Arsenal being a young team but
a year ago they reached the Champions League Final and, without
trying to find excuses, they had so many people injured last
season."
Quizzed about the uncertain future of the club, he said he didn't
want to "get into the politics" but he could not agree with Freddie
Ljungberg who, having joined West Ham, suggested that the Gunners
lacked ambition.
"I'm sure this season with everybody back, Arsenal can compete for
the league. Sometimes it doesn't matter about the size of your
squad, it's about the atmosphere in the dressing room and everybody
loves each other at Arsenal," he said.
"Hopefully they will have no injuries and I don't know why they
can't win the league with Robin van Persie back along with
[Emmanuel] Adebayor and Eduardo [da Silva].
"Everybody has to get behind the boss and I know they will. I can
only wish them all the very best and I will always support them
whenever they play.
"Whenever I have the chance to go and see a game, I've kept my box
so now I can finally say I will be an Arsenal fan.
"It may sound weird, something amazing to say, but I'll even miss
the boos at Tottenham even though I never lost to them when I was
in an Arsenal shirt.
"I'll miss the Manchester United games and Chelsea games
too."
Speaking about his first goal for his new club, a last-minute
netted rebound after his penalty had been saved, the 29-year-old
said: "It was a double great feeling, playing again after five
months.
"Scoring a goal on my debut was great and I hope it will be the
first of many. But as long as the team wins that's the most
important thing."
If arsenal can still win
title,why leave at the first place? haishh