‘Invincible’ Parlour wants Adams-type defender at Arsenal

Ray Parlour

Matt Mundy speaks to the Romford Pele – Arsenal legend Ray Parlour…

Ray Parlour thinks Arsenal are one defender away from having a squad capable of challenging for the title.

Parlour was in the last Arsenal squad that won the league – in the famous Invincible side of 2004.

Since then, the Gunners’ relocation to the Emirates Stadium coincided with a halt in their haul of trophies, despite winning their first piece of silverware in nine years in the FA Cup last season.

But Parlour thinks the current squad Arsene Wenger has assembled is close to winning trophies.

“If I could pick one player to go into this Arsenal team from the teams I played in, it would be Tony Adams,” he says. “Alongside someone like Laurent Koscielny, he would be that leader in the team which I think is missing.

“With players going forward like [Alexis] Sanchez, [Mesut] Ozil, [Olivier] Giroud, I don’t think there’s a problem but I’d always say that the defensive unit is where they can improve.”

Known as ‘Mr Arsenal’, Adams made 669 appearances for Arsenal over 22 years, captaining 14 of those at the centre of defence.

He won 10 major trophies in his career, of which four were league titles, and is regarded as an all-time Arsenal great and one of the best-ever Arsenal captains.

Parlour agrees that adding someone with his leadership would be the difference for a squad that has only Danny Welbeck with experience of winning the Premier League, explaining: “Tony was such a leader and that is something which I think is missing in this Arsenal team.”

Arsenal have Per Mertesacker, Calum Chambers and new signing Gabriel competing with Koscielny for a centre-back role, but it is an area of the pitch which has come under scrutiny as lacking authority.

Mertesacker, who won the World Cup with Germany last year, is considered a leader but has suffered from a dip in form recently. Captain Mikel Arteta has fitness doubts having missed large parts of the season and is entering the latter stages of his career at 32 years old.

Born in Romford, Parlour played for 12 years at the North London club winning three league titles and four FA Cups. Looking back at his spell at the Gunners, the former England international only remembers good times.

“Playing for Arsenal was a dream come true. I was very lucky,” he says. “There were some lows – losing to Manchester United in the semi-final of the FA Cup in ’99 – but most of time I was at Arsenal there were so many highs. The unbeaten season was definitely one of them.”

Parlour made 25 appearances in the league that season, competing with Gilberto Silva and Patrick Vieira for a central midfield place.

“No one expected to do it,” Parlour said of the feat. “Wenger said we could do it the year before so it put us under pressure, but we knew we had a good side.

“The main thing was to win the title, so when we did it against Tottenham there was then the pressure to go unbeaten.

“You sometimes take your foot off the peddle because the title is won, so it was an unbelievable achievement.

“Wenger deserves a huge amount of credit for that season.”

Picture: RayParlour.co.uk

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