In the summer of 2013, Nicklas Bendtner tried everything to get out of Arsenal. Friendly conversations followed tense meetings, and eventually the Dane insulting Arsene Wenger to see if he could provoke him enough to get him fed up and agree to his departure. The French coach, however, did not bend his knee, as the forward himself tells in an interview for the magazine FourFourTwo.
“We respected each other, we had very fruitful meetings and we were both very honest with each other. But I remember that at that moment I wanted to leave Arsenal and Crystal Palace had decided to make a good offer for me. The agreement did not go ahead because the club could not find a replacement for me, ”Bendtner recalls now.
The player, who scored 47 goals and handed out 22 assists during his 171 games at Arsenal, retired last August, but still remembers the frustration he felt then. “Wenger called me and said, 'I'm sorry, you can't go.' That for me was a huge disappointment, I had been waiting all week to be told that I could go. I told him he was an asshole and an idiot so that he had to sell me, but it didn't work, “he explains. “This taught me a lot about his character, as he later explained to me that my staying was the best for the club. It was difficult to argue. That was the only time we had a really heated argument… in the rest he was the only one who yelled at me! “