Tony Adams has revealed that Arsene Wenger had to push training sessions back due to legendary striker Ian Wright arriving late ‘every single day’ during their time at Arsenal.
Wright rose from non-league obscurity to establish himself as one of the greatest players in the Gunners’ history, scoring 185 goals in 288 appearances for the north London outfit from 1991 to 1998.
Wenger’s arrival in 1996 transformed the club – after three years without silverware – and Wright won the Premier League title and the FA Cup in his final season under the Frenchman’s tutelage before moving across the capital to join West Ham.
Adams, who served as captain for 14 years until his retirement, claims Wright was given extra leeway by Wenger and the rest of the squad had to accommodate for the forward’s poor time-keeping by training at a later time.
‘Arsene Wenger threw up a whole different way of managing through love. With kindness, consideration and compassion. All these words I’d never bloody heard of! I thought it was fight, fight, fight, fight, fight!’ Adams said on the The Micky & Woody Show’s Podcast.
‘He managed with love: “Are you having a bad day today, Tony? Why don’t you take the day off?”
‘I always remember his lovely style, it might sum up his style of management which was really interesting. The lunatic, talking about emotionally up and down, Ian Wright used to play for us and he was coming in from Croydon every day. Every single day, late. Every single day.
‘I said to Arsene, “Are you gonna say something or me? I’m gonna pin him. I’m six weeks clean and sober so I’m not gonna pin [laughs] him but I’m having a conversation!”
‘And Arsene said: “Nooo, nooo! We put training back so he can get in on time”. I said, “What?! Put training back?! What are you talking about?!”
‘He said, “But listen, we need him at the moment. The minute we don’t need him, we get rid of him”. I said, “I’m not gonna have a confrontation, we’ll put training back, we’ll allow him to get in on time, we train with him, we leave him”.
‘To be honest with you, there’s a balancing line so I pinned Wrighty as well [laughs]. I said: “Wrighty, we’ve got to pick the kids up in the afternoon so get yourself inside!”
Adams says he admired the way Wenger always tried to avoid confrontation and just ‘walk away’ whenever possible.
‘There’s a time for confrontation as well but Arsene was completely against confrontation,’ the ex-England defender added.
‘He always walked away, he went for a walk every time and had no place for it.
‘It’s really interesting.’
Source:Metro
