Was there a hidden message in Wenger’s reluctance to sign English talent?

Tonight, for the first time in a while, Arsenal boast 3 players in the England side with young guns: Jack Wilshere, Keiran Gibbs and Theo Walcott. However, Arsenal for years have been well document for their squad of mostly foreign stars and little in the way of Englishmen, compared to Liverpool, Manchester United and Chelsea. In fact, this has caused to many people not regarding Arsenal as an English team at all. I mean I remember one year in school, we all had to do a poster on France as we were learning basic French and some kid put "”Arsenal” and the gun on his, when I asked him why he did it, he simply replied “Because Arsenal are made up of French players and are a French team not an English one”. This was around 2005, it was fair to say Adams, Seaman, Dixon and most of our English defence had moved on and retired. By that time, we had Cole and Campbell and not much else, but that’s not the point of this article.

After England’s failure’s in World Cups past and present, was Wenger trying to show the FA and England that English players just weren’t good enough? The only English players Wenger seemed to have signed were Campbell (twice), Wright, Jeffers and Walcott.. Campbell and Walcott really being the only ones that caught on and had a regular spot. But of course, that was because Campbell was a great defender back in 2001 and continued to be for many years, in fact, he was pretty awesome for his age last season and Theo being an attacking protégé.

I mean, if you look at Wenger’s top 10 signings, only one is English, Campbell as mentioned. I mean, even this season, instead of getting Joe Cole, he brought Chamakh. I don’t think this a snub to English players, as he kept Adams, Winterburn, Dixon, Bould, Seaman, Wright and many others when we came in. He has also nurtured players like Jack Wilshere and Gibbs. I think, this is something to do with Wenger believing that English players, AREN’T good enough. It’s almost a message to the FA saying “English players are good, however, they aren’t as good as you think, and by signing better foreign players hopefully, you’ll change.”

There have probably been times when Wenger could’ve signed an Englishman or two and probably turned it down and went for someone like Patrick Vieira or Thierry Henry, who ended up winning Arsene 3 Premiership trophies.

Maybe I am looking too much into this, but I would like to think, that Wenger is a mastermind, and actually signed all these French, Brazilian, Spanish players because they are just better than English ones.