Adebayor key to clash of styles

Over at Manchester City, it is all about now. They can’t get enough of football’s latest fashions and fads. Mark Hughes and his Abu Dhabi bosses must have the ‘in’ defender, the most talked about midfielder and the hottest striker, no matter if they might be ‘out’ again next season.

Wenger, Arsenal’s trend-setting manager, likes nothing better than to trawl football’s equivalent of the charity shops and come up with an ultra-cool creation for next-to-nothing that he knows will catch on.

Hughes, meanwhile, is a subscriber to all the style magazines and frequents the designer boutiques, paying astronomical prices for the look Wenger was strutting his stuff in six months ago.

That is why Arsenal’s trip to Manchester City this afternoon is so fascinating. The designer versus the buyer, the polisher against the plunderer, the trendsetter takes on the fashion victim.

Perhaps the best example of the differing mentalities of the two clubs is City’s £25million striker Emmanuel Adebayor, who will go up against his former employers for the first time this afternoon.

Like so many of Wenger’s buys, Adebayor arrived at Arsenal as a virtual unknown in January 2006. He was not playing regularly for Monaco and if he was considered to be the natural heir to Thierry Henry’s throne it was certainly not apparent why.

To replace Henry, who was allowed to leave for Barcelona 18 months after Adebayor’s arrival, with a man who had initially cost just £3m was surely madness. But, like a kooky fashion designer, Wenger’s genius is that he thinks outside the box.

Up to Henry’s departure, Adebayor, now 25, had scored only 16 goals for the Gunners. But Wenger knew his workmanship would pay off and it did so spectacularly during the 2007-08 season, when Togo international Adebayor netted 30 times.

It is some claim that Wenger believes Adebayor’s game improved more rapidly under his tutelage than any of his other former players, given what he did for the careers of Henry, Patrick Vieira and Emmanuel Petit.

“Adebayor was maybe the player that improved the most in a short space of time here because he did not play at Monaco when I bought him,” said Wenger.

“We were very happy with how he progressed and it shows you that when players come to Arsenal they don’t waste their time. They develop well.

“That is the most important thing – that they develop and have a good career.”

It was when AC Milan and Barcelona came calling about Adebayor last summer – and he appeared to take more than a passing interest – that things started to go wrong for him at Arsenal. He claims the club’s fans made him into a scapegoat, something Wenger agrees with. But, despite his troubles and a reduced tally of 16 goals last term, City still thought Adebayor could be a valuable addition to their expensive wardrobe of superstars.

And, having seen him score three goals in City’s first three Premier League victories before today, Hughes is confident Adebayor’s eye-watering price tag and £130,000-a-week wages will prove to be value for money.

“I’m not sure Ade is bitter towards Arsenal,” said Hughes. “He’s upset and it’s certainly something that has affected him quite deeply.

“He has no problem with Arsenal football club itself because he sees it as a huge part of his football life and his development as a player. But you just sense, and he’s said it himself, he can’t quite understand why the Arsenal fans turned against him.

“That’s maybe why we’re getting the benefit of how he’s playing and his demeanour at the moment because City fans absolutely love him. They’ve never seen a player like Adebayor in a blue shirt. He has the capability of scoring 30 goals in the Premier League, that’s a statement in itself. He’s in a select band. He’s one of those players that on his day has the ability to be one of the best forwards in world football.

“I have looked at many top players with huge reputations and I don’t see many up there with the qualities Ade has got. That would be echoed not just by myself, but by other people in the business as well.”

A profit of £22m will always be viewed as a success for a club such as Arsenal, who watch their finances carefully, but the Adebayor deal has also freed up Wenger to get to work on his next big thing.

“Both us and Manchester City got a good deal for Ade and I don’t regret selling him,” said Wenger.

“They got a great striker and we got a reasonable price and we have some young players who can now get an opportunity to play.