‘He was dead’ – Ex-director, Edelman opens up on why Thierry Henry left Arsenal for Barcelona

Former Arsenal's managing director, Keith Edelman, has opened up about the reason behind Thierry Henry's decision to leave the club to join Barcelona in 2007.

Henry, who spent 8 years at Arsenal, left the Gunners and joined the Catalan giants for a reported €24 million transfer fee.

The French superstar dominated the Premier League and made himself feared across European football.

The former France international played 377 games for the Gunners, registering 228 goals and 96 assists.

He won three FA Cups and two Premier League titles with the Gunners.

Edelman told The Sun that Arsenal were comfortable with letting him go to Barcelona for a price.

He said that the Frenchman had become a “dead” player who was quickly losing his marquee attribute, i.e., speed.

“The reason Thierry moved on was because he was losing his speed. His game was basically all about speed. And if you lose your speed, then you’re dead.

“So, we got money for him despite the fact that he was on the downward trap,” he said.

Edelman went on to compare Henry with Manchester City and Belgian midfielder, Kevin de Bruyne.

He said, “It’s like Kevin De Bruyne. Would you have been better to sell him for more money at the end of last year? Or keep him and risk that he’d keep going this season?”;

He also spoke about the skill of building a team and how the Gunners had some of the best players in the Premier League during their “invincible years.”

“And therefore, if you win things, you have a lot of world-class players because that’s how you win things. But when they get older, it’s very difficult to replace them. You’ve got to look at how many world-class players you’ve got in your team, and they won’t be world-class forever, they get older and tend to dip,” said Edelman.

“Arsenal were, in the Invincible years, were really lucky because they had Thierry Henry, Patrick Vieira, Robert Pires, Sol Campbell and Gilberto Silva, there’s five world-class players,” he concluded.

Thierry Henry played for Barcelona for three seasons, combining with Samuel Eto'o and Lionel Messi to form a deadly attack under Pep Guardiola.