Arsenal: If you lose Hector Bellerin, you’ve lost the entire plot

Arsenal are now at risk of losing Hector Bellerin, and if that comes to pass, then Unai Emery has truly lost the entire plot of his managing.

There is a clear divide among players at Arsenal. Not like an internal conflict or anything, but a divide between mindsets. There are the players who are clearly on the out, mostly senior players, and will probably be gone sooner rather than later.

Some of these players have been at the club for awhile, some are relatively new, but they have reached a high enough status in their own individual play that that they don’t want to wait around for anything. I’m thinking Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, mostly.

Then there are the young stars. Matteo Guendouzi and Gabriel Martinelli for instance. Guys who, while new, seem to buy into the state of the club 100%, never saying anything out of place and never expressing any discontent. And rarely does a young player speak out in such circumstances, but still, it’s reassuring.

Hector Bellerin falls in between the two camps. He’s experienced, has been at the club a long time, and there’s no reason why there should be any talk of him leaving. Not just because of what he provides on the pitch, but because he is just a fountain of positivity.

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He is always speaking highly of the club, of uniting and standing together, and all the things that you just don’t hear often enough.

As such, the rumors of his potential exit are disturbing. Bellerin is everything Unai Emery would want in a senior player, not least of all the fact that he isn’t even really a senior player. He’s only 24-years-old and as such, has another decade to give the club, if we’d have him (and if he’d have us, though I feel like he would).

Calum Chambers is another such player. Always positive. Always fighting. And incredibly deserving of being a senior player after the inevitable turnover.

That’s the thing though, if you lose these guys as well, what’s the point? You can’t buy veteran leadership like Emery tried with David Luiz. You earn it. Bellerin and Chambers have earned it, they are ready to be considered in the senior leadership of the club and it would be a complete catastrophe to lose either one of them, let alone both.

This is a big test for the Gunners, and I hope they can pass. There’s been too much failure lately.