Nasri: Gunners fans don’t have passion like City
DEPARTING Samir Nasri took a swipe at Arsenal fans for a lack of passion after completing his £24m move to Manchester City.
The Frenchman yesterday signed a four-year contract worth an estimated £185,000-a-week to follow Gael Clichy from the Gunners to ambitious City. And Nasri wasted no time in stirring up bad feeling by declaring the Emirates faithful to be less inspiring than that at the Etihad Stadium.
He said: “[City] fans remind me of Marseille. Arsenal have good fans but they are not that passionate since they moved from Highbury to the Emirates. I remember when we lost 3-0 to City the crowd was amazing and that’s what I want. I’m here to play football, enjoy it and win titles.”
Nasri also revealed that Arsenal legend and current City director Patrick Vieira convinced him to quit the Gunners and move to City.
He added: “I spoke with Gael Clichy and Kolo Toure a lot and with Patrick [Vieira]. It was important to get advice from players at the club and they know the difference between Arsenal and Manchester City.
“Patrick said City is the place to be because they are the club of the future and they want to win everything.”
GROUP STAGE DRAW | THE POTS
The draw takes place today at 4.45pm. The 32 teams will be divided into eight groups, with one from each pot.
Pot one Manchester United, Barcelona, Chelsea, Bayern Munich, Arsenal, Real Madrid, Porto, Inter Milan
Pot two Shakhtar Donetsk, Lyon, Villarreal, AC Milan, Valencia, Marseille, CSKA Moscow, Benfica
Pot three Zenit St Petersburg, Man City, Olympiakos, Ajax, Bayer Leverkusen, Basle, Lille, BATE Borisov
Pot four Borussia Dortmund, Dinamo Zagreb, Napoli, APOEL, Genk, Otelul Galati, Viktoria Plzen, Trabzonspor