Former Arsenal physio claims club sold player for £25m knowing he had serious knee issues

A former Arsenal physio says the club made a £20 million profit on a well-known international player after they found "early signs of knee degeneration" in his medical.

Gary Lewin, who spent 22 years at Arsenal between 1986 and 2008, recalled the tale on an episode of Ben Foster's Fozcast podcast.

The 59-year-old was explaining the process of a medical when he brought the unnamed player into conversation.

"We signed a player for about £5 million - a well-known international player. He had a cruciate injury 18 months before we signed him," Lewin said.

"We did a full medical on him and we saw an orthopaedic surgeon and the surgeon said, 'He's got early signs of degeneration of the knee that he's had surgery on, you will get three or four years out of him at this level, then that knee will start to degenerate'."

Lewin added: "We went back to the board, graded that risk, spoke to the manager, and he said, 'We're going to sign him, that's great information to have, I will use that in the future'.

"I thought nothing of it. Two and a half years later, we'd won a few trophies and he was a big part of that. We then sold him to another European club for £25 million. 18 months after that he retired."

No claims were made suggesting Arsenal sold the player knowing he would be unable to play for much longer.

As mentioned above, Lewin spoke about a player that was bought for £5 million and sold for £25 million, which could potentially point towards former Gunners winger Marc Overmars.

Overmars joined the North London club from Ajax in 1997 and would go on to flourish in his short spell, scoring 41 goals in 142 appearances.

Image credit: Getty

He was then sold to Barcelona for a reported £25 million in 2000, which made him the most expensive player in Dutch football history.

But the former Netherlands international retired in 2004, aged 31, due to a persistent knee injury.

"My footballing future ends now," he said at the time. "My knee is causing too many problems and I just can't play at the level I would wish any more."

SPORTbible has reached out to Arsenal for comment.

Topics: Arsenal, Premier League, England

Jack Kenmare

Senior Journalist at SPORTbible with a passion for long-form journalism. Almost 10 years’ experience across online and print.

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