Emmanuel Petit had, by all accounts, an interesting career as a professional footballer. And his best football came for the two clubs in red for whom he was signed by Arsene Wenger.

The first, Monaco, was where he started his professional career, plucked from Normandy in the north and brought to the Principality in the south, where Wenger was in charge of one of the best club sides in France.

There, in his very first season as a professional footballer, Petit played - and lost - a Coupe de France final against Marseille, where he lined up in a team which included Glenn Hoddle, George Weah, Claude Puel and Patrick Battiston, the man who lost three teeth enduring a horrific tackle from West Germany goalkeeper Harald Schumacher in the 1982 World Cup. Right from the off, Petit was playing alongside legends of the game, mostly from an era which seems much earlier than his own.

Years later, though, and just after he’d captained Monaco to the 1997 Ligue 1 title, he was signed by his former manager once again. This time Wenger brought Peti to London - a city much closer to the midfielder’s hometown of Dieppe in the north of France than Monaco was.

You can see why the French manager had so much faith in his young protege. Petit was a quick and athletic player whose versatility and intelligence were what allowed him to stand out from the rest. Back at Monaco, Wenger had used him alongside Hoddle and Puel in the midfield, but had also employed Petit as a centre back in the side’s defeat to Werder Bremen in the 1992 Cup Winners’ Cup final, in what was to be Wenger’s first defeat of three in European competition, where he is the only manager to lose in the final of all three European competitions.

It was at Arsenal where Petit made his name in England, forging a partnership with Patrick Vieira in midfield and helping Arsenal to a league and cup double in 1998, before winning the World Cup with his country in 1998. After that, his autobiography tells of debauchery and a life spent far from the rails enjoying the trappings of the riches that a life as a top footballer provides.

A short spell at Barcelona, where he never fitted in with the dressing room, and then four years at Chelsea, where he played just 55 league games thanks to a series of knee injuries which eventually led to his retirement followed. Petit was never the same player who left Highbury in 2000 and accompanied Marc Overmars to the Camp Nou. Arsenal’s Invincibles side of 2004 will always be the pinnacle of Arsene Wenger’s time in north London, but ironically that was the season in which the Frenchman was forced to retire with a knee injury. His last game for Claudio Ranieri’s Chelsea came in February of that season, where Chelsea eventually finished second to unbeaten Arsenal, and the Italian coach of the Blues was replaced by Jose Mourinho who released Petit from his contract with the club.

If Arsenal had to go back and pick just one player to take from their late 90s early 2000s team to play today, it wouldn’t be Petit. Dennis Bergkamp and Thierry Henry would be heart’s choices, Tony Adams or Patrick Vieira would be chosen by the head. But Petit would be a choice to jolt Wenger into action, remind him of how he used to be.

Petit was a player Wenger moulded and made, a player who gave the coach his best years, and one who never stagnated under him. After Wenger’s departure from Monaco, it was Petit who led the team to a league title under Jean Tigana. The former Fulham manager played in a similar position to Petit, and was a star turn in the exciting France side of the 1980s, coming second in the Ballon d’Or voting in 1984 when Michel Platini won. A classy player who wasn’t afraid to carry out his defensive tasks for the team.

And perhaps that’s the lesson for Arsenal, for Wenger, and indeed for some of the Gunners’ current crop of players. Although Wenger was the man who moulded Petit into a versatile, technical footballer, it was under Tigana where he flourished for the first time, learning to add a steelier side to his game.

Petit retired after Arsenal’s Invincibles triumph, when the game changed for good and Wenger seemed to retire his steeliest side. And although Wenger and Arsenal fans may not necessarily long for the days of Manu Petit, they probably should wish they had a similar midfielder who left Wenger to learn how to play as a defensive midfielder before coming back again later.

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