David Bentley has told Theo Walcott to quit Arsenal if he wants regular first-team football.
Bentley, 23, left the Gunners in January 2006 after impressing Blackburn boss Mark Hughes during a loan spell.
He has blossomed at Rovers and the England winger believes Walcott must also move on to realise his true potential.
Bentley said: "Sometimes you need football, you need games to become better and to put your skills out on the pitch.
"If Theo is not getting the minutes at Arsenal, he's going to have to look elsewhere.
"Your career doesn't start and end at Arsenal — it can flourish somewhere else.
"At the end of the day you want to make a career for yourself.
"You want to play football for a start and you want to make money as well. It's your job.
"If you want to make a career for yourself you can't afford to stay at a club where you might be 24 or 25 with only 30 games under your belt."
Bentley admits it was hard to leave Arsenal but insists he does not regret the decision.
He added: "I was there from when I was 12 and I had a lot of friends.
"It becomes like a home and it was comfortable. But I didn't want to accept not playing and thinking 'these players are better than me'.
"It was hard to leave but I wanted a game every week."
Bentley is a bit one-eyed about this issue and his comments are premature, making them sound like sour grapes. Walcott might not make it at Arsenal, which is what this is mostly about rather than Arsenal holding back players’ careers. Nevertheless, Walcott just had one of the biggest nights an English club player can ever have in his career. Providing the coup de grace assist to end the reign of the most decorated group of players over the years that Walcott has grown up (i.e., the last 9 years). In the San Siro no less. Bentley MAY play there someday. Walcott already has.
Being a youngster at Arsenal is a trade-off. If you want to learn with the best, be a part of a team that is going after the biggest prizes and seeing first hand what it takes to achieve that — and you aren’t a world beater yet — you need to sacrifice minutes on the pitch.
Walcott has at least another season to see where he stands. Bentley may in the end be right. But this applies to all other big clubs all across Europe. Super-promising youngsters take a stab at scaling the heights and at times get knocked back. BUT: Was Capello holding back Italian football when he didn’t play Cassano at Madrid? Was Ancelotti holding back Brazilian football when he didn’t play Pato until his squad was depleted with injuries? Indeed, I think I’m right in saying that Wenger is the only manager in the top 4 who is actively developing an England under-21 international with regular playing time.
Heck, it even happens at mid-sized clubs, too. Is Juande Ramos holding back England by benching Paul Robinson?