Reasons NOT to renew your season ticket

The manager should not be boasting about avoiding relegation



Reasons NOT to renew your season ticket

Are we paying Bruce Springsteen prices for this?


Early this season, on the way to the ground, one of my Gooner mates took me to task for calling for Wenger's head after the transfer window had shut without a glimmer of the defensive midfielder we all agreed was needed. I was being disrespectful and ridiculous, he said, and I would be looking pretty silly when we won the league. Two hours later we lost at home to Hull.

Let's make no bones about it, this season has been a complete disaster from start to finish - the team and most of the players have gone backwards. We are in a weaker position than 12 months ago. And regardless of whether we have no money, a bit of money or just what Wenger can find down the sofa, I think that everything stemmed from not replacing Flamini. I have never seen a footballing mistake so ruthlessy exposed. And however much money we did or didn't have, at the very least Wenger could have got in a midfielder (or kept Gilberto).

His utterly inexplicable failure to do this for me amounts to gross incompetence, which in any other walk of life (or Premiership club) would be punished with dismissal. Imagine your boss gave you one main task to do in the whole summer as part of your job, gave you a clear deadline, you told everyone you intended to do it and then the day after the deadline came up empty-handed. I'd be expecting my p45!

So I encourage you NOT to renew your season ticket and give more money to an ego-project which is doomed and a club which is ripping you off and giving you a substandard product for your £1,000 - £2,500 (£274 more than any other season ticket in the country). And make no mistake that in paying that price you are getting ripped off by the club. You are paying Bruce Springsteen prices to watch Rolf Harris live at Wembley.

I have given up my season ticket and I have vowed not to go back to the E******s under Wenger. So until he is fired or more likely he retires in 2011 having been given "two more years" and failed to win any silverware my live football Arsenal experience is over. You may think this is an over-reaction. But consider that the hard-earned £1,162 I would pay for the ticket employs Adebayor for about 2 HOURS OF HIS TIME! My season ticket pays for Adebayor to watch a decent length DVD on his sofa in his house! It wouldn't even pay for him to watch Forest Gump or Lord of the Rings because then he would start using someone else's season ticket money!!

Clearly this is not right. Obviously this is somewhat part of the modern game etc, etc and would be the same with Ronaldo or Ballack (in fact probably they would only get through an episode of Eastenders on their wages). But my point is that when Adebayor is on the pitch, HE MAY AS WELL BE WATCHING A BL**DY DVD!! In fact he probably puts more effort in when he is watching a really good film than when he is playing upfront for us.

But I am not giving up my season ticket because of Adebayor. He will probably be sold shortly and good riddance. The point I am trying to make is that we have a bunch of highly paid clowns (Silvestre, Eboue, Denilson, Rosicky - injury clown, Fabianski, etc, etc) who are taking us for fools. Look it up on the net - we have the same wage bill as Man United!!! And pay more wages than Liverpool!! And they have players like Ronaldo, Rooney, Gerrard and Torres. Why are we paying these muppets so much of our money???

The real reason that I am not going to Arsenal any more is that I have simply stopped enjoying it. This team doesn't move me any more. I feel no connection with the players and I despise them and their inability to defend and tackle. I can't sing for them any more. Wenger has killed it for me. By creating a side with such obvious flaws he refuses to even admit, let alone address, it is like watching the same car accident over and over, again and again. And with driver of the bus emerging from the flames and saying "this was not an accident", "we deserved better", "no one was at fault", "despite this being my fifth write-off in a month, I am not a bad driver", "the sky is not blue" "Black is actually white", etc, etc.

This is a quote I ripped out of the newspaper in disgust: Wenger: "For me, it's one of the best seasons for a long time considering where we were in November. Our average midfield is 22. Normally you play not to go down with a team like that." Thanks Arsene. So we should be thankful that you have created a midfield which you freely admit is so young it would be relegated under normal circumstances. Special bonus Premiership points for you.

Liverpool have gone six and a half years without conceding a two goal lead in the Premiership. We did it twice just this season. What happened against Spurs is something I have never seen before in 19 years of watching football (losing a two goal lead at 89 minutes) and we went and did it again against Aston Villa and then threw games away against Man Utd and Chelsea inside 30 minutes.

Why celebrate a goal if we refuse to defend the lead? What is the point? If a team can throw away points so carelessly why rejoice when they pick up three? Wenger can buy who he wants this summer but he is clearly incapable of training a defence.

"You don't know you are born," older Gooners say to me - "You never watched Terry Neill's Arsenal". No I didn't. But I can spot a crap player when I see one and I know a spineless team with no bottle.

Obviously your relationship with your team is a personal one and if you still enjoy watching Arsenal then pay your renewal happily, invest in blind faith and get your 'Arsene Knows' banner ready for another season of sideways passing and youthful indulgence.

But there is another choice - vote with your feet. With each season of failure the army of dissenters is growing and as the stadiums get emptier and emptier, the board will be forced to take notice. They will not accept fourth place, will get their act together and we will become a proper club, worthy of our size with a manager who can bring us a squad of proper players. This will consist of men - not boys - who can defend a lead, are prepared to work hard, tackle (and where necessary foul - when was the last time we had a red card that wasn't petulance but for actually nailing someone Vieira-style?) who deserve their high wages and are worth our ridiculously overblown ticket prices.


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