Joe Fitzpatrick 
I have not been surprised by Arsenal's defeats to Barcelona away and Manchester United away but I certainly have been surprised by the fans’ reaction to them. The venomous attacks that have been directed at Arsene Wenger have sickened me to my very core and the way in which some of you have thrown your toys out of the pram would be amusing if it all was not so sad. I too have felt the pain and frustration over our continuing barren run and of course as a true fan I hate losing as much as any of you. THERE ARE things I would like to see change at the club but throwing the baby out with the bathwater is only ever a good idea if your name is Frau Hitler.
Make no mistake, the level of vitriolic attacks that have been directed at Arsene Wenger lately have only been comparable to those made upon Adolf Hitler himself. He has been demonised and vilified, but I'm here to make the case that "he's not the Antichrist, he's just a very naughty boy."
Cast your minds back to the year of our lord 1986, Alex Ferguson has just been appointed manager of Manchester united after domestic and European success with Aberdeen. Although Manchester United at the time had very little success on the pitch, they enjoyed one of the biggest followings in the country (if not the world) and the access to the kind of funds for player transfers that only the elite clubs do because they had the fan base and infastructure in place to do so. Ferguson joined Manchester United in November 1986 and the finished 11th at the end of the 1986-87 season.
In the summer of 1987 Ferguson bought Viv Anderson from us for £250,000, Brian McClair from Celtic for £850,000, Jim Leighton from Aberdeen for £500,000 and Steve Bruce from Norwich for £800,000. These transfer fees may seem paltry by today's standards but, younger Gooners, let me assure you that was a lot of money back then. The spending spree had the desired effect and Manchester United finished in second place at the end of the 1987-88 season. Then in the 1988-89 season they finished 11th including a nine match winless run in October-November. Ferguson blamed injuries to his key players for their poor showing that year but the fans were having none of it and wanted much more from the next season. Then in 1989-90 Manchester United finished 13th! There was uproar among the Old Trafford faithful and calls rang out for Ferguson's head on a silver platter even though he had at least managed to deliver the FA Cup that season.
How many Manchester United fans would now care to admit that they were once calling for Sir Alex's head from the terraces of Old Trafford? Remember it all now don't you my fellow Gooners? How could you have forgotten it at all?
If Wenger was finishing 11th and 13th while overhauling the club’s finances and moving stadium I would be upset but Ferguson managed it with a huge stadium already there for him when he arrived and loads of money to spend on players! Ferguson didn't have to worry about financial constraints and already had more than enough experience as a European champion with Aberdeen so he cited injuries for his side’s problems and the Manchester United board agreed that he could have more time and money to bring them their first league championship since 1966-67.
After finishing 6th in 1990-91 and 2nd in 1991-92 Ferguson finally won the championship in 1992-93 spending generously all along the way (Mike Phelan, Paul Ince, Neil Webb, Gary Pallister and Danny Wallace in the 1989-90 season alone).
Manchester United went from 1966-67 to 1992-93 without winning the league title despite being one of the world’s biggest clubs with a great fan base and money to burn. Puts our little barren spell into perspective doesn't it?
What is even more amazing is just how close they came to sacking their most successful manager of all time even before he had really been given enough time to build the foundations for what would turn out to be the most successful period in the club’s history.
Arsene Wenger has operated under huge financial constraints at Arsenal since moving to Ashburton Grove and all the newspaper reports talking about an Arsenal cash surplus are absolute rubbish when you consider that there is still in excess of £130 million to pay on the new stadium. Arsene Wenger has still challenged for trophies under these constraints and has never looked in danger of finishing 6th let alone 11th or 13th and I firmly believe that given enough money to spend on new players he will win at least one more major trophy for Arsenal. Wenger has taken a lot of the flak when it's the board who we should be both aiming for and firing at.
When David Dein was a director I never once heard of Wenger saying "No David! Please No! I don't want to spend £11million on Thierry Henry or £15million on Jose Antonio Reyes or £15 million on Sylvan Wiltord or £7million for Marc Overmars"
The point is that Wenger will spend when the money is made available to him as any manager would, but that has not been possible for the last six long, long years. Arsene Wenger wants to win but he also loves Arsenal Football Club and he is not going to demand that the board put the club’s long term future in jeopardy for the sake of fleeting short term success that, let us make no mistake, would have benefitted him personally and given him the status that the big spending Jose Mourinho now enjoys.
We as fans should demand that this living legend, this great man, be given the funds he both needs and deserves, to win the silverware he so clearly craves. He knows some of his players are not up to scratch, after all, he is used to working with and developing World Cup winners and Premier League champions and therefore knows a world class player when he sees one. But he also has to at least try to motivate and encourage the mediocre players he has to put up with at the present time, both privately and publicly.
Players like Diaby and Denilson, who showed early promise, have let him down despite a plethora of opportunities, and that shows us both his loyalty to young players with signs of potential and his resignation to the fact that there simply is no money to replace them right now. I'm sure Wenger would love to buy a Wesley Sneidjer or a Sebastian Schweinsteiger to replace them, but the board won't give him the funds to do so.
Are we so conceited as to think that we are all so much more clever than him and we can see things that he can't? If anyone is going to tell me that Wenger wouldn't have taken Van Der Vaart for £8million if the money was made available to him they are deluded. If anyone really thought that Arsenal FC Were going to issue the following statement upon leaving Highbury they are also living in a dreamworld…
"Arsenal FC are currently embarking on a move to a new 60,000 capacity stadium at a cost of £400 million. This will mean we are not going to be able to compete in the transfer market for the next seven years thus resulting in vastly reduced success on the pitch. We would advise all of you to not bother renewing your membership until we sort this mess out and start winning trophies again. All of you new fans who have just started supporting Arsenal because of recent successes should think about heading over to Chelsea for the next few seasons as we hear they've just been bought by a billionaire with in excess of £400 million to spend on acquiring a new coach and playing staff."
Of course Arsene Wenger and the board have been guilty of a lot of spin, because, telling the truth to most so-called fans would have been financial suicide. The fans had to believe the magical Wenger would continue to deliver the goods despite having the financial powerhouses of Manchester United and Chelsea to contend with every year. If the fans didn't come and spend their money on club level packages and £4 hot dogs etc, Arsenal would have gone bankrupt.
Yes, Arsene Wenger has got it wrong on occasion but when the purse strings are controlled so tightly, mistakes are inevitable. For every Cygan, there was a Kolo Toure, for every Fabianski there was a Jens Lehmann, for every Diaby there was a Patrick Vieira and for every Denilson there is a Jack Wilshere or Aaron Ramsey. If Wenger wouldn't have became Arsenal manager we would never have kept Dennis Bergkamp or ever even seen Thierry Henry, Robert Pires or Cesc Fabregas in an Arsenal shirt.
The man is a genius and has taken us further than anyone else could have on this budget and you should all remember that those United fans that called for Alex Ferguson's head are now too ashamed to admit it.
Is he perfect? No. But who is? I don't think that our lord Jesus Christ is available to take over right now so Wenger will do just fine for me. As a fan I would like to see someone like Ray Wilkins, Steve Clarke or Owen Coyle brought in to bring some fresh ideas and tactical nous to the table like Ferguson does with his ever changing assistants at Old Trafford. Keeping Pat Rice in that position as a yes man for so long is definitely very naughty of him, as was dispensing with Martin Keown as the defensive coach when we were doing so well with him in that role (Champions League clean sheet record).
But after all I'm not arguing that he is perfect, just that he is not the antichrist incarnate sent to destroy Arsenal FC. Above all I would like to see Wenger given real money to spend and not have to constantly trawl the bargain basement for hidden gems. Ask yourself this, if Ferguson and Mourinho were asked to perform under the constraints and pressure Wenger has now, would they have done any better?
