Kevin Whitcher
There were some people that seriously believed Arsenal could win the league this season. There were others who believe that until obvious lessons from past failures are addressed, then the same mistakes are destined to be repeated. Although I believe fans will see some major purchases this summer, if only because of the amount of money received for Fabregas, Nasri and Clichy (what significance that none of these players were even on the bench yesterday? Don’t expect to see them against Fulham either), ultimately the manager’s refusal to work on the defensive side of the game will continue to cost the team honours.
The crest for next season has the word ‘Forward’ running underneath. A while back, the club badge featured a motto that translated as ‘victory through harmony’. There’s not much harmony at Arsenal these days. When I heard Pat Rice was staying on for a further year, the new crest came to mind. A much-needed chance to shake things up, to actually do something in a positive direction has been put on hold for a further 12 months. And why? Because the manager persuaded Rice to stay on. It is a demonstration that he has too much power and that an employee has his bosses – who decided to pay him £6.5 million a year until the summer of 2014 – by the short and curlies.
A friend saw Ivan Gazidis after the game yesterday and said he looked despondent, really low. I don’t think there is any illusion about the gravity of the situation for the CEO, but he feels powerless to do anything about it. Actually Mr Gazidis you are not. I have written before that the board need to force changes on the manager by insistence on alterations in the way the team are prepared and on the shopping habits of Wenger. For starters, they can tell him he has to recruit a specialist defensive coach and said coach must be given regular training time to work on the team. When Arsenal do not have the ball they are found wanting.
Additionally, decisions about the playing budget need to be removed from the manager. He should identify the players he wants (and be told in no uncertain terms that he needs to get in players with experience and leadership qualities) and the board should then tell him to p*ss off back to his office and leave them to deal with transfer and wage negotiations. Additionally, the existing contracts need to be looked at and some imaginative dealings done. Some players are not going to move because of the fat wages they are on which no other mug on earth would be foolish enough to pay them. So the club must arrange loans (and swallow paying a percentage of the players’ earnings) or free transfers to get them off the wage bill. What is the purpose of Tomas Rosicky going to be in 2011/12. Denilson? Sebastien Squillaci? These players positively handicap the team’s chances of success. Basically, the manager has to be usurped with some strategic instruction to him as an employee. Then he might jump ship and go manage Real Madrid.
Of course it’s going to be ugly. The chain mail divide in club level with Wenger’s giant face has Big Brother echoes about it and now the celebrations of his achievements make compromising him awkward. The club is now starting to go backwards and the manager is already getting his excuses in for a finish outside the top four this time next year. He knows next season is going to be a struggle. It is difficult to replace Fabregas and Nasri and improve.
So the board must pretty much insist on the changes so that the club can get through the next two seasons – they can afford to give Wenger the boot in 2013 and swallow the cost – and halt the decline we will witness if they simply leave Wenger to continue to indulge himself in his vanity project to show what a great manager he is.
The facts are these. The team that won the trophies under him was built on the bedrock of an experienced defence, with the addition of Sol Campbell. It was the defence that sorted out the midfield of Petit and Vieira to give them the protection they needed. A defence Wenger inherited. Trophies followed as Vieira developed into the player a winning team needs. Wenger also had David Seaman in goal and then made an inspired signing in Jens Lehmann. Yes, going forward he signed some marvelous players (although more experienced than history sometimes makes out, Pires and Henry had World Cup winners’ medals before they arrived at Highbury), but we have some marvelous players going forward now – real talent like Van Persie, Nasri, Arshavin and Fabregas. The problem since Campbell left the club in 2006 is the goals conceded. Through the failure to recruit enough quality, experience and leadership at the back, and the ridiculous farce at the start of the season that meant Almunia and Fabianski had to confirm by dropping league points what everyone knew - they are not good enough – the club has wasted a season. A season in which a fantastic opportunity to win the title has been spurned.
There was a demonstration against the board before the game yesterday. Next week at Fulham there will apparently be an anti-Wenger demonstration. The club moved stadium so it could keep up with the big spenders, but there has been £40 million in the player trading account since the sale of Toure and Adebayor two years ago. It has not been used to improve the team on the pitch, but just look at all that lovely money. And the club want more! For what exactly?
If there’s one thing Ivan Gazidis should do it is insist that every penny used for player sales (circa £90 million if Fabregas, Nasri, Clichy, Bendtner and Arshavin all go) plus the £40 million in the kitty is all used. £130 million can buy two Vidic style defenders, a quality holding midfielder (giving Alex Song something to think about and ideally learn from) and a striker to work alongside Robin van Persie. Next season’s team will look very different and it is important there is genuine competition for places. Forget trying to protect the likes of Song and Abou Diaby and make them play out of their skins to keep their places.
Wenger said recently, “I have been asked if I will change my principles and if you can convince me that my principles are wrong, then I am ready to change. But I feel we try to play football the proper way. When you don't win, your principles are questioned.” But Arsene, if your principles are that what you do with the ball is more important than what you do without it, then they are wrong. They are of equal importance as the great teams have shown, including your own. Wenger again: “I think if something is wrong in our team, it is not the principle of playing our football the way we do.” So paying so little attention to the defensive side of the game is not wrong, is it?
Two more years of this…
To finish, a text that made me smile in the aftermath of the defeat against Villa, a team that had nothing to play for and every reason to have been ‘on the beach’. It’s from occasional contributor Doktor Schneide – Could not stay for the lap of ‘appreciation’. Am more disappointed than Arshavin being led into an all you can eat salad bar
The current issue of The Gooner will be on sale outside Fulham next Sunday and can be bought online here.
