Richard Ansell
I am guessing that most of us spend far too much time wondering what on earth is going on in Arsene Wenger’s head, and none of us will be any the wiser for it I am sure. It is only my long association with Arsenal that is driving my interest now because I have given up on Wenger and expect nothing to change until he has gone.
We have had lots of winless streaks, many during my support of the club, but it is this one that has really got under my skin. The closest I can remember to it was under Terry Neil when we were just short of being a title winning side, and then instead of seeing decent players coming in we had to watch first Brady and then Stapleton quit the club. These departures of course spelt disaster and we then endured some of the worst players I have ever seen pull on an Arsenal shirt – who remembers the Hankin / Hawley strike force? I am afraid that we are about to see a similar pattern emerging now with the Nasri / Fabregas fiasco.
It is the fact that we have been so close to greatness that really irks me because it is just completely frustrating. We watch the same players let the team down week in and week out, we all know we need some decent, experienced defensive signings, an experienced quality keeper, and a big centre forward to give us that much required plan B, and yet NOTHING ever seems to happen to improve matters. Now it is like déjà vu and for Brady / Stapleton read Nasri and Fabregas. Of course our better players have had enough, just like we have, of Wenger’s jam tomorrow promises. We have heard it too many times now and don’t believe him anymore.
Based on past experience my bet is that both Nasri and Fabregas will be sold near to the end of the transfer window and Wenger will claim that he did all he could to keep them and will then say of course there is now no time for replacements to be brought in. The alternative is that he forces them to stay; Nasri runs his contract down, losing the club £20M, Fabregas’s value falls and we have two players at the club that don’t want to play for us. Either way it is a mess of Wenger’s own making.
I don’t expect to see any proper defensive signings, and predict that Jenkinson (just out of short trousers) will be our only addition in this respect. Clichy was no big loss but Gibbs for me still has a lot to prove, and I don’t think Traore is up to it. Then on the right we still have Eboue waiting in the wings to f**k things up when Sagna is injured. It will be great to have Vermaalen back but overall we will be no better than last year defensively because we know that the defence is not up to the job. Song is no Vieira and Frimpong, although promising, is still very much work in progress. In goal we have Szczesny who looks good, but how about Given for £3.5M as back up rather than Fabianski or God help us Almunia if we haven’t managed to loan him out somewhere.
We can all see what needs to be done, even though we have not had even a half day working in football, but Wenger seems oblivious to it, continues to back all the under-achievers (though at least the penny seems to have dropped with Denilson – although of course it had to be a loan, because no other manager would be stupid enough to actually buy him and pay his ridiculous salary) and his recent comments seem even more deluded than at the end of last season.
I hope that history does not repeat itself and that somehow we will do alright next season but I cannot help but think it will get a lot worse before it gets better.
