Gary Thwaites
I write this the night before the first leg against Fenerbahçe. Hopefully, by the time you read it, we’ll have one foot on the Champions League group stage, and the purse strings will have been loosened to strengthen our squad, which was predictably exposed as paper-thin during the horrific opening day of the season.
There’s already been plenty of opinions voiced on the relative blameworthiness of Messrs Wenger, Kroenke and Gazidis for our failure to strengthen this summer. Personally, I blame them all to one degree or another, but I’ll leave that debate to others. I am, however, not sure if there is anyone left out there who still believes that “Arsène knows”. Still, for those who do and for those Wenger apologists who have shouted down any dissenting voices amongst the faithful with accusations of treason over the last few season, I invite you to consider the following statement from Le Boss, uttered during his remarkably terse pre-game press conference:
“I would just like to reiterate in the last 16 years we have been very successful with transfers”
That is, at first blush, a fantastically flawed attempt to justify our current inactivity in the market by reference to past successes that involved not one of the players in our current squad. It’s like Rick Astley arguing that he should be voted pop star of the year because he used to knock out hit records back in the day. Nobody is arguing that Wenger didn’t sign good players when we used to win trophies. But that was in the distant past. A far more relevant test is to look at the players he has brought in during the eight full seasons since we last won a trophy. As you are reading this, try remembering that during the same period we have sold every single one of the Invincibles, Cesc and RvP.
2005/2006
This was a relatively busy year by our standards. We brought in Bentdner, Mannone, Traore, Hleb, Diaby, Adebayor, Walcott and Poom. Only Walcott can even arguably be counted as a success, if only a qualified one. Still, being generous and discounting the non-playing Poom, that makes one success and six failures. Not a good start for Arsène, but it’s early days.
2006/2007
This year saw us bring in Song, Rosicky, the Beast (on loan), Gallas and Denilson. The two boys from Brazil were unqualified failures, and I would argue that the rest also fall into the “fail” camp. Song had one half-decent season (although a vastly overrated one in my view), before buggering off. Le Grande Sulk disgraced the armband like nobody before him and Thomas, although showing signs of resurgence recently, can hardly be considered a success given his limited contribution over the course of his tenure. That makes it 11-1 against Wenger.
2007/2008
Any season in which we signed Fabianski can only be remembered as a poor one, and his fellow new arrivals this year fared little better. Nordveit never got a game for us and Eduardo can’t be considered a success, despite his cult popularity with fans following his horrific injury. Diarra had promise but was inexplicably sold half-way through the season. That leaves the sole success of Sagna, and a running total of 15-2 against.
2008/2009
This season saw the arrival of two very promising players in Nasri and Arshavin. The latter was a disaster, and the former was only a success if you’re the club accountant, which I’m not. Add Fergie’s Silvestre-shaped practical joke and the ever-mysterious Bischoff in the failure column, and we are left with Ramsey. Being generous, the jury is still out on him, so I’ll count him as neither a failure nor a success for now. That’s 19-2. Oh dear.
2009/2010
As the new decade dawned, we had one of our quietest years. Aside from Sol’s brief return and the signing of young Galindo (neither of which I will count for obvious reasons), our only acquisition was Vermaelen. I still have serious doubts about our current skipper, but he’s the first holder of the armband not to agitate for a move since Tony Adams (I know we sold Vieira when he had finally settled down, but don’t forget his annual flirtations with Madrid before then), so I’ll chalk that up as a success. 19-3 then.
2010/2011
This was the year that saw us sign Chamakh and Squillaci, both such epic failures that I’d be justified in giving them double points in that category, but one each it is. Koscielny, though certainly no true great yet, has done enough to be considered a tentative success, which only leaves Miyaichi (forgetting Lehmann’s brief return). Ryo might still prove me wrong, but the signs are not good, and if Kos gets a plus mark for the work he has done so far, Ryo must surely get a negative mark against his name for now. 22-4. Not long to go.
2011/2012
With a post 8-2 trolley-dash, this turned out to be a very busy year. As I can sense I am losing your attention (as I myself am losing the will to continue), I will rush through them. Arteta, Mertz and the Ox all have their limitations but, being generous, they have each made enough of a positive contribution to get a plus mark. Jenkinson gets no mark either way, as it is too early to tell whether he has what it takes (my head says not, but he’s a true Gooner so my heart gives him the benefit of the doubt). Clear fail marks for Gervinho, Joel Campbell, Eisfeld, Santos and Park take us to 27-7. Almost there.
2012/2013
It’s a bit harsh to judge any player on one season or less, so Podolski and Monreal get neutral scores. Both look like they might have something to offer, but need to show a lot more of it to be considered a success in the long run. Santi gets a plus, of course. He is the one real gem amongst all of the above. Giroud, however, gets a fail. I hope he proves me wrong, but he just doesn’t take a high enough proportion of his chances to lead our line. A good squad player perhaps, but that is not what he was bought for, so it’s a fail for him. All told, that’s 28 failures to 8 successes.
So, in summary, either Arsène really is indeed trying to justify his £7m+ annual salary by ignoring recent history and relying entirely on the glories of almost a decade ago, or he thinks that signing three and a half flops for every success is not just acceptable, but counts as “very successful”. I suppose that’s what we should expect from a man who repeatedly talks up fourth place like its a trophy.
Like all Arsenal fans, I dearly hope we spend now and I would even love nothing more than to see Arsène himself pick up a meaningful trophy at the end of the season. However, we should be careful what we wish for. As the above shows, when he does spend money, the players he brings in are, more often than not, not enough to turn around our fortunes. Maybe that will change if we ever start spending real money, but I have my doubts.
I have hoped for his peaceful departure at the end of each of the last few seasons, but that ship has sailed for another year. The board needs to step in now, sack him and install a new manager (such as the available Gus Hiddink) while he still has time to spend our supposedly bulging transfer kitty on his own men. Unfortunately, that has about as much chance of happening as Cliff Richard does of opening Glastonbury this year. It is going to be another long hard season, Gooners. Brace yourselves.
