Joe Fitzpatrick 
Do you think that Arsenal need to sign at least five experienced international-level players to mount a credible challenge for a major trophy this season? I used to think that. Now I realise that I was just brainwashed into thinking that by the evil "media" people. Stop your silly fretting over the lack of new arrivals at Arsenal this summer! Everything is fine, my fellow Gooners; we have a squad that is more than capable of challenging for the Champions League. C'mon you Gunners!
For those of you that missed it, Arsène Wenger gave one of the most shocking interviews of his career, and managed to display both his trademark arrogance and his total contempt for the opinion of the ordinary fan. Apparently we aren't capable of forming our own opinions, we are simply a herd of human cattle who are being brainwashed by the evil anti-Arsenal media.
Our dearly beloved living breathing statue is quoted as saying, "The media in general has brainwashed a little bit the Emirates. Maybe rightly so, I don't know. Because we haven't won trophies for years everything is negative. But we have to live with that and focus on playing well football. We lost one game since the beginning of March. That's why it was a shock. But we won in the Champions League at Bayern Munich. We won at Fenerbahçe. It is just like that at the moment. People always want news. We live in a world which is very interesting but very excessive. When people are not loyal, you are critical. When people are loyal, you say they have been there too long. It's always excessive reaction. The people in charge need to keep their distance from that more than ever. Someone told me I have had 956 games for Arsenal. I care about this club and when we had last week's result I was deeply disappointed. This is not a personal trip. This is about doing things well for the club I love and I am happy we are back on track."
It's true, we did beat Bayern Munich but only after they destroyed us in the first leg of the tie and we were pretty much out of it after 90 minutes. It's true, we did beat Fenerbahçe in the Champions League qualifying first leg but, we also should have finished higher than fourth in the league last year in order to ensure that we didn't have to play a bloody nerve-wracking banana-skin qualifier in the first place! Ask yourself what kind of financial sense it makes to gamble between £40-£50 million of potential Champions League revenue by your repeated refusal to strengthen the playing squad every single transfer-window while allowing your best players to leave.
Arsène Wenger is trying to spin reality to suit his own delusional perception, which is that he really doesn't need to significantly strengthen his very poor squad in order to be successful and he truly believes that every fan that doesn't share his twisted version of reality is being sold an illusion by the evil British press. It's ridiculous. It's insulting. It's one of the greatest signs yet that Arsène Wenger has finally lost touch with reality. If he can't see the glaring deficiencies in his playing squad then he should retire from the game immediately. It's obvious to everyone apart from him now, isn't it?
Time for a reality check then, fellow Gooners?
Arsenal badly need to sign players because they simply don't have the strength in depth that other teams do. Chelsea have Peter Cech and Mark Schwarzer. Tottenham have Hugo Lloris and Brad Friedel. Manchester United have De Gea and Lindegaard. We have Wojciech Szczęsny and Lucas Flappyhandski coached by the incompetent Gerry Peyton (the man who brought you Manuel Almunia).
Chelsea have John Terry, Gary Cahill and David Luiz. Manchester United have Vidic, Ferdinand, Jones, Evans and Smalling. Manchester City have Lescott, Kompany and Nastasic. We have an injury-ravaged Vermaelen, a promising but raw Koscielny and a lumbering cumbersome German Giant who sadly has left his best years behind him.
We can all see that we are not strong enough defensively and we can all name players that would strengthen our squad in every area of the pitch, but Arsenal are on course to end the transfer window with Yaya Sanogo and possibly Mathieu Flamini as the only signings of our latest summer of discontent. There is talk of another bid for Yohann Cabaye but, to be honest, he is just a direct replacement for the injured Mikel Arteta, and Cabaye really isn't the marquee signing that Ivan Gazidis promised us. Signing Cabaye is really the bare minimum that Arsenal could be doing to try to cement their place in the top four instead of really setting their sights on true glory.
We Arsenal supporters know that we should be signing players like Phil Jagielka, Kurt Zouma, Giorgio Chellini, Fabricio Coloccini, Julio Cesar, Asimir Begovic, Julian Draxler, Christian Eriksen, David Villa, Marouane Fellaini, Loric Remy, Leighton Baines, Christian Benteke, Tim Krul, Juan Mata, Isco, Iker Muniaín, Luis Suarez and Gonzalo Higuain. The fact that we haven't signed ANY of those players so far is both inexcusable and unforgivable because the MONEY IS THERE, but Arsenal and Arsene Wenger just refuse to spend it.
There are hundreds of players out there who would improve this threadbare Arsenal squad; please remember that when we are ravaged by injuries, suspensions and international commitments, as we struggle to repeat out groundhog season of scraping Champions League qualification. I heard a fan on Arsenal fan T.V. say "In life you get what you pay for, unless you're an Arsenal fan" and I think that is the best way to describe how most Arsenal fans feel right now, because in all the years that we joked about Arsène Wenger's eyesight we never thought that he was actually slowly going blind. The truth is that, after recent failures like Gervinho, Chamakh, Park, Santos and Squillaci, Arsene Wenger is now far too conservative in the transfer market and is working to a mysterious criterion that he refuses to divulge to the rest of us.
It's going to be a very, very long season. Again.
