Adrian Nichols
There can be few Arsenal supporters who were surprised at the manner of our tame surrender of two points at Carrow Road on Sunday. We saw the slow start, the exercise of some measure of control, the scoring of a goal, which was then followed by an outbreak of what appeared to be general lethargy and complacency. Think West Brom. Think any number of games. At least, thanks to the ex-Chelsea reserve keeper, we did not lose all three points.
The real question is why? A lack of on field leadership has to be part of it. By leadership, I do not mean the manic flapping of arms in the general direction of colleagues as practiced by Flamini, a man who increasingly seems to need the aid of a SatNav to find his bearings in midfield, but someone who continually reminds players of their responsibilities. Why do we not stop the opposition getting crosses in? Surely, the art of closing down is not a lost skill. Other teams seem to manage to do that pretty well against us. The service to Giroud was certainly not good on Sunday but shouldn’t he be trying to make bad balls into good ones rather than going through his entire repertoire of Gallic shrugs and imprecations and generally appearing to wish he was anywhere but playing for Arsenal in Norwich on the last Sunday in November?
Not surprisingly, there was a lot of moaning and expressions of frustration from the travelling Gooners as we shuffled away from the ground on Sunday, and the generally negative theme was continued on 606, which I listened to on the return journey. There were two points that caught my attention.
Firstly, there were the efforts of Ian Wright to balance his obvious affection for Arsenal and for Wenger with, I thought, his equally obvious agreement with several of the less than positive points made by those Arsenal supporters phoning in.
Then, there were the comments made by Chelsea and Spurs fans to the effect that we Gooners have nothing really to complain about – regular top four finishes, Champions League final appearance, FA Cup victories etc etc so what’s the problem?
That set me thinking. Are we really just a bunch of whingeing toe rags with an over-developed sense of entitlement or are we right to question the direction and strategy of the Club?
There is an element of misplaced entitlement that is common to all football fans of the so called Big Clubs in the Premier League and we Gooners are not totally immune from this. However, we are right to call out the fact that we are not using our resources to the full because of what are pretty obvious shortcomings in how the Club is run and the fact that the controlling owner’s strategy does not appear to involve making a whole-hearted attempt to create a team that can mount a realistic title challenge for an entire season.
There are two main resources that remain under-utilised. The first is cash. I do not know that the whole £193m is available to spend on the squad, probably not, but it’s pretty obvious that we won’t go bust by pursuing a less conservative acquisition policy to plug shortcomings in the squad, thereby bringing to an end the “make do and mend” transfer strategy that is such a cause of frustration. We all know the DM situation, the reliance on Coquelin who has had less than a full season of Premier League experience with the back up consisting of the perennially injured, the veteran, and the untried. Well, that’s come back to bite us, hasn’t it?
Then there is the gamble on Walcott, Ramsey, Wilshere, and Oxlade-Chamberlain remaining fit for an entire season, or, at least, one of them managing to do so. That really is a triumph of hope over experience.
That leads on to the second great underutilised resource, the genuinely class players such as Sanchez and Ozil, who we then render less effective by surrounding them with a number of lightweights, both physically and mentally. I cannot imagine that part of Wenger’s pitch to either of them was the prospect of playing with Joel Campbell. I really feel that I owe Wiltord and Edu an apology for my readily expressed disappointment whenever they appeared back in the day. What I wouldn’t give for players of their all round quality in the current squad.
So, if there is substance to the dissatisfaction of the fan base, who do we blame?
The Board? Sir Frites and Lord Carpets are directors because they bring to the Board the qualities of… good question. What do they offer? They are obviously fine chaps with impeccable table manners I am sure but what do they actually do? What Ivan G and Kroenke Junior don’t know about soccerball is obviously not worth knowing.
The point I am making in a rather heavy-handed manner is that there appears to be no effective challenge to Wenger. Who questions his policy and strategy? The Board and owner are insulated from taking hard decisions by the tsunami of broadcasting money which seems to render the financial benefits of a top four finish as no more than petty cash. Where is the incentive to go eyeballs out to create a truly competitive team?
I am sure that Wenger wants to win trophies but he seems unable to compromise his philosophy or principles or strategy, particularly his rather arbitrary assessment of a player’s market value, and he is under no internal pressure to do so. The fans do not count. In the eyes of the Board we are not “stakeholders” but expendable consumers, who, if we fell away, would be replaced in a heartbeat.
So, we shall go on complaining at wasted opportunities. Long standing fans such as myself (57 years and counting) will feel increasingly estranged as the current drift continues until we enter a post Wenger era and who knows what that will bring?
When it comes down to it, I suppose that I am suffering a crisis of faith. Can anyone out there give me reasons to keep on believing?
