John Evans
I remember a game that I attended with a non-Arsenal supporting friend back in May 2009. It was the last game of the season at home to Stoke City and we had endured a disappointing run-in to the season where we had a good chance of winning the title before falling away tamely. We won the game 4-1 from memory but the overall atmosphere inside the stadium felt pretty flat and I remember my friend making a remark to that fact even when we scored a goal.
After the final whistle went the players came round the side of the pitch for the annual lap of appreciation. There was some tension in the air as we had allowed our season to fall away all too tamely and some fans were not best pleased with how this had been allowed to happen again. I think at the time we would not have won anything for four years or so.
As the players came close to where we were sitting an almost defiant chant went up of ‘there’s only one Arsene Wenger, one Arsene Wenger, there’s only one Arsene Wenger’. I remember feeling at the time a little surprised that this chant had started up given the fact that we had crumbled under his leadership and didn’t look like a team that believed in ourselves which you can only really put down to poor leadership.
At that time though Arsene’s previous triumphs were still recent enough for us to allow him a few failures and still see him as a figure of honour and respect within the club that we all followed with enthusiasm. I joined in with the chant and felt a sense of passion and pride at being able to support a manager that had failed us but at the same time still was seen as a winner overall.
That game was seven years ago next month and I can honestly say that nothing has changed since. Nothing that actually matters to me as a fan of the club anyway. Yes we now have a more secure financial footing as a business but that does not matter to me as a fan of Arsenal Football Club. I do not receive any dividends come the end of the financial year.
All I want as a fan is for my club to try its hardest every season to be as successful as they can possibly be. That is it. No one can ever guarantee success. Trophies are not a given right they are a by-product of hard work, effort and determination to the best. They happen when you are well organised from top down and everybody at a club is all pulling in the same direction to be the best they can possibly be.
That has not happened at Arsenal for the last decade. It has simply not been the case at our football club. We have stagnated for so long now that the club reeks of it from the very top down.
Arsene Wenger has allowed himself to become unsackable and that has harmed us and will continue to do so. Arsene became an important figure at the club through winning trophies and being successful. This was partly due to ambition in the early years of his reign. When David Dein left the club Arsene himself filled the void and took over far too much for the clubs own good. In doing so he became unsackable and un-accountable for his own failures.
This has been a disaster for the club. In my opinion we won two FA Cups recently despite of Arsene Wenger not because of him. We got very fortunate with semi-final and final opponents of Wigan, Hull City, Reading and Aston Villa over a two year period. An absolute dream run of luck and on three of the four occasions we were very fortunate to overcome such mediocre opposition. One down against Wigan with ten minutes to go and we end up winning on penalties, two down after 10 minutes against Hull which could have been three if not for a goal line clearance. A dire performance against Reading where we fell over the line due to a once in a lifetime goalkeeping howler with a few minutes remaining.
I have to be honest here and say that if you look at Arsenal’s squad of players and who they came up against in those four matches to win those FA Cups I would have been disappointed if I could not have managed the team to victory. The gulf in class should have been so big you could have got away with simply telling them to go out there and play.
Our playing squad this season is clearly in my opinion one that is stronger than Leicester’s and Spurs. We are constantly underperforming and have been for the last decade. The only constant theme in the last decade is Arsene Wenger himself. The player’s names change but the end result is always the same and one of chronic under achievement. If you look at where we are as a club compared to seven years ago all we have done really is change Van Persie and Fabregas for Ozil and Sanchez, the rest really is all much of a muchness in my opinion. Especially when that squad is always being coached to Arsene’s tune.
You could give Arsene £100m to spend this summer and I guarantee you the end result will be the same. Arsene will not be able to win the title in any case. He is not the man to get you over the line and he hasn’t been for many a year.
If we have to put up with another season of Arsene being at the helm (which I don’t see why we should) I would suggest the summer transfer budget be set at zero. I would advocate holding funds back for a manger to come in with fresh ideas next summer and implement them with a healthy war chest to spend on his type of player.
A lot of people over the last decade or so have been of the opinion that we lack an on-field leader. Should the manager not be able to organise his team so that they all know what role they have to fulfil before the game starts instead of running about like headless chickens at times? The real leader at any football club is the manager. On field captains of the ilk of a Tony Adams are a thing of the past, they no longer exist. Players are millionaires before their twentieth birthdays even if they have not actually won anything. That kills the kind of passion that was apparent in Tony Adams. A manager needs to have the very basic ability to get his team up for matches on a consistent basis. That is the bare minimum that you would expect from any team above a Sunday league level and that most basic of levels has not been met at Arsenal Football Club for years.
To anyone that disputes these facts I would politely ask them to gaze not that far down the Seven Sisters Road. There you will find a football club that is ambitious and progressive. A football club that whilst being supported by a fair number of morons can at the very least claim to be trying their very best to be a success. I do not say that just because of this season either. Spurs finishing above Arsenal in the league has been coming for the last five years or so and we as a club have done nothing about it. We have stood still whilst our most bitter of rivals have continued to make forward progressive strides. If you try a manager and they don’t quite come up to scratch you search for a new one until one does work out. That is what makes progress happen. You don’t simply put up with what you have got if it is not fit for purpose.
Arsene won things for us in the first nine years that he managed our club. That fact does not mean that he can stay forever and leave the club whenever he pleases. Thierry Henry was the best forward Arsenal have ever had and is the club’s all-time leading goal scorer. Does that fact mean we should have allowed him to continue playing for us into his forties when he can hardly run anymore just because a decade ago he was great? No it does not and Arsene is exactly the same. He is long past his best and is now harming the club to the extent where we may well have to witness Spurs winning a title for the first time since 1961. We could not compete on a high enough level to stop them or Leicester City. The bar was lowered and we dropped to our knees to miss it.
The buck stops with Arsene and I plead with any match day goer that agrees with me to voice their opinions inside the ground and start the end of this stasis.
