Kevin Whitcher
It looks like it will take more than a semi-final victory to put the enthusiasm for the team back into the Arsenal support. The attendance yesterday was maximum 75%. Granted, this was a rescheduled game, but it wasn’t on the box, and if the team were playing Real Madrid in the second leg of a Champions League quarter final on a Wednesday evening, I suspect people would have been able to make it somehow. So at least 15,000 empty seats should send a loud and clear message to the board.
And two conversations I have had over recent days indicate that the Wenger extension is not yet signed and it’s simply a matter of the club just waiting for the right time to announce it. It will be decided at the end of the season, and it will be decided mutually. That translates as – if one side does not agree – then no new contract. And let’s get one thing absolutely clear here. An FA Cup trophy might be good for feelgood factor, but it doesn’t matter a jot on the balance books compared with the £50 million plus of lost income for failing to qualify for the Champions League. Wenger is talking about plans for the summer and onwards, but – given that he has indicated he wishes to stay – he would. The decision is not his alone to make. The number of empty seats at recent matches, the fact the club had to go down to red members to sell their semi-final allocation, send a direct message to the board. People want something exciting to happen at the club and two more years of Arsene isn’t it. In spite of the victory at Wembley there were no chants of ‘One Arsene Wenger’ last night.
Sadly, the club are not going to announce that the remaining seven fixtures are Arsene’s final hurrah, giving the fanbase the opportunity to unite and get behind the team in a more substantial way than the occasional chanting we heard in the second half against Leicester. So the team face six Premier League matches in which they can afford to drop minimal points with a crowd unconvinced and often unmotivated. It’s not a healthy situation. Spurs away, Man Utd at home, Southampton away and Stoke away. United will probably play in a similar fashion to Leicester – massed ranks in defence and breakaway attacks. The other three sides will be more expansive, which at least will provide Arsenal with more opportunities to create genuine chances than there were yesterday evening. However, the defence will be more thoroughly tested.
In truth, Sunday at the Lane is the game that will set the pattern. I fully expect Arsenal to turn up for that one – the visiting support would not allow them any doubt as to that from the first minute. But it will be a severe test. Come through it unscathed and they can continue with the confidence that has slowly built up with the three games in the new formation. Lose and I think we’ll just see complete collapse.
Against Leicester, some rotation, presumably to save legs for the remaining games. Monreal switched to the back three as Holding stepped down. Gibbs and Bellerin came in as wing backs, the Ox on the bench. Coquelin replaced Ramsey and Giroud was benched, with Sanchez playing central and Theo returned to the starting line up. The latter proved a complete waste of space except for one first half chance. For this observer, the post Highbury move era has become known as ‘The Walcott Years’ – a clueless player who should have been drummed out of the team years ago somehow retained and played. But never actually good enough. There are a large number of others that applies to but they haven’t hung around quite so long. Bottom line is that we’ve largely been fed mediocrity in comparison with what we enjoyed before. Wenger chose to develop Denilson and Alex Song rather than pay an extra £2 million to secure Xabi Alonso in 2009. That worked out well. No wonder no title challenge for so many seasons.
Anyhow, Leicester did carve out some chances, but were unable to convert. Petr Cech pulled off one excellent save in the first half. In the second half, Leicester seemed to become even more entrenched, and it was a case of the Gunners seemingly lacking the imagination to break them down. The game looked to be petering out, but on came Giroud, the ball started to get pumped into the box and from one such knockdown after 85 minutes, Nacho Monreal smashed the ball in – later it transpired – off Robert Huth. We had no idea in the stadium, because the videoscreen did not show us any replays, a surefire indication that there might have been something iffy about the goal, offside most likely.
Seeing it since, Giroud is offside, and there is initial doubt as to whether he got a touch, but it was just Huth. Whoever was in charge of letting those in the stadium see the replays was evidently in enough doubt not to take any chances. Rather strangely, as soon as play re-started, rather than consolidate, Wenger’s team went gung ho in search of a second. Lunacy. No football intelligence there, no leadership, no calming voice. Maybe a new formation, but the same old tactical naivety. Eventually they calmed down and slowed things down in injury time.
So three points that may or may not prove significant. Not a great performance by any stretch of the imagination, but another result and as we all know, the points are what matters. Spurs up next…
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