Adam Rivellini
One of the things that comforts me and many Gooners at times like these are the works of erudite bloggers and sites such as onlinegooner.com. Misery loves company.
I was taken by a comment that Tim Stillman made on the great Arsenal Vision podcast recently where he framed managers into a number of groups. Paraphrasing, Tim outlined “Great” Managers as those who see problems coming before they land and proactively take action to mitigate… he came onto “Poor” Managers who create problems for themselves.
Salient wouldn’t you say?
While the majority of Gooners saw a bad result coming at Anfield, I think many of us were yet caught out by a new side to Wenger. The masochist. Some might say the saboteur.
It didn’t need someone with a doctorate in psychiatry to diagnose the Ox as being unlikely to be in a fit state of mind to give 100% for the Club. As for playing players out of position, it also doesn’t take a schoolboy to tell you Bellerin can’t play LWB… There’s then the odd contrasting cases. Another with his bags packed, Mustafi, is left out. You then have apparently “confidence broken” Rob Holding reinstated against a top attacking unit.
Wenger’s desperate shoe-horning of Ox into the side, shifting Bellerin to his unnatural side while benching Bundesliga LWB of the Year Kolasinac is evidence in microcosm that Wenger is set in his ways and finished. He does not learn from his mistakes and catalysts for change are unicorns in the world of Arsenal.
Wenger has become the spider that spins a web of contradictions and false paths.
He is discomforted by confrontation, thus rendering him paralysed from making the decisions needed to favour the whole, over the parts of his team. This above all else is the most harmful characteristic of Wenger. It has impaired the club year on year from refreshing and upgrading a stale squad of players. In games, we all recognise the symptoms - wedging favourites into a side, reactive changes, 70th minute substitution thresholds…
Wenger in playing people out of position that want out of our club, while reducing the side’s balance, underlines everything we fear about the man. Blindly loyal to favourite players, amplifying their weaknesses to the detriment of the side. It was almost surprising that Ox wasn’t made captain.
As another fabulous fan and observer @clivepafc said “He cannot make the changes required to the culture. He is too interlinked”
He is a poor manager by Stillberto’s definition. He has evolved to a state where problems of his own making are taking the club backwards.
It is true that Kroenke and co have to go too. But what I and many have observed for years is a Manager that, irrespective of Board issues, is well past delivering results at the top level that is commensurate with the resources at his disposal.
This summer the club bottled it’s best opportunity to move Wenger on.
We have this to owe to dysfunctional ownership and a weak board that are out of touch, culpable of failing on a grand scale in diminishing the net worth and performance of an institution that has vast potential.
The quality of our leadership is weak at all levels of the club – from the top down to on the pitch.
The operating model is broken. Evidence of the merits of every model other than ours envelopes Arsenal’s. The saddest indictment is how such an intelligent man can make such stupid decisions. What is a Director of Football? Arsene – it is someone that could have transformed your stagnated squad of 33 into a lean and hungry group for you to focus quality time to coach – making market value out of departures. It is someone that has turned over tens of players this summer at the likes of Monaco, Milan, Juventus, Sevilla, Atalanta, Dortmund and countless other sides while helping build and retain an identity, increasing the collective level of performance.
What Arsene also knows is that it is someone that makes his role increasingly focused, with relinquished control. The masochist (or self-preservationist) could not allow that, even if it benefitted the whole, more than the individual.
We can all point out incredulous actions from The Professor such as benching his £50m in form striker, playing full backs at centre back, perennially failing to address the classic couple of obvious weaknesses in our squad that would turn us into potential title challengers, not preparing us in pre-season for the first few matches, being unable to do tactics, not learning from mistakes, not approaching top opponents accordingly and so on.
What we should all do now is determine what we do. I believe we need to make our voices heard. Ignore press, pundits and media. Here you will find a shield of contradiction and idiosyncrasies that protects Wenger. They call it disgraceful to protest against the manager, deifying him in turn. They love criticism but offer no solutions. That is because solutions take away the biggest story-writer the media-hacks have ever had the pleasure of making a living off of.
In my humble opinion it is time for a combination of respectful protests inside and outside the ground. Inside the ground is often frowned upon, seen as harmful to our team’s performance. Exclusive – nothing can make this team any less competitive or honourable than what I have seen of late. It is not distasteful to make your voice heard, providing you do it with respect, using the only forum we have. While staying away has also been suggested, I just don’t think the level of coordination required renders it possible; it also goes against the grain of what underpins football – that inner love of your club that you cannot switch on and off at will.
