The past few months on Twitter have resembled Baz Lurhman’s opening to his film interpretation of William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, ‘’Two households (AKB’S v WOB) both alike in dignity, in fair Verona where we lay our scene’’ Okay so you swap dignity for petulance and swap Verona for the pitch and you get the idea; civil war is rife – rife between the fans and now, seemingly among the players. Protests are now more prominent (two more are reportedly planned for this weekend) and the clambering for the sacking of Arsene Wenger and the removal of Stan Kroenke is now moving on from whispers here and there, to full on shouting from the rooftops. Does Arsene deserve this treatment? To me, no, but to others the only satisfaction they will get is when Wenger is sacked, Game of Thrones style in a brutal manner where he is left to rue the position he is in.
Kroenke out is being shouted
When Wenger arrived in 1996 he was an innovator, a forward thinker who revolutionised English football, played dynamic quick power football that left teams bewildered and in awe of what they witnessed. He wrestled the crown from Man United and made sure we were the top dogs, and others teams around us looked our way with envy and tried to copy us. You could say he effectively changed the game in this country. Okay yes the game would have naturally evolved anyway, regardless of Wenger but thanks to Arsene we didn’t have to wait. Other teams and teams from other countries adapted to US (you think Klopp invented his brand of football) Gegenpressing is pure Arsenal 03/04. You guys know the story I don’t need to go into any more details but what I will say is we have to be seriously be careful what we wish for.
We all want better football, we all want the best players, we all want the title and we NEVER want Spurs to finish above us, but hounding out Arsene Wenger is not the answer, protests are not the answer. We can all voice our frustration by booing that’s natural, but becoming angry towards our greatest ever manager, to the point where some people are wishing him harm and even in some cases severe illness, is this how we want to represent our club? We’ve become a laughing stock. We’re used to seeing this kind of behaviour with Chelsea, I cringe at the way that club deals with its business, and it makes me cringe seeing the vile hatred towards Wenger on social media.
Success predicted by no one
Leicester winning the title isn’t even the worst thing for me this season, it’s Spurs finishing above us, even though I knew one day it would happen it still pains me to see it. Leicester have just been a freak of nature club this year, once in a lifetime this will happen; freak results, freak luck with injuries, and its helped that every team usually fighting for the title has had a bad season. What Leicester have done isn’t Wengers fault. At 29 who thought Vardy would break the premier league record for most goals scored in consecutive games? Who thought £450,000 Mahrez would turn into the PFA player of the season? Who thought Wes Morgan, once of Kidderminster Harriers would channel his inner Marcel Desailly and become a rock at centre back? Thank god they have because they have stopped Tottenham from winning the league. But it gets back to the original point, none of that is Wenger’s fault.
What he is guilty of, is being to loyal too long to average players, (Bendtner, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Flamini and Arteta) to name a few and also buying complete turkeys from time to time, and then being stubborn and refusing to acknowledge when he has cocked up. Theo Walcott will go down in my eyes as Wenger’s biggest failure, and he should have been sold a long time ago. We have persisted and persisted in the hope he will come good and to me he hasn’t even become close to being a world class player and never will be, harsh yes, true…also yes. Ramsey is another one, living off his one good season to earn his place in the team, he slows our play and apart from a recent assist to Alexis Sanchez he hasn’t contributed any attacking threat anywhere near he could.
Persisting with players who no logner contribute
Once this season is done, I feel the board should say to Arsene he has to earn a new contract, yes he has one year left but put the man under some pressure, hatred is wrong but pressure is good. Give Wenger a dressing down of sorts and say it’s time to let go of the funds and splash the cash. It’s ironic that year he will have Guardiola, Klopp, Conte, and potentially Mourinho to contend with, he will finally spend big but the problem is, so will everyone else. I’d love to see us bully a Club into selling us a player, I’m sick of reading we’re interested in a player but it takes an age to get the deal over the line. Other club’s open talks on a Monday, arrange the contract on a Tuesday and before you know it on Wednesday, they’ve arranged a press conference to announce their new £50 million player, a slight exaggeration yes but that is what our transfer dealings have done to me!!
My wish list for this summer would look like this:
- Sell Walcott and the Ox.
- Buy Gotze or Isco and a new striker,
- Keep Cazorla and get Wilshere fit.
- Buy a new commanding centre back; bid for stones show we want the best players.
- Bring in Henry, Bergkamp, and other past players as coaches, instil that winner’s mentality.
Wenger needs fit Santi and Jack
This isn’t beyond the realms of possibility and Wenger has to be told not asked or consulted. The board have to be more accountable.
So to summarise my position I’m no AKB but neither a WOB, I’m more of let’s see what Arsene can do this year and if by January we haven’t improved, go all out for Simeone in the summer.
Arsene would do well to read this quote and take it on board ‘’You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain’’ right now Arsene is in serious danger of becoming the ultimate villain.
Thanks for reading my debut Gunners Town blog, until next week.
Thanks Ben and welcome to GT
Huge football fan, Arsenal is my team, love to talk and debate about all things Arsenal, and about football in general. Tweet me @bendraper87 for anything football related, happy to share my views with you!
Agree we need a new center half but Stones is not a great defender to me…..he is just focused to playing the ball
Agree with all except point 2. I would prefer the player we have been linked with Xhaka. We need someone that can pass but also tackle, a younger version of Carzola and I don’t think both of those players you mentioned are able to play in that role.
It’s a shame we were not able to get Draxler, because Wenger was looking to create a new version of Henry/RVP. He could have become a frightening center forward.