Match Reaction v Vitoria SC (away)

[Globalgunner]

It always felt like a bit of a vanity project, Rugby is nowhere near as high profile. As a global sport football is where it's at.
But...whatever, it's a slightly pointless debate. None of us know the fella, and the key thing is he was committed to success and willing to spend as much as it took to make that happen.
Even if he does love the sport he has no particular affiliation with Chelsea, he just saw a club he could buy and pumped in enough money to make them succeed.

Just pointing out that he could have done anything with his mo ey. Horses. F1 Americas cup. He clearly loves football. As do all of us here. If we had a few billion Bob we too could be owning the Arsenal. Bill Gates has all the money's in the world and cares for no sport as far as I know. I know a certain Billionaire that owns a London club decked in red that doesn't give two cents for the game. We should have gone with the Uzbek. I blame Letters amongst others

[Letters]

I blame Letters amongst others

Hey!

[IBK]

When looking for a manager our shorlist was shocking to be honest (we've got Gazidis to thank for that, a guy who failed miserably when with us, he did literally nothing right in his time with us).

Emery on paper looked ok, I was happy to have him over Arteta, however dig a bit deeper and his credentials aren't quite as glowing as they seem, fans of Sevilla talk about his negative tactics and how they would never have him back, at PSG he was outdone by Monaco despite having a huge pot of talent and of course there was that calamitous collapse against Barcelona and that's before mentioning the problems he had with Neymar.

With regards to the signings, we've actually spent very little this year, a lot of it was deferred over several years meaning it will really hit us if we don't qualify for the CL and really curtail our ability to spend, I think our net spend this summer was around the 50 or so million quoted before. I agree the manager is at fault, because he got a few decent players in and his tactics, lineups and decisions have been terrible.

But I still think when replacing Wenger we chose the cheap option, had we been willing to pay more, offered a decent transfer budget and more flexibility and perhaps ambition we may have attracted someone better.

I totally disagree, Arteta is totally unproven and if you want to see what happens when you employ someone like Ljungberg, just look at how Solkjaer is getting on at Man U, Freddie is unproven, I'd let him have a go but in all probability he's unlikely to be the answer. We need a top manager, to shake things up, apply tactics that work, pick our best players and motivate them because this is distinctly lacking here.

They've been there done it and know how to be sucessful and what we need is someone with a proven track record, if we're to take a punt I'd rather have Vieira a guy known for his battling qualities who has been doing a decent job in management thus far.

Re a replacement for Emery, I get where you are coming from, Zim - and I agree 100% with the unproven part. The thing is that I want Emery gone now, and we ain't getting anyone illustrious at this stage in the season. IMO we desperately need an interim manager who can reunite the club with its fan base, and an ex player with no expectations is what I think we need to try to get rid of the toxicity that pervades Arsenal ATM. Like Lampard is doing at Chelsea (and like Solskjær did initially at Manure) I think that we need a manager who has no ego and can work with the players to get the best out of this current team. If it works until the end of the season great. If not, the board can have time to plan succession properly.