The Bitter Truth?

[IBK]

There are a couple of 'truisms' - on here and amongst Gooners generally - that IMO need looking at.

The first is the automatic assumption that Wenger has remained a winning manager, despite nearly a decade now of winning nothing. The problem has been that there have been justifiable reasons for being also rans. The stadium, of course. The rise of the billionaire playboy clubs. The financial constraints that are so easy to hang the perennial losses of our best players on.

But I think that since the end of last season, a few things have happened to lay our belief in our manager bare.

The demonstration of world class management that SAF's league title showed, now that Moyes is at Manure...but also, in other ways - why his judgment was on the wane.

The progress made by the likes of Pochetino; Rogers and Benitez who are showing what asute tactical reading of the game; efficient football (see also Dortmund) and good man management can achieve on a lot less than Arsenal's budget.

Canny player deals (Sp*ds excepted of course) done by a number of clubs; and surprising player advances at others.

The press have scented our frailties for years. We have accused them of being anti Arsenal; or not appreciating the achievement of building a stadium and balancing the books. We have accepted the mantra of how financial self sufficiency is a trophy in itself - while we have 2 billionaire owners who have never put a penny into the club despite raping its share value.

But more importantly, we have continued to hope. While NONE of the clubs above us in the global pecking order, and many below would have taken steps to change things. Because Wenger is a safe pair of hands as regards CL status, and because of the above 'reasons' he needs to be given a chance to show that he is still great.

And that's why I think that even for those of us who would love Wenger to justify our faith in him now see this season as an ending. For once last Summer he had money to spend - but he ballsed it up and spunked a German record fee on, lets face facts, the wrong player. For once he kept all his best players. For once he seemed to have a defensive coach who had sorted a recurring problem. For once - no SAF; a Mourihno without his own choice players; and a Chilean who was to draw 4 and lose 5 this year to date even with his outrageous squad.

And at Christmas - the fact that we were finally regaining our strength as a club seemed to be there for all to see.

But in a way that we have never seen before under Wenger - his basic faults have been laid bare. He doesn't work in the transfer market without a David Dean alongside him - yet he remains 'the boss' in transfer affairs that he should simply not be involved in. He has clung to a watery 'tiki taka' style of play and players (even Giroud must surely have been chosen because he is adept at little flicks when supported in and around the box). He breeds no enduring confidence in his players. And most importantly - he has shown that whenever he is faced by players the equal of ours in ability, he does not have the tactical acumen to prevail. The fact that we have been thrashed away from home 4 times - more than ever under Wenger - has shown a man stubbornly, desperately, clinging on to a flawed system - and being, frankly, embarassed by those with the ability to analyse their enemies' weakness. It is almost shocking to see - and I have never before seen widespread reporting analysing how Wenger has been out thought and out executed. We were wrong; Wenger now seems to realise it - and our players look like they have lost confidence in Wenger's ability to win against decent opposition.

The second, nagging convention is that because the majority have held on to the dream, it is somehow 'disloyal' to criticise Wenger. There has been a fair degree of antipathy to those critical of a supposedly improving team - even when this was in the heat of the moment after a bad result, or intelligently argued.

I think that the truth is that Wenger has enjoyed an extraordinary degree of support from Arsenal fans and the broader football world. Even after this season was revealing itself to be yet another false dawn, there was dismay at Mourinho's 'specialist in failure' jibe (and look how Wenger put him in his place). He has become more than a football manager - almost an untouchable, because he allowed us to remain top 4 despite what (we accept) were financial constraints. He is paid more than any of his players other than Ozil. And while he has certainly been prudent - he has run the club like a personal fiefdom, answerable to noone, and arguably but his beliefs in front of our success and reputation. He has enjoyed every bit of the support that his historic, or off-field achievements have merited.

And for me, the truth finally seems clear enough to want Wenger to leave with fondness rather than adulation.

Thoughts?

[Bumble]

as much as wenger achieved for us as an arsenal probably creating the best individual team to have played in England, you wonder if he really he couldn't have done better. A team with Bergkamp, Henry, Campbell, Cole, Pires, Vieira etc to win a couple of leagues and a couple of FA Cups seems like it could have been so much more. Perhaps this is what we are seeing now when he has lesser players he isn't able to conjure up anything. He is the most successful Arsenal manager, the longest serving arsenal manager and he brought a team together that sadly will probably never be topped. So as Arsenal fans we have been blessed and when Arsene does go, we will all look on his reign with wonderment and awe (the first half!!)

[Power n Glory]

Good , IBK.

Arteta in FourFourTwo. Posted this in another thread but it pretty much sums up where we're going wrong if this is the mentality and philosophy of Wengerball.

http://performance.fourfourtwo.com/t...s-off-the-park

Don’t join the battle
“Take the game where you want. If you get drawn into the battle you will suffer. If you start making fouls and giving away throw-ins and corners then you lose your momentum, which is hard to get back. Stick to your passing game and keep the ball in their half. If you start forcing the play and giving the ball away you give them the opportunity to hit you on the counter attack. Arsene Wenger is so calm. He tells us to keep playing our football until the last minute of the game, and that has paid off.”

Tire out the opposition
“Make the opposition run for 10, 20, 30, 40 minutes – they will struggle to maintain their work rate for the entire game. Once they get tired, they start to make mistakes and you can draw them into two versus one or three versus two situations. This is your opportunity to find the spare man. If you keep the ball then the opposition will get tense and want to get aggressive. This will force them to break out of their positions and this is when you expose the space. Patience – that’s the difference between a good player and a top player.”

Confidence is key
“It doesn’t matter what system you play, or how hard the opposition press, you can find an advantage somewhere on the pitch. You have to pass with speed and precision and believe not only in yourself, but your team-mates, because sometimes you have to put them in trouble with a one-touch pass in a tight area of the pitch. You have to play the ball to their safer side – their stronger foot or where there’s more space for them to turn into. Sometimes just playing the ball into his feet isn’t good enough.”

ARTETA ON PASSING THE ARSENAL WAY
Work your way out of any dead end with this intricate drill, straight from the Gunners training ground

“At Arsenal, we do a lot of exercises where you have to play through the mannequins, but you can use cones.
This is a great drill because it’s real, you’re moving and finding the holes to play the diagonal pass, just like in a match.

After reading this, I think I get why the players appear so lifeless at times with no urgency, why we're so weak in the challenge and why Wenger takes so long to make subs. We're trying to ware down our opponents and hope their tiredness opens them up. In most games we try to play high up the pitch and pin our opponents back into their box. We try to avoid fouls to keep the momentum and maybe that's why we're so frail physically.

Stick to your passing game and keep the ball in their half. If you start forcing the play and giving the ball away you give them the opportunity to hit you on the counter attack.

You have to pass with speed and precision and believe not only in yourself, but your team-mates, because sometimes you have to put them in trouble with a one-touch pass in a tight area of the pitch.

That seems to be a bit of a contradiction or confusing at least. How do the players switch from safety passes, keeping calm and trying not to lose possession because your worried about a counter attack to trusting your players and putting them in a risky position with a pass in order to open up space? Especially against a well organised team that aren't rattled by the possession stats? I know we practice a lot of five aside and Wenger says the players are forced to deal with a lot of situations during those sessions and the brain acts like a computer and teaches them how to react naturally when faced with a challenge. It's why Wenger is never shouting instructions and losing his shit on the touchline because in theory they should know what's required. All in theory.

When Wengerball works, we fly and we're confident but we lose confidence way too easily after a defeat and Wenger needs to intervene. I wonder what Wenger will do when he says 'going back to basics'. More passing drills and five aside? How will we get the confidence back?

This is just a short snippet of Wengerball but it's interesting to read. I think we'd need supremely superior players for this to work in this era. You can see when the players look lost. I don't think it's down to a lack of desire and you always hear Wenger say that the spirit is there. I believe him. I can understand why Henry, Pires and co blasted away the competition in the Prem years back because fitness levels were way below ours and the same goes for the quality of players. In the Champs League it was always a different story. I think we'll really need to adjust under Wenger if we're to go any further.

[fakeyank]

There are a couple of 'truisms' - on here and amongst Gooners generally - that IMO need looking at.

The first is the automatic assumption that Wenger has remained a winning manager, despite nearly a decade now of winning nothing. The problem has been that there have been justifiable reasons for being also rans. The stadium, of course. The rise of the billionaire playboy clubs. The financial constraints that are so easy to hang the perennial losses of our best players on.

But I think that since the end of last season, a few things have happened to lay our belief in our manager bare.

The demonstration of world class management that SAF's league title showed, now that Moyes is at Manure...but also, in other ways - why his judgment was on the wane.

The progress made by the likes of Pochetino; Rogers and Benitez who are showing what asute tactical reading of the game; efficient football (see also Dortmund) and good man management can achieve on a lot less than Arsenal's budget.

Canny player deals (Sp*ds excepted of course) done by a number of clubs; and surprising player advances at others.

The press have scented our frailties for years. We have accused them of being anti Arsenal; or not appreciating the achievement of building a stadium and balancing the books. We have accepted the mantra of how financial self sufficiency is a trophy in itself - while we have 2 billionaire owners who have never put a penny into the club despite raping its share value.

But more importantly, we have continued to hope. While NONE of the clubs above us in the global pecking order, and many below would have taken steps to change things. Because Wenger is a safe pair of hands as regards CL status, and because of the above 'reasons' he needs to be given a chance to show that he is still great.

And that's why I think that even for those of us who would love Wenger to justify our faith in him now see this season as an ending. For once last Summer he had money to spend - but he ballsed it up and spunked a German record fee on, lets face facts, the wrong player. For once he kept all his best players. For once he seemed to have a defensive coach who had sorted a recurring problem. For once - no SAF; a Mourihno without his own choice players; and a Chilean who was to draw 4 and lose 5 this year to date even with his outrageous squad.

And at Christmas - the fact that we were finally regaining our strength as a club seemed to be there for all to see.

But in a way that we have never seen before under Wenger - his basic faults have been laid bare. He doesn't work in the transfer market without a David Dean alongside him - yet he remains 'the boss' in transfer affairs that he should simply not be involved in. He has clung to a watery 'tiki taka' style of play and players (even Giroud must surely have been chosen because he is adept at little flicks when supported in and around the box). He breeds no enduring confidence in his players. And most importantly - he has shown that whenever he is faced by players the equal of ours in ability, he does not have the tactical acumen to prevail. The fact that we have been thrashed away from home 4 times - more than ever under Wenger - has shown a man stubbornly, desperately, clinging on to a flawed system - and being, frankly, embarassed by those with the ability to analyse their enemies' weakness. It is almost shocking to see - and I have never before seen widespread reporting analysing how Wenger has been out thought and out executed. We were wrong; Wenger now seems to realise it - and our players look like they have lost confidence in Wenger's ability to win against decent opposition.

The second, nagging convention is that because the majority have held on to the dream, it is somehow 'disloyal' to criticise Wenger. There has been a fair degree of antipathy to those critical of a supposedly improving team - even when this was in the heat of the moment after a bad result, or intelligently argued.

I think that the truth is that Wenger has enjoyed an extraordinary degree of support from Arsenal fans and the broader football world. Even after this season was revealing itself to be yet another false dawn, there was dismay at Mourinho's 'specialist in failure' jibe (and look how Wenger put him in his place). He has become more than a football manager - almost an untouchable, because he allowed us to remain top 4 despite what (we accept) were financial constraints. He is paid more than any of his players other than Ozil. And while he has certainly been prudent - he has run the club like a personal fiefdom, answerable to noone, and arguably but his beliefs in front of our success and reputation. He has enjoyed every bit of the support that his historic, or off-field achievements have merited.

And for me, the truth finally seems clear enough to want Wenger to leave with fondness rather than adulation.

Thoughts?

A very good post. I sympathize (not necessarily agree) with the fact that we were financially broke in every transfer window. What I cannot sympathize with is the absolute lack of fight shown by the players. I cannot sympathize with no planning, tactics being shown by the manager. I cannot sympathize with playing absolutely dire boring football we play.

[Globalgunner]

I agree, but wish people would stop repeating untruths. We have never been broke and never had too little money to buy players. We (Wenger) chose not to spend. Do you think we suddenly ended up with 120m in the bank. It is the cumulative savings from not spending in window after window. Either by accident or design. We have chosen to buiold up a cash reserve instead of buying players. However given Wengers track record I dont think any set of players would have changed the situation we now find ourselves in. He would have either bought the wrong players, Chamacks, santos, Gervinho. Or bought the right players, Arshavin, Podolski, and trained used them badly.

There is little option to changing the manager. He brought us some great times yes, but I believe he could, should, have done much better. He was the weak point, even when things were going great.

[Letters]

I agree, but wish people would stop repeating untruths. We have never been broke and never had too little money to buy players.

"We had to beg, steal and borrow to pay wages" - David Dein. I don't know all the ins and outs of our finances but I suspect David Dein did and in his interview ahead of Wenger's thousanth (sp?) game he mentioned how tight our finances were at one time. I don't dispute Wenger could have spent more but it's just not true to say we've never had restrictions because of the stadium move and poor commercial deals.

I wish people would stop repeating untruths too. Things like how Wenger isn't bothered about us winning trophies and how he's 'clueless' or 'inept'.
I'm not sure he's the right man to take us forward any more but people don't need to make up stuff or massively exaggerate.

[Power n Glory]

"We had to beg, steal and borrow to pay wages" - David Dein. I don't know all the ins and outs of our finances but I suspect David Dein did and in his interview ahead of Wenger's thousanth (sp?) game he mentioned how tight our finances were at one time. I don't dispute Wenger could have spent more but it's just not true to say we've never had restrictions because of the stadium move and poor commercial deals.

I wish people would stop repeating untruths too. Things like how Wenger isn't bothered about us winning trophies and how he's 'clueless' or 'inept'.
I'm not sure he's the right man to take us forward any more but people don't need to make up stuff or massively exaggerate.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/f...s-2319483.html

Those calling for more spending on the current team will be interested to learn how highly Adams rated Fiszman's contribution. "I think that a significant factor, 90 per cent, in why we achieved so much is that Danny Fiszman invested £50m in the club and we were able to go to the next level," he said. "I got my first decent contract at the club, so did David Seaman, we were able to bring in Dennis Bergkamp – and that was before Arsène arrived – David Platt, Patrick Vieira, Nicolas Anelka, and were able to pay them – top players from around the world.

If Fiszman could invest his own money, I don't get why we haven't asked for help from our two Billionaire's or the other board members?

[Marc Overmars]

Kroenke won't do shit, he's just here for a return. Usmanov won't invest anything without a controlling stake.

[Niall_Quinn]

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/f...s-2319483.html


If Fiszman could invest his own money, I don't get why we haven't asked for help from our two Billionaire's or the other board members?

More like if Fiszman could invest then what about the other shareholders who shared in that bonanza when they fucked off? Poor bastard died and the jackals got the lot.

[Globalgunner]

"We had to beg, steal and borrow to pay wages" - David Dein. I don't know all the ins and outs of our finances but I suspect David Dein did and in his interview ahead of Wenger's thousanth (sp?) game he mentioned how tight our finances were at one time. I don't dispute Wenger could have spent more but it's just not true to say we've never had restrictions because of the stadium move and poor commercial deals.

I wish people would stop repeating untruths too. Things like how Wenger isn't bothered about us winning trophies and how he's 'clueless' or 'inept'.
I'm not sure he's the right man to take us forward any more but people don't need to make up stuff or massively exaggerate.

Speak to the question.David Dein has hardly been with us since the move to the Emirates. Arsenal financial results are not a hidden detail its all over the web. The club has repeatedly stated that there are funds to buy players. Yes not 50m players each window but that is not what we are talking about are we?. The club has money, a wagebill 50% higher than Spurs, 70%b higher than Everton

You are the same person who used to get all upset when 2 years ago people would abuse Wenger and call him a cunt. Now that its commonplace to call him a cunt. Your new hated words are clueless and inept. Even when those words are not used like in this thread you find way to insert them to justify your umbrage. No hes not clueless and inept, but hes definitely not up to the job of winning titles, not anymore anyways.

What you fail to realise in your blind veneration of all things Wenger is that the club stands on the brink of a precipe. This season offered a unique opportunity for the club to win the league....one that we have in our habitual way capitulated on. If Ferguson had not stepped down, we would be 5th at best with no hope of CL. Next season, if we do not make CL, the club that does in our place, either Spuds, Everton or dare i say it United, will strengthen and reinforce to maintain that status. we on the otherhand will stick with Wenger and stick with ineffectual football and flawed approach to success. No we wont do a Leeds but we may not get that CL place back for maybe half a decade. In orderv to come 4th, nowadays you need to be targetting 1st place