So, is Wenger out officially out?

[Harland]

I dont think we have regressed. I think we are/have been at the same level since 08. We have shown improvement in grinding out wins but along with that progress, our football keeps regressing to eye gorging standards. So, we have a + and then with that comes a -. And thats why I say, we are the same level.

If you take the FA Cup final out of the way, we didnt show any real progress in my opinion. I do however think we had a tremendous amount of goodwill around the club.. something that had been missing around our club forever! We signed players early and looked set to challenge.. and then things just stopped! We didnt sign the players required and have again gone gambling on crocks (Diaby, Gibbs, Walcott).

I would say that being in a position to challenge for the title until the last leg of the race was a sign of progress.

The last few seasons before that was us clinching 4th on the last day or so.....

Having said that, i'm getting rather worried by the season so far. We really, really, really need to kick on immediately.

[fakeyank]

I would say that being in a position to challenge for the title until the last leg of the race was a sign of progress.

The last few seasons before that was us clinching 4th on the last day or so.....

Having said that, i'm getting rather worried by the season so far. We really, really, really need to kick on immediately.

I think almost all 'pessimists' (more like 'realists') had said that we will fold and die the moment we face decent opposition last season. Both times we hit a stretch of hard games- near Xmas and in March, we folded like a pack of cards! I think we had shown similar glimpses of 'title challenging' credentials in 07/08, 09/10 and last season. Every one of these times, we have folded around March or April.

[Letters]

I don't think anyone expected us to last the distance last year but to be top of the league for so long - having just about scraped into the top 4 the previous two seasons - showed clear progress. And, of course, we won the FA Cup which got the 'not winning trophies' monkey off our back.
There was clear progress last year compared with the previous one (which is the only sensible comparison). The question is have we built on that. We seemed to be making some good signings in the summer but right now we don't look any better than last year, so far we're looking worse. It's early yet though, Saturday's performance encouraged me so let's see where we are around Christmas, that's usually when you get a better idea of how you're doing.

[LDG]

Tactically, we're as poor as ever. That's Wenger's fault.

We have 6 defenders to last us at least until January, one of whom is Monreal, who is soooo poor defensively. That's Wenger's fault.

Aside from that, the team is good enough to push on, and we should be beating City last weekend, as I still don't think they're all that good! That was the players fault.

[Power n Glory]

I don't think anyone expected us to last the distance last year but to be top of the league for so long - having just about scraped into the top 4 the previous two seasons - showed clear progress. And, of course, we won the FA Cup which got the 'not winning trophies' monkey off our back.
There was clear progress last year compared with the previous one (which is the only sensible comparison). The question is have we built on that. We seemed to be making some good signings in the summer but right now we don't look any better than last year, so far we're looking worse. It's early yet though, Saturday's performance encouraged me so let's see where we are around Christmas, that's usually when you get a better idea of how you're doing.

Not many expected us to win the league because they knew our squad was thin and we didn’t have a world class striker. It’s the same situation this year. The same situation when losing RVP. It’s an ongoing cycle. We had a discussion last year regarding title expectations and I still maintain we could have won if we went into the season better prepared. We needed a world class striker but didn’t move for one in the summer or January transfer window. It didn’t take a genius to see that we’d struggle to keep up the pace with that wafer thin squad. But here we are again.

We can wait to judge in January but we all know what’s going to happen. We won’t keep up the pace even if we’re on good form because we’ve handicapped ourselves with that small squad. We’re in no position to cope with injuries at the back and that will be our undoing. This all falls on Wenger and the blame can’t be shifted on to stadium debt, Stan, Gazidis, financial doping……or whatever else.

[Marc Overmars]

Unfortunately any progression we do make always seems to be superseded by some form of bad preparation. Wenger has no excuses for the depleted defence, it's laughable Chambers is expected to cover 2 positions and Monreal is deemed adequate enough to play CB.

[AFC Leveller]

Not many expected us to win the league because they knew our squad was thin and we didn’t have a world class striker. It’s the same situation this year. The same situation when losing RVP. It’s an ongoing cycle. We had a discussion last year regarding title expectations and I still maintain we could have won if we went into the season better prepared. We needed a world class striker but didn’t move for one in the summer or January transfer window. It didn’t take a genius to see that we’d struggle to keep up the pace with that wafer thin squad. But here we are again.

We can wait to judge in January but we all know what’s going to happen. We won’t keep up the pace even if we’re on good form because we’ve handicapped ourselves with that small squad. We’re in no position to cope with injuries at the back and that will be our undoing. This all falls on Wenger and the blame can’t be shifted on to stadium debt, Stan, Gazidis, financial doping……or whatever else.

Exactly.

How many times over the last few years have we said "this squad needs one or two world class signings and we'd win the league"? Wenger goes into every season short in at least one position and then when we fall short because of lack of preparation, he shift the blame from himself to bad luck, injuries, financial doping etc.

[Özim]

It's the same every transfer window isn't it, obvious weak areas that need patching up that never really seem to be, I never really understand why.

It's not difficult to see our weak areas, why does the manager never do the obvious and fix them when he has the chance.

[Letters]

This transfer window is a bit of a puzzle in that we do seem to have signed some good players.
And yet...while we're possibly stronger up front we now look hopelessly weak at the back which, for once, wasn't a big problem last season.

[selassie]

This transfer window is a bit of a puzzle in that we do seem to have signed some good players.
And yet...while we're possibly stronger up front we now look hopelessly weak at the back which, for once, wasn't a big problem last season.

It's not a puzzle, it's how Wenger operates in the market and manages his squad, he is a compulsive gambler who takes unnecessary risks. Our situation in Defence is laughable, it's mismanagement of the highest order and quite frankly is not acceptable.

We are a big club, we are involved in four competitions and will likely play circa 50 games if not more per season, why on earth does Wenger who is sitting on Millions of pounds not build a proper squad and account for things such as injuries? It really doesn't make any sense to me...more so given that he as sold Defenders and for one reason or another chosen not to replace them!!!