This is an issue I have put to you a few times and not once have you addressed it. Part of me thinks you are avoiding it so I thought I'd try one last time. As NQ has said above, many people have put forward well composed arguments, alongside some of the jokes that keep this place worth returning to. I've consistently read in your posts the mantra of how beating City and Utd away, our 'magnificent' run in the second half of the season and I'm assuming now this Chelsea game would be added to that if we got a point, not even a victory.Originally Posted by Letters
You should stick around, it's so nice to have a grown up to talk to.
I basically agree with a lot of the above. I'd still like to leave it a little longer in this season before jumping to too many conclusions although I agree about the Groundhog Day nature of the last 10 years. That said, I've said endlessly why I see some glimmers of hope - players like Ozil and Sanchez, results like Old Trafford Cup Quarter Final and the FA Cup wins (which I don't accept were luck, I agree to an extent about some of the team being knocked out but there's always an element of luck in a Cup and last year we beat Utd away, the season before we played 3 of the top 6 - all at home, but still).
The last 2 years we've won the Cup and finished 4th then retained the Cup and finished 3rd. There have been frustrations but overall it's not been a bad 2 years. Last year we only finished below the two sides who have billionaires propping them up. People always say the billionaire thing is an "excuse" but the fact is they've mopped up most of the titles between them since they got going. Only Fergie has bested them both and as good as I think Wenger is, he's no Fergie. I do think now we have the new financial deals in place we can give them a run for their money though. As much as we all want to push on for the biggest prizes I think the level of moaning and hyperbole on here is way out of proportion to the situation. We lose, people moan. We win, people just moan about the performance instead.
I see the Chelsea game as a bigger indication of how this season will go than anything we've seen so far. We've not flown out of the blocks this season but only City have. Chelsea have had poor results so far but our record there is horrible of late, if we could win there it would show something about this team.
Ultimately I agree Wenger should be sacked it we don't start competing for the league. But I don't think he deserves the level of criticism much less the disrespect he gets on here.
I've pointed out that over the past two seasons (which comprises this squad) where our issue in the league has come from, which is against the top 8. A group that make up the better teams in the league, a set of teams that have remained consistently in place over the past two seasons. With a small group outside the top quad of teams that offer more of threat to the top four and are in the running for a Europa position. So overall, clubs with a higher standard of player than everyone else below.
The run in the second half of the season illustrated similar failings, beating those in the lower half of the table and consistently dropping points against the better teams. As we did in the first half of the season. As we did in the previous season too. The amount of points we collected over those two seasons against the top 8 is also very similar, both around 17/18 points from 42. Saying that we tailed off at the end of last season because the focus was the FA Cup Final can't be true either - because in 13/14 we won our last five games of the season, unsurprisingly all against teams in the bottom half of the table. Last season in our last five before the final we got 7 from 9 against the lower teams and 1 from 6 against those in the top 8. It's hard to ignore the pattern.
It is absolutely clear that this squad and manager struggles to figure out ways to beat the better teams. That is a combination of his failings and a weak squad. Games against the top four have been a microcosm of that over the past number of seasons but when you extend it out to the other strong teams, the problem persists. Go out further to Europe and we all know that once we get beyond the group stage and the quality increases, we fail to step up.
So bearing all that in mind I'm curious how to know where these signs of progression in the league are being illustrated from your point of view. We may have new financial deals in place but if they are not being utilised to maximum effect it doesn't really offer much help. People do complain about performances when we win - and really, not just on this forum, you should go and look - because we are not playing very well. Doing just enough to get by, which doesn't inspire confidence in fans in a period when all the talk before the season started was about challenging for the title. We hardly look like a team that are capable of sustaining strong performances across an entire campaign. That is why people are worried. We look fragile and just as capable of winning or pulling out a result like Wednesday, or West Ham. We have been living on a myth that we still play great football, fed to the mainstream by numbskull pundits who churn out the easy and safe one-liners. If you watch our games consistently, there is nothing very exciting about the mostly slow, pedestrian approach to our play. That is another reason why fans complain about the performances. It all looks and feels very familiar to the patterns of previous seasons and the facts exist in our results to prove that is the case too.
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