Quote Originally Posted by Toronto Gooner View Post
Sorry, Niall, but that read like it was written by someone who started supporting Arsenal when Wenger joined and has never bothered to look back into Arsenal's history.
I remember the time before Wenger very well. Fans back then had a clear understanding of where the club stood in the scheme of things. There were no silly promises or false assurances, we took each season as it came, satisfied ourselves with cup runs (when the cup still meant something) and celebrated when George Graham overachieved. I remember it all very well. But your point doesn't hold water anyway. Man Utd used to be in the old 2nd division. Then then waited years for a title win. They were the team that almost could but never did. Does that mean they can now drop to mid-table but console themselves that things are still better than they used to be years back? I don't think so. Just as I don't think a club like ours which raised the standards can be easily excused when those standards reverse and continue to drop. If we accept that, if we agree we are a club in decline, then what's to be done about it? Certainly you don't propose accepting it because we once finished below Middlesbro' in the old division one? Sometimes decline is inevitable and beyond the control of the club, periods of success come and go. But I never experienced a team as gutless as the current one under George Graham or Terry Neill. I never saw collapses of the type we see today. There's something very different about the failure that has enveloped the present day team, something fundamentally wrong with the club I haven't witnessed before. In fact I can't recall ever seeing a string of failure such as we've experienced in any top flight team. We had winners at the club and now we have losers. Surely this is self evident? Who brought these losers in on the cheap? Who let experienced and talented players go without replacing them? And why? Was it to calmly accept the decline of the club? No, it was supposed to be a period of austerity whilst the club upped it's financial status, it was supposed to be a period where youngsters were brought through to carry the club forwards. It hasn't happened though, instead we've gone backwards. Wenger has failed, the board hasn't delivered. Most of our players are crap. I don't care how talented they are or how many passed they can string together, when it comes time to do the business they collapse. Happens every year. This lot aren't a patch on what we used to have at the club and that includes the era before Wenger. At least basck then we had players who gave a shit about the shirt. We have precious few now.