Per Mertesacker, Laurent Koscielny is acting captain whilst he is injuredOriginally Posted by Letters
Per Mertesacker, Laurent Koscielny is acting captain whilst he is injured
That Ramsey situation sprung to mind as well. We know he has an engine to get back and make that tackle so seeing him not even make an attempt really pissed me off. If you don't have the ability or awareness to deal with that situation, it's forgivable. If they don't know any better, it's down to the manager to take them to one side and point out the flaws. But if they have the experience, have let their own standards drop and know better and let their own standards drop, I have serious problem with that player. It drives me mad when I see players ducking responsibility. It's the same sort of thing that drives me mad when I see Wenger's post game excuses after we lose.Ramsey is in shocking form and on top of that there is simply the feeling that his attitude stinks, he gives the ball away against Watford for their second goal and he just glares at Gabriel instead of running back, and you mention Coquelin although he failed he seemed to be the only one even bothering to try and catch Capoue.
His greatest success came when he had strong players full stop. Mentally and physically. The last 13 years at Arsenal makes it inevitable there will be questions about just who was behind Arsenal's success. Wenger? Or did the likes of the legendary back five and true leaders like Vieira and Bergkamp do what the current bunch can't and drag Wenger's dead weight to the top of the mountain?
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I was thinking the same thing when trying to think of who's captain. I knew it was Merts but didn't know who was standing in for him. I hate Kos as captain. He says nothing and you only have to watch what he does when we concede. But I doubt it matters who we have as captain. Plenty of experienced players and captains on the pitch but nobody reacts.
Yeah this is the kind of thing Zim tends to do rewriting history, you can make that point about many people.....would Clough have succeeded where he did without Peter Taylor.
Even at the time none of us were under any illusion that Wenger was a master tactician, his great talent was in finding unpolished gems and creating great teams with them. Times have changed and he has been abjectly slow at changing with it, and above all else you aren't a great innovator when you reach Wenger's age.
He did revolutionise the game in this country and bring the athleticism to it that had been previously missing, look how many people adopted his methods in terms of searching obscure leagues to dredge up a diamond and his diet and fitness regimes. He was ahead of the curve in so many ways when he came here, but with twenty years gone he's stale.
What i don't think is necessary is trying to airbrush history and make him appear like someone who just happened upon what he did by dumb luck
Wenger at Arsenal is very much like the Federer of football managers (though yeah hasn't achieved anywhere near what Federer has) in that his biggest achievements have been in the first half of his career....although unlike Federer i don't think Wenger has the equivalent of another grand slam in him.
Last edited by Herbert_Chapman's_Zombie; 06-02-2017 at 03:21 PM.
We have 11 captains Letters, 11 Leaders
Hold on - the last decade has been all about airbrushing history. Wenger's football record is catastrophic, no other top flight manager has survived such terrible numbers. And yet he's a genius, a professor, a miracle worker. Untouchable. So why is it okay to play make believe in the latter half of his reign but unacceptable to examine how badly exposed he has been over that period and then rethink what happened before? All history is refined over time because, usually, when it is written it is written by the hand of those who benefit from a favourable re-telling. Then as time passes so real history emerges. Wenger is not untouchable. He's the fool who lingered long beyond his shelf life. If he'd have had a bit of sense and left years ago then his would be a history that becomes a legend and it wouldn't be much questioned. Now we look at this incompetent old man stumbling around the place, clueless, incoherent, riddled with excuses. I say question everything.
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In terms of elite level management he has been badly exposed the last ten years in terms of winning major trophies, no if he was managing chelsea, city or united he would not have kept his job but given how inconsistent Liverpool have been for instance would they have really sacked a manager who finished no lower than 4th every season even if they had not seen a sniff of a title race, would Atletico Madrid in Spain?, Dortmund in Germany?.
It's all relative, he has not been anywhere near good enough considering what we have been promised to expect and considering the money he has been given to build a capable squad. Fans are rightly sick of the constant capitulations, the lack of mental strength and the guy sitting there in a giant michelin man jacket looking like he's escaped from Rampton....but he has achieved a consistency that few other people are capable of and this has allowed him as well as a play it safe board to be last man standing.
Question everything by all means, but coming to any conclusion other than what he achieved in his first ten years at Arsenal would be near on impossible to be matched (whether he was helped by more mature heads in the squad or not) seems to be based on familiarity breeding contempt rather than any thorough analysis.
I think with ex players having a chance to write their own books and weigh in on interviews about their experience at Arsenal, we gain a great insight to the managers strengths and weaknesses. It’s only over the last few years we’ve seen that quote from Vieira about him having too much faith in players – his greatest strength and weakness.
I'm not saying his legacy should be denied or removed. I'm saying it should be reevaluated. Yes, he has had a big influence on British football. That's tangible, you can see his early methods in effect at most teams these days. Mind you, you would hope so and even though it took guts to come in as an unknown and start rearranging the football culture it's not as if his ideas were inspired. More than anything they were common sense for an environment that lacked common sense up to that point. Binge drinking, crappy diets, a general lack of fitness. You would expect professional athletes behave as such but it's true, it took Wenger to come along and suggest what didn't seem to dawn on those that went before.
True also he brought in players like Vieira, Overmars, Pires, Henry and the rest. So we know he had an eye for a player back then but let's also remember he came with the advantage of having an enviable scouting network built on a career spanning the globe. Good for him, he's the guy who made that career so nobody is taking that away from him either.
The style of football he wanted to play. Another plus point. Fast, powerful, technical football, some of the best every played and certainly it's beyond a doubt it was the best ever played in this country. It's also likely to be the best we'll ever see in this country as the standard of modern football slides back into the swamp.
But now a question arises. Could he have taken the squad he has now (or any of the recent squads) and transplanted them into that era and come away with similar results? I don't think so, it seems highly, highly unlikely. Wenger faced far more fearsome opposition back then in the shape of Ferguson's Utd at its peak. No team in the league today would last five minutes at that level. So just like we say today that the players have to take some responsibility for the shitty results, it's fair to say the players back then deserve some credit. I know they get that credit, so not a problem there. I'm just wondering how that credit should be parcelled out. Because when I see Wenger trying to extract title winning performances out of the current bunch it seems to me he doesn't have the first clue how to do it. Not a clue. And it makes me ask, what is it that he has forgotten and how has he managed to misplace something of such great significance. Or indeed, did he ever possess it? Was it his vision coupled with the leadership of the previous generation of players that was the secret recipe? And now that generation is gone, do we see the real Wenger. A man with his visions but zero ability to bring them into reality? And is this because he's lost his eye for a player? Or have players become inferior in general? Or what is it?
Because it certainly is difficult to explain the extreme differences between early Wenger and what we have now. And I think it's valid to ask questions about that and not illegal to reach some opinion based conclusions.
Clough fell to pieces because he was a drunk, btw. Wenger isn't. His collapse has been in a stone cold sober state. I just wish he'd left years ago so we could all look back and say, what a guy he was, amazing. But now what do you see when you look at him? It's sad. He's done this to himself and he's bloody fortunate he still controls the media because he'd have long since been Robsoned or Taylored by now. Surely he realised that if he signs up for another 2 years he'll struggle to keep that protection and his legacy will be under real threat of being permanently tarnished?
he has to go. Not just for the good of the club but for his own sake.
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