Wenger Out ?

[Özim]

The FA Cup of old, competed for by English, Scots, Irish and Welsh, had a genuine prestige. This modern version, competed for by Spaniards, French and Nigerians, not so much. Doubt half the players would be bothered about it beyond the day itself. Honestly, if grabbing a second rate trophy is enough for some to say keep Wenger in his job, but keeping us on the European stage in a genuinely prestigious tournament is considered failure then there's a weird logic going on. Getting to the final of the CL would be a much bigger achievement than winning the FA Cup. I think winning the latter wouldn't signify much at all. A bit of luck and we could win it this year. What does emulating Wigan tell us though? Anything of value? If we want to see real progress then we have to aim for something bigger than that. Of course great if we win it, but for me I'll be asking what else did we do that showed we took a step forward. I think we have taken a big step forward this year anyway. Having a defence after years of being without is proper advancement. Get a few players in this summer and I think we can measure our ambitions to the size of this club. Sure, why not, pick up the FA Cup while we are at it. I won't complain.

Again I disagree, it's not second rate and what it would prove is that we're actually able to take that final step and convert opportunities into trophies, right now I have my doubts, so do the squad I bet, success breeds winners, we need to break the cycle, losing in a final will only reinforce the fact we can't win anything.

Like I said we have no hope in the CL, Bayern will knock us out and if by some miracle they don't some other team will, we're not good enough to win that competition. As for keeping us on the European stage, sorry I don't personally rate that as an achievement, it's Europe's premier competition not one for 3rd and 4th placed teams IMO.

[saintnickle]

We have Walcott and Ramsey, our two most improved players, out with long term injuries. We don't have the money to have another 2 Walcotts and another 2 Ramseys on the bench. Take 3xToure and 3xAguero out of City long term, Suarez and Gerard out of Liverpool, 3xHazard and ... (just how the hell are those fuckers top anyway?) and problems would be rearing for those clubs too. Fortunately the extent of our current problem is being 4 points off the lead instead of 14 as usual. Could we be four points closer if we'd had our best team on the pitch for any significant duration? It's not unreasonable to suggest yes.

What we're saying is, there have been definite signs of improvement. The defence is better beyond all recognition. The goalkeeper has come on brilliantly. Some of our "project" players are starting to finally come though, Walcott, Ramsey, Ox. We have signed one of the best players in the world (and even though he's tailed off in his first season in a 100mph with no rest kickabout league he's class and it will surface), we have led the way most of the way, we are still in with a shout at the top, took it to Bayern and outplayed them until fate intervened, we have announced massive new deals that open up the door to some serious reinforcements. In conclusion - sack the manager, he has nothing to offer.

Why are you making excuses .All teams have injuries.We have 70 million in the bank after 2 transfer windows where we spent 25 million in total,which is less than what cardiff spend and we moan about 2 players being injured.Get real

[Özim]

On the contrary, I remember very well what the FA Cup used to be. That's why I don't have much time for the modern day parody.

Why because Wenger and co have decided that the league and CL (a competition which allows 4th place into it) are more important? Yeah that's all about money I'm afraid nothing else (CL anyway).

I personally long for the joy of seeing my team score a goal that wins a game which ends in them lifting a trophy, there's nothing like it, this 4th place sh*t, well it barely gets me out of my chair.

[Power n Glory]

The FA Cup of old, competed for by English, Scots, Irish and Welsh, had a genuine prestige. This modern version, competed for by Spaniards, French and Nigerians, not so much. Doubt half the players would be bothered about it beyond the day itself. Honestly, if grabbing a second rate trophy is enough for some to say keep Wenger in his job, but keeping us on the European stage in a genuinely prestigious tournament is considered failure then there's a weird logic going on. Getting to the final of the CL would be a much bigger achievement than winning the FA Cup. I think winning the latter wouldn't signify much at all. A bit of luck and we could win it this year. What does emulating Wigan tell us though? Anything of value? If we want to see real progress then we have to aim for something bigger than that. Of course great if we win it, but for me I'll be asking what else did we do that showed we took a step forward. I think we have taken a big step forward this year anyway. Having a defence after years of being without is proper advancement. Get a few players in this summer and I think we can measure our ambitions to the size of this club. Sure, why not, pick up the FA Cup while we are at it. I won't complain.

You've really been taken in by Wenger's doctrine! I think you've lost your mind.

Qualification for the CL and another final that we end up losing does nothing for us. It just feeds into this 'specialist of failure' stigma we have attached to us. The players and coach need to stop chocking and actually win a trophy to restore some confidence and our reputation.

[JonasTC]

NQ stop making sense and stop saying you support Wenger... It will make you unpopular in here

[Özim]

NQ stop making sense and stop saying you support Wenger... It will make you unpopular in here

I guess it only makes sense if you agree with it?

[Letters]

On the contrary, I remember very well what the FA Cup used to be. That's why I don't have much time for the modern day parody.

I remember what it used to be too, it used to be the highlight of the season, a really special day, hours of build up...well, the build up started when the semi-finals were over. One of the few games of the season shown live on TV. Now...just another big game in the tide of hyped TV games, massively devalued by the CL - both in that it's overshadowed by it and qualification for next year's is more important to many clubs than winning it.


All that said, we need to get this no trophies monkey off our back.

[Niall_Quinn]

I haven't been taken in by anything at all. I just know the difference between running a business and talking about running a business. Sure, at a top down level the owners and executives of the club will consider the fans in terms of the overall goal. But then they sit down at a table and start working out the practical realities of achieving that goal. What can be done, what can't, how a thing can be achieved or partially achieved given the resources at hand and the environment being operated in. How long it will take to hit each milestone. What the contingencies are. The finer details.

Quite obviously securing CL football and partially funding the stadium move using a net positive transfer balance were critical to the plan. Our main competitors have pumped cash into players while we took cash out of that pot. So things have been tough on the pitch. Now you can say, fuck, we want trophies, we want signings, we want it today. And we could have gone that way instead and won a title or a few cups. But those would be the last we'd ever win as the consequences of not reacting to the changing face of football would have been to become second tier on a permanent basis.

Now we have the means of cementing ourselves at the top of the game for the long term. According to the plan what is supposed to follow is the investment on the pitch that will produce the team that was the whole reason for the stadium move and up-scaled business plan. So we were told. We saw the first piece of this with the signing of Ozil in a Barcelona, Madrid, Man City sized deal. Some have laughably suggested Wenger blew that money to appease fans. That's the stupidest argument it's possible to make in light of the facts. Facts many complain about, no investment, second tier signings, transfer profits, etc. Of course it wasn't appeasement. It was delivery on what was promised all along. The first parcel anyway.

This is such a crucial time for the club. Exactly the wrong time for certain elements to be pissing about calling for the manager to be sacked, trying to oust Wilshere, calling Ozil whatever name the Daily Hannibal Lecter has pushed out for the day. Crying because we didn't nail the title well ahead of schedule. That's what the mention of the injured players is about. In a couple of years maybe we WILL have 3xRamsey on the bench. Then it's a whole new ball game.

I haven't been taken in at all. I'm just reading the evidence and seeing that it tallies with the assurances given by the board and the manager. Ozil was the key evidence that I find it amazing some can dismiss so easily. It's almost like some fans are getting frightened we might pull this off and are having one last stabbing frenzy to see if they can blow it up. With 3 tough games coming up our job is to be supporting the club, not trying to fuck the manager out the door. And whichever way those games go we still have the business of finishing what we started to attend to. So it won't be time to sack the manager or hound Wilshere out in April either.

[Power n Glory]

I just know the difference between running a business and talking about running a business.

I'm surprised by you. Last year you were at total odds with the way the club was being run and especially critical of Gazidis and Kronke. At least your now starting to see that they're doing what's required. Wenger has constantly made noise about funding in the football and they've done all they can to help provide the funds. The ball is now in his court.

We've had this sort of debate before and I did say it makes sense for the Board to be more cautious with our funds and pushing out the boat because they have a long term goal with this stadium move. Stability and consistency helps them forecast. You were pretty critical of me when I defended their approach and could understand why they're so cautious. Where we differ is, I put the onus on Wenger to push for silverware because he's the manager and motivations should be in line with the athletes. Winning as much as possible and taking home the silverware should be what drives him and I don't expect the Board to have to drive that message home to him.

It's not impossible to win the FA cup and secure a CL qualification place. I'm not sure why you'd argue otherwise when you know how important it is for us to break this mental block. The FA Cup is still a cup. I completely understand your point about this being a crucial moment and it may sound premature to want rid of Wenger but if we now have the financial backing and seem more secure financially, I don't think that strengthens Wenger's position at the club. It will be sad if he doesn't get to enjoy the fruits of his labour but he needs to help himself. If he were to walk now, I wouldn't be in a major panic because we now have the funds for a new manager to build a better squad.

[Blink 1nce Quince 2wice]

Finishing 4th would mean another summer of waiting until the end to sign players and rushing about to complete deals due to the qualifier.

No thanks.

That is in all likelihood what we will do in any case.....and the world cup is far more likely to be a factor in that, than our pending CL qualifier. We didn't have that to deal with in January and yet we signed an injured player right at the death.

Doing deals late has been a very deliberate, calculated and concerted strategy, habit and tendency of the club's for a number of years now. This seems to be in order to play the hard ball style in negotiations we like and to get deals as cheap as we see fit.

3rd place is better than 4th place but one is simply 3rd placed loser and the other is 4th placed loser. If we finish 4th and win the FA cup I will still deem the season a successful one as it's a damn sight more than we've done in the last several years.