Wenger Out ?

[Power n Glory]

Guys, we are in danger of scraping the bottom of the deepest buried barrel here. In the last couple of posts I can see there is zero actual appreciation of the good things that have happened at this club over the last years, or at least any appreciation is an impatient lip service in anticipation of some main course that is undefined and apparently left up to the gods or devils to produce. We're even suggesting opening the door to a murderer, thief, human rights abuser, why? Because he has cash. Well Wenger and the few who stuck it out now have cash too and nobody died. When Wenger leaves I certainly hope we can do the bare minimum and afford him some credit, a couple of years thereafter. Hopefully we won't congratulate ourselves too much for our restrained generosity, or maybe we will. I also hope we remember how half our fan base reacted when a few adverse chips went down but I think amnesia will be the preference. Crashing the car is a reference to the fracture between the fans, the club will go on regardless.

This is where the debates get tedious because your picking out the most trivial parts of a post and not making an attempt to even engage with the real questions. Continue to pat yourself on the back and award yourself the gold star for excellent conduct in this sad, sorry affair. You're a model example of a true Arsenal fan Happy?

[Niall_Quinn]

This is where the debates get tedious because your picking out the most trivial parts of a post and not making an attempt to even engage with the real questions. Continue to pat yourself on the back and award yourself the gold star for excellent conduct in this sad, sorry affair. You're a model example of a true Arsenal fan Happy?

Why are you putting trivia in your post then?

[Power n Glory]

Although I do believe that Wenger should shoulder some of the blame, I do not think it is entirely his fault.

I get the impression that the Board have this blind optimism that Wenger does everything right (whether this is fuelled by the revenue his business dealings generate is for another debate). I don't believe that Bould falls into this category, but when you have 20 other people going yes to everything you say with only 1 saying otherwise, then human nature usually leans towards the majority.

It's almost as if Wenger has become a bratty childhood star surrounded by a bunch of "Yes Men" and he's ignoring his 1 true Friend.

I wholeheartedly agree that things need to change, but I do not believe that this should be the Manager...

Personally, I think they should bring Dein back as well as allow Usamov to be part of the Board (which I know alot of people will disagree with).

Dein & Wenger were a perfect match, as they are both Friends and trust eachother wholeheartedly. I don't get the impression that Wenger feels the same with Gazidis, so he's trying to shoulder too much of the burden. The drop in form at Arsenal has been on a steady decline since his departure, and I do not believe it was simply coincidence.

The whole matter about our fractured ownership is almost laughable. It's like watching a bunch of kids arguing about who gets to next play on the swing. Let him come aboard and put his money where his mouth is. Worry less about the needless politics and get the Club back on the road to success!

I wonder if Dein can make a comeback? I don’t see why it would be a problem since PHW has stepped down. He’s still close to the club so I guess we’ll see. But I don’t think that’s enough to change things. For starters, Dein and Wenger seem to have totally different views when it comes to football finance. Dein wanted a move to Wembley and financing from Kronke and Usamov. That’s goes against Wenger’s principles.

Besides that, I think the main problem we have is on the field. Wenger needs to change is training methods drastically if he wants to survive in this era. Days of us finding diamonds in the rough are well and truly over. We’re very unlikely to find undervalued players in the current market and it seems like Wenger’s new strategy is to raid the lower divisions in the French and English leagues. It’s all too risky because we’re still paying around £10m for players that may turn out to be a complete waste of time and will take longer to develop because of the league quality. It’s okay to try and find undervalued players but we really need to update our strategy. I hope to see more Ozil like signings in the future but I’m really not a fan of this hands off approach, no instructions type training we have going on here. It works for some but not for all. Some players may develop and others may just get lost because they haven’t a clue what they should be doing. Theo has so much untapped potential still sitting there and I think he’s an example of a very slow development process.

From Board level, how can they actually intervene? I think they are totally dependent on Wenger’s input for the football stuff. None of them are football men and it would help if we had people on the Board that were up to date on the modern game. But there is always a thin line because I wouldn’t want too much influence from that level imposed on the manager. It’s a fine balance. Considering the transition from Highbury to the Emirate, I doubt the Board were keen on rocking the boat and demanding trophies because we were still in the building stage. Chelsea and now City had just entered the game and Wenger was still keeping us in the top 4. When you look at it like that, it’s quite an achievement. Trying to wrestle control back from Wenger or put demands on him at that point would have been risky at that stage. I understand their caution.

What I don’t understand is how Wenger can go 9 years without a trophy. As a man that hates to lose, just like any coach or athlete, he should have been banging on the Boards door if he felt he needed more funds or support to build a trophy winning team. Even though we’ve been restricted financially, I don’t believe the Board would deny him funds if he knew there was a player out there that would help win us a title. This season just summed it up for me. We had the funds to spend and we knew the team was lacking but we still went in short when there was no need to. He chose to gamble on Sanogo, another cheap gamble from a low division. That’s the sort of thing I can’t understand and still truly believe this was the best opportunity in years to win the title. It’s not all over. We have the FA Cup and it’s winnable. But if Wenger is to stay on, he really needs to change his ways. This sort of thing drives me mental. Excuse the longwinded rant. I need to get back to work myself! But if we change things at Board level and someone more hands takes over, would that maybe push Wenger over the edge? Would he accept such a change because he always says he likes the set up here and working without interference. You see his reaction to outside criticism from ‘experts’ so it would take someone really good to get through to him. That goes back full circle to the Dein question.

[1_nilto the arsenal]

Here's my view. The manager and the players have to share the blame for our failures from going from championship contenders to 4th place pretenders. The players are simply not good enough and those players were signed by Wenger, and to be honest you dont need to spend 30 or 40 million for a striker, midfielder or defender, coz all you need is a very good scouting system and network of players and club alliances, then you can find the players that fit our business model in terms of our financial restrictions. So there you have it.

[Letters]

The players aren't good enough to win the title - although IMO add a top class striker and we'd be very close. They're good enough not to get their arses handed to them by Chelsea though and you can't completely blame Wenger for that. You can debate endlessly about tactics but off the top of my head the 2nd goal was started by Ox giving the ball away cheaply when we were breaking up field. Just generally we kept on giving the ball away and you can't just blame the manager for that.

[I am invisible]

The players aren't good enough to win the title - although IMO add a top class striker and we'd be very close....

Yeah, Liverpool are testament to that - they're still shipping in goals all over the place, but as long as they can smash in 3/4/5/6 in response at the other end then it's not proving to be much of an issue.

I suppose even we were proving the point earlier in the season when we had Ramsey fit - even having just that single runner from midfield made us look like a different animal, so you'd have to hope that a fit Ramsey and Walcott, plus a couple of quality additions to the attack over the summer would make a big difference to our results, even if we continue to go into games out with no real thought about tactics, and embarrass ourselves against our main rivals?

[Power n Glory]

The players aren't good enough to win the title - although IMO add a top class striker and we'd be very close. They're good enough not to get their arses handed to them by Chelsea though and you can't completely blame Wenger for that. You can debate endlessly about tactics but off the top of my head the 2nd goal was started by Ox giving the ball away cheaply when we were breaking up field. Just generally we kept on giving the ball away and you can't just blame the manager for that.

Ox was at fault for the 1st goal. But he’s spent the majority of his Arsenal career on the wings. There is always that possibility that he’d take more risks in areas he shouldn’t. Wenger should know that. It’s not as if we passed the ball brilliantly in our previous two games. Also, we’re up against Mourinho and he’ll always have a strong midfield core to out muscle and press us. When you take that into consideration, we shouldn’t have committed so many men forward. It left us open to a counter.

Cazorla was at fault for the 2nd and 3rd. But they’re all preventable when you consider the fact we lost the ball high up the pitch. We shouldn’t have been so gung-ho. Even against Swansea when we were 2-1 up, Wenger said we should have committed more men forwards to stop them from scoring. I think it leaves the players confused and since he doesn’t give instructions some of the players might not be on the same wavelength. We've had this sort of problem with several different teams since Mourinho's first arrival.

[Dein-machine]

The players aren't good enough to win the title - although IMO add a top class striker and we'd be very close. They're good enough not to get their arses handed to them by Chelsea though and you can't completely blame Wenger for that. You can debate endlessly about tactics but off the top of my head the 2nd goal was started by Ox giving the ball away cheaply when we were breaking up field. Just generally we kept on giving the ball away and you can't just blame the manager for that.

The players aren't good enough to win the league - agreed
Add a top class striker - agreed.

Therefore wouldn't you like a manager who sees the need to have both of the above in place during a decade of mediocricy.

If Rodgers played Sturridge or Sterling in CM, if Maureen played Hazard in CM or Pelegrini played Navaz or Nasri CM - they would also give the ball away in dangerous positions. Our problem is that those managers use players to their strengths. Ox does not posses the greatest footballing brain nor the best passing ability. He has pace, can score goals & will scare defences backwards. That is where he should be used but unfortunately Wumger has made his mind up & we all know what happens after that.

[LDG]

The players aren't good enough to win the league - agreed
Add a top class striker - agreed.

Therefore wouldn't you like a manager who sees the need to have both of the above in place during a decade of mediocricy.

If Rodgers played Sturridge or Sterling in CM, if Maureen played Hazard in CM or Pelegrini played Navaz or Nasri CM - they would also give the ball away in dangerous positions. Our problem is that those managers use players to their strengths. Ox does not posses the greatest footballing brain nor the best passing ability. He has pace, can score goals & will scare defences backwards. That is where he should be used but unfortunately Wumger has made his mind up & we all know what happens after that.

Now? Yes, probably, as I'm not so sure Wenger has what it takes, purely based on his stubborn football ideals.

But this "decade of mediocrity" shit has to stop. We all agree we have made mistakes, but no other club/manager has had to steer a side through the upgrade we have had, whilst maintaining a top four position.

Seriously, I get the lack of attention to detail on the football pitch sometimes, but people forget, that without Wenger, we'd be mid-table or worse by now. Seriously.

When he does eventually go, his legacy will be immense for this club.

[Özim]

We always hear this top 4 thing, you'd think top 4 was a major trophy or something, it's almost like fans have been brainwashed by the club into thinking it really is something major you can't live without.

Pre Wenger there was no such thing as top 4, this has come in due to the CL and let's be honest that's a joke isn't it? I don't really get the appeal of top 4, sure we get into the CL, so what is it really enjoyable getting knocked out in the last 16 every season, really?

Why should 4 teams from one league get into Europe's premier competition, there's only one reason, money. The top clubs have conspired between themselves to make sure they can all get a big slice of the cake, that's all it is.

If you're interested in money they yes top 4 is great, otherwise it's kinda pointless, especially for us who never really give it a good go at winning the CL. As for signing top players, we've been in the CL for years but how many have we really signed, as has been mentioned there are plenty of players for everyone it's a case of finding them, top 4 is only really worth something if you're willing to compete for the major trophies, if not you may as well come 7th and save your efforts for the league and actually earn you're right to be in the CL.

I would love nothing more than UEFA taking away CL places for the 3rd and 4th placed teams, it will never happen of course but if it did all this talk of top 4 would disappear and you'd actually have to have a genuine shot at the title to get in.