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Morleys Mesut Özil > You and your mum, chief 4,431 pts

What happens if we finish below Leicester & Spurs?

Posted by Morleys almost 9 years ago · 83 replies

I posted this on Reddit as a rant after the United match. Don't know how anyone can disagree:

I understood standing behind Wenger in the barren years. I was alongside everyone wondering 'imagine if Arsene had money to spend'. We've bought Alexis & Özil, won 2 FA Cup's yet there's a case to made that there has been 0 progress as we're likely to finish below Spurs & Leicester this season.

I absolutely love Arsene and all he's done for the club, but if that happens he has to leave. Resign, get sacked or whatever; it'd be a new low for our football club. If Leicester win it, it makes our transitional period look absolutely hilarious considering we had more funds then than Leicester do now and still never managed to win a single thing. Spurs winning the title would be the ultimate humiliation for Arsene, our supporters and most importantly the club. That being said, I don't believe our board cares. They'll still charge ridiculous ticket prices and not give a single fuck because they'll be too busy counting the quids and it makes me feel sick.

I honestly think Spurs will do us at WHL and put the final nail in the coffin. Leicester will get unstuck when they go to these clubs who sit back and soak pressure for 90 mins (every team will want to rain on their parade) and Spurs, credit to them being the most consistent, having the best manager & being set up wonderfully, will cruise it. Whether we're 1 point behind or 10 points behind, that would be a catastrophic failure for everyone involved in the club - except for the board of course. Wenger needs to go if that happens. I don't really understand any arguments against it. It's previously been 'who offers better that would be available' to simply 'what does Wenger offer us?'

This job is one of the most lucrative and open roles in World football. Many, many quality managers will be vying for it. We missed the boat massively with Pep, Klopp & Ancelotti. But if we finish as I think we will then we have to gamble on the next best, whether that be Simeone, Tuchel, Unai Emery or Sampaoli. It has to be done, otherwise it will definitely show that Arsene is bigger than the club, which is unacceptable behaviour.

What do you believe should happen? (FWIW, I honestly believe our board is so content with the money the club generates that they'd keep Arsene in charge no matter what. There is no possibility he gets sacked)

83 Comments

Ix Techau Evil Mastermind 14,278 pts
Posted almost 9 years ago by Ix Techau

How can you justify bigger clubs messing up, with lot more money invest, but you single out Arsenal.

Because as I said, we don't have the problems the other big clubs have. We have a manager of 20 years with 100% control of what philosophy and tactics he wants to use and 100% control of what players he can buy. He has the full backing of the board and is beloved by the supporters. He has spent years building the type of dressing room atmosphere he wants, and yet he STILL can't get his players to click or his tactics to work consistently.

Chelsea and Man Utd are failing because of reasons that don't apply to us.

I don't understand how you can still defend Wenger when he's being outclassed by not just one other mid-table team, but two. That's not a fluke. Ranieri and Pochettino have outclassed Wenger this season, and the former has only been in charge for ten months.

Wenger keeps telling us managerial stability is key: clearly it only takes a few months for Ranieri to build a Premier League-winning team. Chelsea brought in Hiddink and suddenly the team plays well again. So that argument is gone.

Wenger keeps telling us we shouldn't bring in too many players at once: Spurs and Man City are buying players as if footballers will be the only valid currency in an impending zombie apocalypse, and yet they perform fine. So that argument is gone.

Wenger tells us we're playing great football: but we're not. Passing for the sake of it is not beautiful football. Slowly looking for the perfect pass instead of thundercunting the ball into the net is not automatically beautiful football. Wenger has this perverse idea of emulating Barca but he hasn't understood WHY they have so much possession, he just thinks they pass a lot. He has missed the part about efficient high-energy pressing. So that argument is out.

Wenger keeps insisting on the exact same formation every year, regardless of opposition or scenario: this 4-2-3-1/4-2-1-3 we've been playing since 2007-2008-ish is simply not working, as evidenced by our trophy cabinet. But instead of changing it to try something new when we enter the 11th title-less year, he just keeps trying it, like a toddler trying to bang a square peg into a drawing of a round hole. One would think that if it's not working after 500 games, perhaps it's time to try something different?

Wenger keeps telling us it's glorious to be "self-sustainable": so why then does literally no other club care about it? Everyone else are spending, but Wenger keeps riding that imaginary high horse of economic integrity. Why? What does he think would happen if we splashed £150m on a few world class players? He says he wants to compete on the same level as Barca, Real and Bayern...but he's still trying to find unknown gems and gets Elneny as the only signing in a VITAL January this year.

...and so on. Everything Wenger says is either a) designed to excuse a mistake, or b) only valid in 2003 when Wenger's football philosophy was still relevant.

It's time.

VA10 Football God 4,806 pts
Posted almost 9 years ago by VA10

No he never got the final product of his project. Don't even start arguing about that... I remember him even saying if they lose Cesc and Nasri it would be unthinkable. I'll never believe he wouldn't have done more to have kept their services but he simply wasn't allowed to. Thing with Arsene is that he's not the man to come out and say stop blaming me this how things really happened. One day he'll talk/write about it all and of course you'll realize that I was right.

Ix Techau Evil Mastermind 14,278 pts
Posted almost 9 years ago by Ix Techau

No he never got the final product of his project. Don't even start arguing about that... I remember him even saying if they lose Cesc and Nasri it would be unthinkable. I'll never believe he wouldn't have done more to have kept their services but he simply wasn't allowed to. Thing with Arsene is that he's not the man to come out and say stop blaming me this how things really happened. One day he'll talk/write about it all and of course you'll realize that I was right.

So you are actually suggesting that Wenger was against the self-sustainability policy from the start and really wanted the club to go into debt so we could buy world class players from 2005 onwards. You seem to forget that Wenger has always been a wheeler dealer, trying to find unknown talent and making unexpected signings, he was doing that well before our "financial restrictions". But then by some miracle you are saying he suddenly wanted to change that approach around 2004-2005 and instead start signing £50m players. Right.

VA10 Football God 4,806 pts
Posted almost 9 years ago by VA10

We already had a huge ass debt. Quotes like "I think maintaining top 4 during the hard period is my biggest achievement" and "If you asked me to do it now I would said no" tells what his stance is on that period.

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