How can we back a board that has backed Wenger?
If Wenger had any dignity, he would have resigned after the 8-2.
Wenger gave Djourou a new contract last week. Our wage bill is £40m less than Spurs and our gates 25,000 more.
Time for a new manager .Wenger is now stale.No new ideas.
(Myles : Wenger gave Djourou a new contract?!! £ £$$$!!!????
I don’t believe that. Are you sure?)
From Scott Sheldon : MVB
Always noticed that dirty midfielder Van Bommel in previous games, it always takes a referee about 18 fouls before he is given a yellow card.
I do not recall him having to make a tackle or interception once last night.
In addtion Arsenal.com have given Rosicky the MOM.
That guy sums up the paucity of quality in our squad. The fact that Rosicky started the game is a nonsense. He offers nothing, I mean nothing at all.
From Arjun : KPB
Kevin Prince Boateng has done what he has because he has rare technique and an audacious amount of self-confidence.
Now that he is surrounded by classy players who leave space for him to run into in front of the opposing area, in a league where pressing and cutting down space is unheard of, he has the time to try all the things he believes he can do.
KPB is like David Bentley but with better skill and work ethic.
From Brendan : Theo Walcott
That side will never be right until Wenger finally admits in his head that THEO WALCOTT is not a player.
From Neil D : Still seething!!!
Do you remember the game where you gave up on Mr Wenger?
Arsenal were playing Tottenham Hotspur and were 4 – 2 ahead with two minutes to go and collapsed.
I remember looking at the team after reading your piece and I saw Clichy, Eboue, Almunia, Adebayor (sorry I nearly forgot – MIKEL SILVESTRE TOO) and I thought – “You know what – this is terrible! I have endured 3 seasons of this team being absolutely terrible.”
Wenger was making terrible decisions tactically during the match. After reading your piece I remember thinking to myself : I agree.
I also gave up on Wenger EVER winning a big trophy again.
Remember, Song came on for Nasri with two minutes to go, even though Arsenal had all the possession. The way the game was flowing, the obvious choice would have been to keep the ball as we were doing, but instead he gave the momentum to Spurs by bringing on the lump – Song!!
Instead, Wenger took off Nasri. Song came onto the pitch laughing and joking – I remember his face.
8 minutes later it was 4 – 4.
From Stuart Laws: Us
We were just not up to it. Not good enough.
Not sure how good Milan are…didn’t look good in recent games, and I thought at worst we’d get away with a 1-0 defeat!
What they are is hungry and organised. They could upset better teams in the competition.
To be that up for the Arsenal game, they couldn’t have watched us much!
Organisation though – that’s so important. Our defence are a bunch of strangers. Midfield and forward line just not at that level.
Top 16 in Europe? Barely!
But then, how do you improve it? Who can a new manager go and buy that Man City or Chelsea won’t guzump us for? Or Man U will offer success?
By buying young talent who will come because AW will give them their chance. I don’t see another way.
And I don’t see quality experienced players coming to babysit these kids. I thought Arteta might be better at this level. It’s all up to the commercial side to generate the money that players demand these days, then you can keep your Nasri’s and Van Persie’s and buy a Pires or Henry again.
From Mike Geraghty : Old, tired and clueless
I think you’ve summed it up perfectly.
The whole situation at Arsenal is old, tired and clueless… but also boring.
The same deficiencies have been there for 6-7 years.
On top of that, we’ve been selling 1 or 2 first team players, usually our better players, every year in that time.
It was inevitable that we’d morph from a top team to an utterly mediocre one with that strategy.
It’s occurred. What’s needed now is reinvestment in player personnel to the tune of 120-150 million pounds.
Could Wenger stomach that? That is the only way to persuade RVP to sign a new contract. If they sell him this summer, then a return to the top tier of European football is impossible. Change is surely afoot this summer.
Myles replies:
When an organisation, a company, a club has to make a change, a cry is heard throughout the land.
It’s a loud cry, it’s familiar, it comes from every direction.
Unfortunately, it’s the wrong cry.
It’s “Who are we gonna get?”
That’s what fans want to know.
That’s what ANR readers have been asking me for four years: Who sare we gonna get?
What they should ask first is: What are we trying to build?
Please, let’s define our objectives.
Let’s figure out the aims of Arsenal Football Club.
Then find people who can achieve those objectives.
The Arsenal board sit in the Diamond Club in an atmosphere of sedate superiority, totally removed from ordinary supporters, many of whom are more intelligent than anybody on the board.
The board’s aim for seven years has been to play Champions League football, to sit at the top table and hope to get to a quarter-final or beyond. Wenger looked to have a job for life if he finished in the top four
The Colney Creche is a bubble created by a snob, who, when he won nothing, told us that, “Third is a trophy.”
He aims low.
Arsenal aim lower every season but fans keep buying tickets, mainly for social reasons.
The players are pampered and sheltered in their creche. They only hear their track-suit messiah’s voice and most of them speak with HMV.
But they get complacent and suffer slippage. Aiming for third, they slip to fourth. Losing top talent, lacking experience, leadership and bottle, Arsenal could easily slip to fifth.
If Arsenal finish fifth, will Wenger stay?
If he does stay, will the crowd stay with him?
How will Arsenal sell boxes for the Europa League?
Sponsors can’t ask their customers if they fancy coming to watch Arsenal versus FC Honka of Finland. Companies respect their clients more than that.
Indeed, they respect their employees more than that. The Sales Director can’t say, “I’ve got a treat for you tomorrow night, lads. We’re going to see Arsenal against Flamurtari of Albania !”
I’m not gonna talk about Milan tonight but I did wonder: Does Allegri speak English? Very good coach who’s turned the team around.
I heard yesterday that Milan’s wage bill is a third less than Arsenal’s. Could that be true?
Arsenal mainly exists to pump multi-millions of your pounds into French pockets.
It’s a selling club, it’s the West Ham of the Champions League, and it’s an entirely typical scam by Wenger to bring back Thierry Henry, who can’t run any more, for a six-week loan on obcene wages.
And it’s entirely typical of Thierry Henry to walk off the pitch with Ibrahimovic, laughing. Just as he once walked off at West Ham laughing with Teddy Sheringham, arm in arm.
Wenger says Henry has given the training ground a boost, and lifted the dressing room, as he is such a big character. We’ll never know if that’s true and I don’t trust anything this manager says.
But if it’s true, it’s also true that Thierry Henry caught a plane back to New York on Thursday.
If he was such a big influence, Henry will be missed.
So Henry’s absence is the equivalent of another 4-0 defeat, coming the day after Arsenal failed to turn up in the San Siro.
The score was Milan 4 Wenger 0.
That massacre was entirely his result. That scoreline belongs to him and will belong to him for the next 100 years, or for as long as football results are recorded and remembered.
Milan 4 Wenger 0.