From Norrie Hernon : Success is relative
Hi Myles,
I’ll try and fail to keep this brief.
I was embarrassed – but not surprised – by the difference in reaction from Wenger and Moyes after last Sunday’s games.
David Moyes has had no money, bought 10 players for under £6m, sold well, bought well and when ‘congratulated’ on finishing 7th – a fair position given his restrictions – rejected the assertion by stating that 7th was not a success, and finishing above Liverpool alone did not constitute success.
Translation: a proud man who never considers what he does enough, and strives for more.
Contrast with Arsene Wenger: a disastrous pre-season borne of his myopic refusal to believe the cast-iron certainty of Cesc’s and Nasri’s departures, last-minute panic buys, a catastrophic start to the season, a solid middle and – oh, how many times? – a weak and timid end. His reaction? 3rd was a success, and we’ll be even stronger once Diaby is back.
Translation: a man who has lost sight of his priorities, who is no longer able to understand or correct his and his team’s flaws, and who now settles, points-wise, for half-way between 1st and 9th and four fewer goals conceded than Aston Villa, a club that finished fifth from bottom.
I can stand not winning trophies for as long as the appetite for winning is sustained.
The abject pity of the Wenger era as it now stands (and I think we can classify 7 years as an ‘era’) is that not only have we forgotten how to win, but apparently lost the will also.
I used to believe that the team was, up until the end of last season, still only two or three players short of genuine contention.
Well, the players changed but the mentality has remained the same.
This is the damning proof that we are no longer faced with a personnel problem, but an existential and structural one: a business designed for fiscal prudence, rather than a club for sporting excellence.
And without that, what exactly is the point of this club – any club – at all?
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Thanks, Norrie.
As a club, as a team, Arsenal isn’t trying.
They built a big stadium and then gave up.
It’s the mentality of the board as well as the mentality of the players.
Many opportunities have been squandered in the last seven years because the manager didn’t equip himself to take advantage of those opportunities.
Wenger isn’t the only problem at the club but he’s the biggest negative because he’s such an intransigent old dictator.
The solution is regime change.
But even NATO couldn’t liberate London Colney from his iron grip.
He will be there for the next 16 years.
Right now, the top competition is between the richest European clubs, who have the highest overheads. The Champions League provides popular TV shows and funnels big money to the most famous clubs.
If you brought back the European Cup, where champions played each other home and away on a knock-out basis, Wenger’s Arsenal would have to aim at first, not third.
But that will never happen because the world’s greatest sport has sold its soul to television.