It is quite simple – what we should all do is turn up at the game against Fenerbahce and support the team as much as we would if we were in the middle of the Unbeaten Season.
That is what support means, and for anyone who thinks it is clever or good to start moaning at the team, or booing if things don’t go well on Wednesday night, then the one thing that person is not, is an Arsenal fan.
Maybe its the fact that I started supporting Arsenal in 1956 when Tottenham were not a fantasy outfit but were actually top of the league and playing much the better football. I had to live with years of no championships and no cups. Later there were the long boring years of Mersey domination and I had to put up with that.
But I still supported the team, whoever the manager put out.
We have no absolute right to win things. Of course different decisions could have meant different results, and we are living through one of those rare spells where the Lord Wenger looks like he is getting it wrong.
But reading some of the blogs it looks to me as if the writers have forgotten that our manager was sacked by Monaco for not being consistent enough, just as they are forgetting those 3 years when we came second to Manchester Bankrupt year on year and there looked to be no way through.
Wenger is a genius, but he does not deliver the championship year after year. If that is what you want, go to Scotland and support Celtic, and then when they slip for a while, move across to Rangers.
For Arsenal fans this is a frustrating and tough time – losing to Stoke, Fulham and Hull, but there is only one response for us, and that is to support the team even more. To be there on Wednesday and again on Saturday, and to keep on and on supporting the club, knowing that it will come right.
As I have said so often, if you were not at the match before the start of the 49 unbeaten run, you don’t know what depression about Arsenal is all about. It was awful. The feeling for that first game of the 49 – the home victory against Southampton – was so bad that on the walk up to Highbury from Finsbury Park you could buy best seat tickets from the touts for £20 – and even then they couldn’t sell them.
Of course the players have a duty to us, because we pay their wages. But because we have chosen to give our lifetime support to Arsenal, we have a duty to the club, and that is to be there, and to give the players that the manager chooses to send out, our total and unconditional support.
That is what it means to be part of Arsenal. Unconditional support. Nothing less.
I feel your passion but I can’t share your conclusion. I love the Arsenal and think Wenger is a genius, but even a schoolboy knew he had gotten it wrong before the season began with a stubborn, miserly refusal to add the players we so desperately needed. This team has no defensive midfielder, no central defensive partnership that can work, no ability to defend set pieces, be they corners or throw-ins.
The formula to trouble Arsenal is simple. You can simply bypass our midfield., get the ball into our third and then trouble our backline. (Our midfield is completely lopsided. Fab is a playmaker not a defender. Denilson, while effective going forward, is a poor man’s Fab and does not give our wonderboy space to operate and therefore cannot partner with him. Song and Eboue are not and never will be Arsenal quality, and simply can’t defend. Nasri is fine, but also can barely put in a tackle.)
At back, I rate Clichy (though he has demonstrated he is prone to the occasional monstrous gaffe, and not just against Spurs) and Sagna. Toure and Gallas are too similar as defenders. Toure has lost a step, and Gallas has no ability whatsoever to lead from the back.
What we need is what we needed at the beginning of the season. A big, strong tough central defender in the mold of a Vidic, a Ferdinand or a Terry. A Viera-lie destroyer in our midfield who can grab the game by the scruff of its neck and put in hard tackles. (We miss Flamini!) And a world-class keeper. Almunia has had some decent games, but he is not world class, and this team will never win anything with him. Mark my words. Bentley’s 40 yarder was clever, but no way does a vigilant keeper who is on his line get caught out. The second Spurs’ goal was worse — you can’t spill a shot lot like that.
This team has no spine, it is easily rattled, its fightback is insufficient, and it doesn’t weather adversity well.
And much as I love Wenger, I put it down to his arrogant and stubborn refusal to splash cash like the other top three teams. He wants to do it his way, but in 2008, his way no longer works. Spend in the transfer window, or our beloved Gunners will miss out on the Champions League.
End of.
Please show True Arsenal fans some respect by not telling them how to best react to what they are witnessing.
Excellent reponse….you are a star, sir
Great post.
I follow your articles daily, but people usually dont comment here so I do the commenting part on ACLF. But your posts are always great, well thought out, and the hint of humour is the cherry topping. Keep up the good work. True Gooner you are.
Hear, hear.
You’re a proper fan, proper Gent, and a proper scribe.
There are so many voices online these days, but, just as when there were a lot of voices in The Blackstock of an evening, but you could tell the fans from the wannabes from a few words, it is the same with the DOOM squads.
To paraphrase DEVO; Are we not Fans? NO! We are Gooners!
So get behind the team, get with us, and STFU if you don’t get it, mayte.
OK,
a few hours ago I said to myself …”well, let’s see how the guy from ‘Untold Arsenal’ puts some lipstick on this pig.”
You actually did very well…
That’s why I love this blog.
wenger also has a duty 2 make sensible decisions & at the moment he’s not makin them! Fans also hav a duty 2 show their displeasure when they do not like what’s happening on the field!
when arsene wenger was manager of monaco marseille were found guilty of match fixing but arsene refused to take the title through default. monaco sacking arsene had murkier undertones. wenger might be making a few questionable decisions at the moment but i believe thats a result of the match fixing against arsenal last season and the match fixing in the premiership last season and this season. people will say how do i know. well i say to them do some research and things become clearer. look how the games just feel like a soap opera. look at the murky characters who run the clubs. how many billionaires would leave things to chance. there rich because they are greedy punks . there not just gonna put money into something and hope for the best. thats why they are rich. stingy ,greedy and shifty. match fixing has always known to be in the game. in many countries. so why would england be immune, especially with so much money at stake. if england was so honest there would be no prision systems ,so why do people always believe there is no corruption. these people have a sheltered vision on life . they believe everything is rosey becacause they haven’t seen negativity , only on tv so they think that it wouldnt happen in there life. well i have news there is corruption in the english league. if you question my belief go and do the research to prove what i am saying is nonsense.
I agree Tony, this is a testing time and the true supporters will rise to the occasion and the faint-hearted will go back to supporting whoever they supported before.