I'm amazed at the attitude of the Arsenal fans on here towards Wenger. I can understand it's been frustrating not to have won a trophy since 2005. But, your team play great football and are never boring to watch. You're always competing for trophies and have the potential to win any competition, you have some fantastic young players, financially stable, huge games every season against the likes of Barcelona. You have Wenger to thank for all of this. Maybe you should look at what's happened at Liverpool recently. Under Benitez they were in a similar sort of situation to you - Competing for the Premier League but always falling short. Lots of fans wanted him to be sacked and guess what that has resulted in now, Liverpool not being able to make into the Champions league. A lot of fans would gladly trade places with you lot, and be chuffed to bits with the season you're having. Be grateful for what you've got!
The reason that we are showing less faith in Wenger (that does not mean all of us want him sacked, only a small amount do) is that we have hit a barrier and in 6 years we are no closer to overcoming it than we were at the start. Nobody wants to continue this state of limbo for a lot longer so obviously blame will be apportioned, and as Wenger is the only real constant in that period of time naturally he must take responsibility for it. We are all grateful for what he has done for us which is one of the reasons (the amount of money he creates for the board being the other) why he has been given more time than usual for a coach who has not showed signs of making progress with the team. However there will be a point where enough is enough, for me that is when his contract runs out, for others it is now. No person should be above judgement at a club.
I get why some may have lost some faith in Wenger, personaly think it would be a mistake to sack him but he has won nothing in 6 years, doesn't spend much of the profit the club makes. Kind of insulting to Arsenal fans they create the profit and the board members pocket it without finicially backing the team. Not saying they should start paying 50 mil for players like Chels but surely Arsenal fans expect some kind of investment in players.
A new #2 with the balls to speak up would be my choice of action with regards the club management. Pat Rice, lovely bloke and all that, but he seems like a bit of a yes man. Wenger needs someone to challenge him & offer alternative opinions from time to time.
How can you say what Pat Rice does? Just because it is never highlighted does not mean he doesn't do anything.
The reason Rafa Benitez was sacked was that Liverpool finished 7th and the quality of their squad severely deteriorated. Wenger has done a good job to get Arsenal into a financially stable position, however the job of a football manager is to improve their squad and for a club of Arsenal's size and stature to go 6 years without a trophy is pretty poor.
I'm speculating. Pretty much what 99.9% of the comments made on such a forum do. In fact most of your post (#3) where you claimed to be speaking for us Arsenal fans could have only been speculation, unless you have spoken to us all, which I know you haven't!
Interesting comments from Wenger on the subject: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/teams/a/arsenal/9452017.stm He does make a good point - would you rather be in the Champions League every season, or winning the odd trophy but not guaranteed European football. In other words, over the past six years, would you rather be Arsenal or Spurs / Liverpool? And ultimately, apart from United in 2009 and Chelsea in 2010, the only teams to have won the FA Cup or CC over the past six years have been focused on it as the rest of their season has pretty much been a flop. Imo the only thing wrong with Arsenal and Wenger's management atm is that there's no point putting ã120 million in the bank if the squad still needs strengthening. But then that point could well have been made about United had we been drawn against Barca in the CL or had a couple of results not gone our way in the league and FA Cup.
...and I'm sure he contributes elsewhere, but I don't see him challenging Arsene during a match when perhaps it might be needed. If AW has one fault it has to be his apparent dogmatism during any given match. He seems to set his stall out at the start of a game and is often too stubborn to deviate when his tactics are clearly failing at times. Someone needs to bend his ear during the 90 minutes...imo.
sirtfireball Just to clarify I am not saying you are wrong, I just genuinely don't know if Pat is doing a good or bad job. Swarbs When Wenger is talking about the champions league being better to get in to than the cups I think that is a con. He is putting us in a situation where its either one or the other when its not like that at all. Although consistently getting in to the champions league with a team built with less money than tottenham's is a notable achievement, a club of our stature should be aiming higher than that. I know Wenger needs to defend the team but he should know this, we HAVE been patient with him and not all of us are reactionary dickheads who have unrealistic solutions to our problems.
I agree it shouldn't have to be an either / or thing, and you should be aiming higher than that. But only United and Chelsea have achieved more than you over the past six years, and mainly because United have greater stature and will to win and Chelsea have far greater financial resources. Ultimately, I think if you want to win things you will have to compromise on one of your principles - either focus on more effective and direct attacking play, or be more willing to spend more on established players and not rely on youth so much. What would you do in Wenger's position?
I suppose the bottom line is that we pay to watch Arsenal tens of times a season and not just in cup finals. I would rather see them play 30+ great games and not win silver as opposed to say Tottingham, where they might win a crap cup once in a blue moon and play **** all the time. Of course I would rather have the Mancs success, but achieved with our style and panache rather than their overt gamesmanship.
I'd chose to spend money if I was Wenger, he could still say that the youth experiment was at least partly successful as they allowed us to stay in the top 4 without much money. As long as the money we spend is within our means then I have no problem with using it.
I agree - if you could do what United do and mix young players and home grown talent with established stars you'd still have the moral high ground over 90% of the PL. And the bulging trophy cabinet to go with it.
Sounds nice but I try to stay clear of all the 'if we did X then we would be amazing' talk, especially when we are so far away from it. You go down that road then you end up like KingPepeReina
I don't believe that Wenger is settling for second best. He genuinely believes that the squad is good enough at the start of each season to win the league. The problem is that the emerging pattern is that whilst we are good enough to beat anyone (Barca) we don't have what it takes to sustain the challenge and that means buying more players. Chelsea do it, Utd do it, Spurs try to do it. Arsenal rely on almost blind faith.
