If you think your mate is so ****ing funny remember to ask him the next time you want a ticket for a game
To be honest I guess he is thinking bigger than that. I think he will look back on ALL his years with justified pride. Why should he blank out those 8 years? Trophies is only a part of the story. As others said he had modernised and transformed the club, and not just the club but English football as well. I think he will be tremendously proud to leave the club in a great shape. I think this leagcy is more important to Arsene than just trophies. Otherwise he would have long left Arsenal for Real or some other big trophy grabbing club.
Wenger should be and would be proud of his career at Arsenal. It's true when people say he is not just a trophy manager. He is much much more than that. This is what sets him apart from the majority of top managers around the world. I cannot think of many who would be able to be so disciplined financially in order for the club to stay financially healthy yet still compete among the money dopers. I will personally remember him as the greatest manager I have ever seen in my lifetime. Better than fergie, Jose, and any other free money spending trophy hunter. Yes those mangers have won more but few have achieved what Wenger has. When you get awarded manager of the decade then it shows how valued he is in the world of football.
He can certainly consider himself desperately unlucky in the 2007/2008 season. If things had gone even slightly differently we would have celebrated a fourth premiership title under Wenger and the likes of Flamini, Hleb, even Adebayor may have stayed on. The nucleus of players we had then would only have got better and who know what could have been achieved in the subsequent seasons? Not only would we have won a 4th title but won it without the financial doping that we have seen since the arrival of Abramovich. It would have been a glorious triumph over the money-induced injustices and cynicism that have taken over the game. However, when this failed to materialize, I think Wenger was too slow to rectify the problem. It must have been deeply frustrating to see the young and talented team he built disintegrate after that season but I think he should have replaced them with more proven quality. The acquisition of players like Denilson, Bendtner and Vela instead of the likes of Alonso et al was, in retrospect, a costly gamble considering the players we have seen leave in recent years due to lack of ambition. He was so close to masterminding a stunning victory against all odds in a different way to vulgar, obscene overspending and it is a great shame that he fell short of this goal. Hopefully the good times will return soon with the kind of serious squad investment that we saw early on in his reign.
People forget how close we have come and how well some of our teams have played. In our trophyless time we have (as well as the 07/08 league run) been to a CL final and two League Cup finals. But for the odd bit of luck or different ref decision we would have respectable amount of trophies and probably wouldn't have lost as many top players. There are fine lines in football and we have fallen just short over our trophyless period. Also even when we have fallen short (most times dropping away towards the end of the season) we have maintained CL football (and done well in the competition) whilst playing good football. It's only the last couple of seasons we have not been competing and not played such an attractive brand of football. And even then there have been highlights like the Henry return and the almost CL come-back against Milan. It's only a couple of years since we almost put Barca out of the CL (and but for the worst red card i have ever seen given in my life we would have). We are having a particularly tough patch at the moment but with the clubs finanial position i still think Wenger will add trophies before he leaves the club. He'll look back on a career with us that saw him become one of the greatest managers this country has had, having won several trophies, been our most successful manager and left behind a fantastic legacy - a club with a great stadium, top facilities, good financial position and great history which he has been a big part of. He was named Manager of the decade while with us and will look back with great pride over his whole time with the club i think.
Regarding the last half decade or so I think he'd be disappointed. If we'd won the league in 07-08 his policy would have been vindicated and if that team had stayed together then who knows..
The papers say he is on his way to Real Madrid - http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/news/premier-league-paper-round-wenger-take-joses-job-095917591.html Premier League - Paper Round: Wenger to take Jose's job
Agree with both suker_suker and afcftw. We should view his Arsenal career in its entirety, and not on his barren years. He revolutionalised English football, changed us into an exciting, continental type, successful football team. He was also behind making a new stadium, providing us with a fantastic financial footing. He was so close to making a return to the top, but they unfortunately fell short. He will go down as one of the best Premiership managers of all-time, due to what he brought to English football.
