‘Change before you have to’, said Jack Welch; Antonio Conte did, Arsene Wenger, once again, did not.
It didn’t matter that the Frenchman was high up there in the stands. It didn’t matter that he couldn’t stand on the touchline and bark instructions at the team trying to correct all the wrongs they did against Chelsea.
None of it mattered. Having won against the Blues in their first encounter earlier in the season, the Gunners learned nothing from the way Chelsea changed following that result. And that all boils down to Arsene Wenger.
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As big a fan I am of his, I think it’s time he left the club. A whole faction of Arsenal fans aren’t quite as upset losing to Chelsea – or Watford, or any other team for that matter – they’re upset because we’re losing those games with Arsene at the helm.
For someone who won the double in his debut season, raised some of the best footballers the Premier League has ever seen, assembled the Invincibles and has dominated in the FA Cup, the very sight of always having to witness him witness losses is painful.
He revolutionised the English game but that very game has raced him by since.
There’s no more room for a perfectionist in this league. Pep Guardiola is learning that the hard way; and for all the praise Antonio Conte gets, his system is ever so successful because of N’Golo Kante.
Wenger believes that football has to be played pure. It has to involve players ‘playing’ with the ball, moving it, making space, and genuinely humiliating defences by doing so.
And while that does work often for the Gunners, it isn’t the system that works against good players and teams anymore. There was a time and an age for that kind of football and it has passed; Barcelona can vouch for that.
Today’s game seems to be all about energy, twice the adrenaline, masculinity, and power. Arsenal are none of those.
And that’s why Arsene Wenger must go. At the end of the current season, with the hopes of UEFA Champions League football, he should throw in the towel and walk. Either up or out.
He can walk with his head held high for he’s still the most successful manager the club – one of the biggest ones in the world – has ever had.
A statue of him shall be commissioned. And despite all the hatred he gets from a section of the fans, the unveiling will be attended by thousands of them all clapping and cheering; acknowledging everything he’s done for them.
Herbert Chapman will look down proud and satisfied for there hadn’t been anyone since who replicated his love for the club from the chair.
The path ahead
The team boasts of one of the best squads in both England and in Europe, they have great strength in depth, a variety of footballers capable of playing a plethora of positions.
The thing the club need the most from a new manager is change. They seem to have gotten comfortable – not the most positive kind – with the way they’ve been playing over the years and it’s bleeding on to the pitch.
Chelsea needed change, Liverpool needed change, Tottenham Hotspur needed change and it worked for all of them. Working, in fact. They’re the sides who will likely knock Arsenal off their coveted fourth-placed trophy this season.
And as a club that took strides to be ahead of their opposition, Arsenal have fallen well behind despite their influx of money and stars.
A manager in the ilk of Diego Simeone or Jorge Sampaoli would be the ideal replacements the club ought to look at. And while they teased all of us by talking to Ralph Hasenhuttl, the Austrian doesn’t quite strike me as a manager who could bring about said change.
We need a manager at Arsenal to do what Arsene Wenger did to Arsenal when he arrived back in 1996. Someone who’ll fundamentally change everything about the club and instil a new identity; someone proven who’ll come in demand things be done his way or face an exit; someone that archaically ruthless.
For that’s the only way this club will move ahead.
No more ‘nice guys’, ‘soft guys’, ‘pushovers’, it’s time Arsenal stood up on their feet and fought back.
The club is an icon and a global superpower but still play like someone who’s ready to give up the moment they’re pushed a little.
That’s unacceptable. Whatever happened to us being called the ‘comeback kings’? That’s the kind of ruthless, strong unit they need to become and they’ll only be able to that if things change at the top.
As an Arsenal fan who still loves and admires Arsene Wenger, I’ve had enough of seeing him and his side wilt.
