Is Wenger really scared Arsenal won’t challenge Man Utd?

Well you kind of knew that it would not take long for the Arsenal manager and his long term rival Jose Mourinho to get back to their old trick of aiming verbal bullets at each other and that is what has happened before the new Premier League season has even started.

Arsene Wenger had a little comment about the crazy money that Manchester United spent on Paul Pogba, Jose hit back by saying it was unethical for other managers to discuss United’s business and it is all bubbling up under the surface ready to pop.

Now all the talk is about which team will triumph this time Mourinho has had another swipe at Wenger and the other rival managers by claiming that playing down talk of the title is really just down to being scared to admit their ambition, The Mirror reports, with the suggestion being that everyone is worried that United will be too strong.

He said, “At Man United Football Club you cannot say differently, we have to fight for the title. Many more think the same way as us but they are afraid to say it.

“They prefer to play a defensive game in words. They prefer to say or to hide or to play defensively with the words, that’s not our way. I don’t think that’s Man United.

“I think Man United has to say we want to win the title. We feel that we are candidates to win the title.

“We have all the respect for the others and maybe we don’t win, maybe we arrive end of season and happy to finish top four. It depends on how season goes. But in this moment when I speak to you I speak to my players too, and I cannot speak differently.”

As usual with the mouthy one he seems to have conveniently forgotten that it was a comment very much like it from Wenger two years ago that set him off on the infamous rant about being a specialist in failure. So is this just more typical rubbish from Mourinho or does he have a point?

Wenger is already playing down our chances so is he afraid or is he just playing it cool?

Bob.

Tags Mourinho

21 Comments

  1. I don’t know who will win the league but I think Manchester United and Man city are favourite. Then Liverpool and Chelsea can be right there if managed properly as no European football for them this season..

    I would have mentioned Arsenal if we got a striker and CB but I think we will be up there. Top 4 as usual. Sigh.

    Predicting games this season will be difficult… Every game is like a cup final. There are no easy games in the league..

  2. LC looses already, Vardy & Mahrez on the phone… get me outta here! My fear is pep & jose go back to their rivalry from madrid/barca days, win at all costs, money is splashed like crazy in manchester, we are left in the dust. jose and pep will not only spend huge, they will attract players and recruit from arsenal… wenger needed to make a major signing for many reasons, but one is to let his players know we are intent on winning.

  3. The thing is with Mourinho at Utd and Guardiola at City most people expect one of them to be crowned champions at the end. Most don’t even take Arsenal seriously. Couldn’t care less about either of them to be honest, I just hope Wenger gets it right finally…

    1. why would we be taken seriously? we bottled the league several times when the big teams were in transition.
      now when they have superior managers an superior players, we should be taken as contenders?

      1. Of course we are not taken seriously, we are a joke. If the Premier League would be a Presidential Election, we would be the Kanye West of that race.

      2. Damn! All this negativity and we haven’t even kicked a ball yet, this season. Keep up the support. (Sarcasm)

        1. chill winston.

          still supporting, still willing us to win every game,
          u may not like your mum, but if she falls over…do you not help her up?

          being realistic is not a crime, hope we do well

          1. Muff it hurts but its true. Don’t know what it will take for us to be top of this league. the way it is going I am not too sure people like Sanchez, ozil and Bellerin will be hanging around waiting for the title to come to us. If we don’t win the epl this year, it may be the last season we will see them in an arsenal shirt!

  4. Wenger is only scared of two things!
    And that’s Retiring and Spending Money.

    As for Mo, it’s funny how quickly he has forgotten about his performance, last year! ?

  5. I bet you Joe Hart never thought he would be back up at City. How quickly life can change for players under a new manager.

    I got more excitement watching Hull than watching City right now.

  6. Imagine if we did sign Mahrez this week and played him against Leciester and he scores or assists.

  7. I don’t see why Wenger should be afraid. At this point we have just as good a chance of winning the title as Man U since neither have kicked a ball yet. Yes they have Pogba and their other new signings but who’s to say they won’t suffer key injuries during the course of the campaign. Arsenal are use to loosing key players to injury for most of the season which seems to be why we still manage to finish top 4 regardless. When other top teams like Man City loose key players they finish significantly lower or crash out of the top 4 all together. We finished 2nd last season with key players injured, now we have 2 quality goalkeepers, if we sign Mustafi to partner Koscielny we will have a good defence, we have an improved mid field which has depth and many options, we have the ability to create chances, we get the finishing sorted out and we would be the biggest threat in the league.

    1. When you talk about injuries you sure haven’t accounted for injuries to Ozil, Sanchez and Giroud; any of that happens we are out of top 4 let me guarantee.

      Wenger knows that and he still doesn’t buy makes me go nuts. Why we spent 35 M on Xhaka I will never understand- we needed mid field backups and not a first team player this season worth that much money.

      We could have gone for Williams but instead we are looking at Mathew- our transfering dealings have to be one of the worst if not the worst!

      Where was Atheletico before Simeone came along. It is said Atheletico is a selling club; how have they turned around the club now? We all respect wenger but this time he has taken it too far !

      what we needed was a world class striker and we again end up with nothing ! Nothing is going to happen in the winter and we will again be scraping for 4th by the end of April.

  8. Whether Wenger is scare or not, I don’t know. But I do know that Wenger for years has failed in coming forward setting the title as a specific goal and an action plan to reach that goal. Last season we were second, and you would normally expect a manager look closely at exactly what is needed to move up to first. Instead we now start the season with other teams seemingly much better prepared than us.
    It’s scandalous…

    1. Anders, the aims of the club are set by the Board/kroenke but it is not clear to us fans what those aims are, we get vague statements but nothing specific.

      Many think it is the top four business model ie minimum spend to achieve top four, occasional domestic cup and last 16 CL.

      If that is the case then the bosrd will not want to admit that we are not aiming to win the PL, hence the vague statements,

  9. It’s not about being scared , it’s about admitting your own flaws. Jose mou may be irritating but he does his job effectively. I find no jibe at wenger. He has not taliked about arsenal fc or wenger, maybe made some suggestive remarks towards wenger but wenger has already mentioned pogba, talked about zlatan, now talking about Manchester United.

    1. Mou wins titles and we don’t- that is all that matters; it’s good to have a philosophy but it can never be an excuse for not winning. All these years we spoke about how we were debt ridden and could not compete financially- so what’s stopping us now? the inflated transfer market is blamed for our failings but that is not entirely true.

      Couple of things to ponder

      1- No academy player apart from Bellerin has made it in the last few years (Iwobi hasn’t played a full season yet)

      2- Where are the academy strikers and CBs ? If Apkom is the best we have got then there is something seriously wrong in the set up!

      3: Scouting: what is our scouting doing? Ok we cannot spend big- but then how did we miss out on Vardy and Mahrez and all other cheap players who have gone onto become stars now? We choose not to bid for Griezmann when he moved for 35M? Why? We cannot be failing in both directions and that is exactly what is happening now.

      4: Wages: compare the wages of arsenal and we are probably amongst the top 4/5 in PL- why? This obv means a lot of avg players are on high wages – if we can free up those wages will it not empower us to spend on transfers? Players like the ox should be on more than 30-40 K; he has literally done nothing! same for wilshere- he should be paid by appearance! we are doing him a favor by having him in the club!

      5. Even with the existing players, we have passed on/missed opportunities to be champions more than once. When the chips are down and we need to show steel the players seem to give up!! what does this tell us about wenger? the athletico players play like they are going to war!!! why do we not have the same spirit?

      All these point to the fact the establishment as a whole has stagnated and there is no fresh outlook on things because wenger isn’t and cannot be challenged! Simply spending money on transfers is not the solution- our problems run much deeper than that.

      And I think wenger moving on is what will change things and bring in a fresh perspective. Like many pundits say – yes we may not end up “FOURTH” but there is an equal chance that we move towards the top and a chance that we drop out of top 4.

      Whatever happens I will at least be happy that we are showing intent! right now the status quo is like death! Right now you can write the script of Arsenal’s season and bet your life against it and can still win !

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