Whether you believe him or not is another matter, but Arsene Wenger has declared himself pretty happy with the transfer business done by Arsenal this summer, despite missing out on the France international pair of Kylian Mbappe and Thomas Lemar from AS Monaco and failing to persuade the England international star Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain to sign a new contract and having to sell him to Liverpool.
The boss has actually done more business through the exit door at the Emirates stadium than he has bringing in new players, but according to a BBC report that was part of the plan all along. We know and Wenger even spoke about the squad being too big. It was a drain on the wage structure and quite a few of the players in it, like Kieran Gibbs, Carl Jenkinson, Joel Campbell and Lucas Perez were not likely to play much.
So will this trimmed down squad actually be better for Wenger and Arsenal? Time will tell, of course, but it just might work out that way. The last two clubs to win the Premier League, Chelsea and Leicester, did so using the same core players for most of the games and it produced a team spirit and understanding.
They had no European football whatsoever but we can afford to play a second string side in the Europa League and focus on the EPL games, at least until the latter stages if we get there. There is always a worry with Arsenal about injury problems seeing us lose key players and we have to hope that this year proves a bit kinder to us on that front.
If it does, though, do you think that the leaner and less bloated Arsenal squad may actually do better?
Bob.
Better for the AFC owners bank balance..
Aside from that I see no benefit. Quality is still relatively low and we aren’t Leicester.
Yes, it is better for Kroenke’s pocket. There is no way Arsenal can pull off a Leicester, unless Wenger implements a total pragmatic football system ala Mourinho and Ranieri.
It was an accident, and our board mean to tell us, that we can win the epl only by chance, and not by ability. Very depressing
Please define your new and often repeated word ‘pragmatic’, as it applies to a football system. Please be as specific as possible e.g. zonal or man marking? 4-3-3, 4-4-2, 3-4-3? etc. etc. So far as I can see it means absolutely nothing – just a fancy word which means nothing to toss in on most of your comments. Will be pleased to learn otherwise. Thank you.
Do you believe it is a good idea or positive to have players with little to no chance hanging around the club. Is it a good idea a to pay a player a wage to have them sitting around doing nothing?
Or is is sensible to move them on, cut your expenses and potentially give others a chance to build a career?
We do not need a large squad, we need a quality squad and a new Manager. Until we get someone who will not use favoritism and sentiments to choose match day teams in addition to his wrong tactics and lack of motivation, we will not win anything major. Arsene has proven over time that he can not steer the team to success in the League and Europe. Doing well over a season is a problem. God will help us
I defer to this clubs injury records and let history speak for itself.
Admin what the F is the pizza advert all accross the screen get it sorted
As an arsenal fan i want things to get better especially on the field but my fear is arsenal that won’t happen any time from now. I personally believe there are some people working against arsenal and are using fans to do their biddings. Comparing our situation with Liverpool and Spurs, I can’t understand why we get all the negativity: Liverpool ; League tittle 18, the last one was won in 1990. That was 27 years ago. How often do we hear their fans, pundit, ex players and media castigating the club, calling her a failure after putting so much money in players recruitment and employed new coaches and the major trophies thing. Have we ever seen their ex players doing and saying as much as ours do to bring the club down. People like Merson, Wright and Henry to some extent have nothing good to say about the club they are an ambassador of. Some might say they care and want the best for the club but I’m struggling to see how they will achieve that with the kind of services they are giving to the club they once play for. Back to Liverpool, they won 7 fa cups with the last one been won in 2006,13 years ago the last time arsenal won EPL. That was also the last time they won a community shield. The only domestic cup they won recently (league cup2012) was 5 years ago. Spurs: Is there anything good to admire about spurs? Let us see. The last time spurs won a trophy recently was in 2008 ( league cup). There last fa cup was in 1991 and English league was in 1961. I’m not bringing this up so that we can feel good about the situation but to point out there is an agenda somewhere. There is a situation at our club that need fixing if we don’t want have Liverpool( a bigger club than ours in terms of EPL) situation at our hand but at the same time i don’t think arsenal deserves all these negative sh**t because we have not won epl in 13 years. I will take all the crisis talk and negativity if the same is said about Liverpool and spurs. Arsenal has out performed these two clubs but yet we are the one in crisis. If we don’t reorientate ourselves, put things into perspective , stop listening those nitwit called pundits and ex players and use more of our own brain than mind this club will continue to suffer and we ourself to blame for it.
only losers compare them self to losers. The diff between us and them is that, they try and fail, where we dont try and fail.
I say start listening to everyone who is not linked to Arsenal, bec its there where you will get your honest opninions and the harsh truths
many fans like my mate abowe like to live in a bubble ( save zone) where everything can be alright, as long as you change your perspective into something more fitting, like mehh, there are always teams who are worse, rather then thinking, there are to many teams who are better then us, and i want to be there where they are and even beat them
Loser mentality, and Winning mentality
Well said KS – to many “supporters” always comparing themselves with the loosers instead of aspiring to be like the winners.
That is exactly my point. Why are Liverpool and Spurs treated differently since they are loser like arsenal Have you thought about that. I’m not someone who wave away people’s opinion and idea because what i see as completely wrong others see as completely right. We need to step in each others shoe to see things differently. I don’t need to listen to anyone to see the state of things at arsenal because i have eyes and i can see. Maybe we need to see these other losers to win 3 fa cups and community shield in 4 years to see what those you listen to say about them. Is there really and thing like winner and loser mentality in sport? When a team or a person with loser mentality defeat the one with winning Mentality what do we call that. Except you want to tell me it is not possible.
We moved to the emirates to prove a point, that we can do better, and not limit our selfs with cups, even teams likes wigan and biringham can win in a competition with a handfull of few games
“Is there really and thing like winner and loser mentality in sport?” Yes mate there is
Winning mentality; expect to win, bothered with losing
Loser mentality; expect to try, not bothered abouting losing
my english skills are garbage XD
Mobella, You appear as if you are happy to be among the also rans. If you are, as it seems happy with a few recent FA cups (two of them won against pathetic opponents, and against Hull, only the bad ref decision for our equaliser saved us from a 2-1 defeat). Who cares, except you , about Spuds and Liverpool. We should be trying to beat the recent times Premier champions, not teams that last won it when dinosaurs roamed the earth. Get real and recognise the reality, which is that Arsenal are in disarray, thanks to Wenger, Kroenke and Gazidis and help us fight to rid our club of them
the problem does not lie with how long since we won the epl but when we last realistically competed till the end. Say what u want about spurs they have challenged for the title for the last season. WE ARE FREAKING ARSENAL, at the very very least we should be level with tottenham.
Last time was 2007-08 i think when we finished with 83 pts, this is what fans want to be challenging. we are’nt man u fans we don’t expect to win every season but we must challenge. since 2007-08 teams with at-least 80 pts
Man u – 5
Man c – 2
Chel – 5
Liv – 2
Tott – 1
Ars – 0
And what has your whining done about that?
And what has your deluded defense of this pathetic management done about arsenal state?
The thing is we are talking about arsenal because we are fans of this club, NOT LIVERPOOL, TOTTENHAM OR ANY OTHER. Our goal is to always win everything(fans), but the people running the club have different goals.
I do agree that the past players have slaughtered arsenal name, but i think they have earn the right to do so, especially if arsenal was at the top when they were there, it is obvious that some of the comments are down to get ratings from the public, but in truth most of the comments made are the truth. The Media constantly picks on arsenal because we continue have the same issues each year more so than any other team. While other teams address the issues directly we do experiments until we come up with a plausible solution.
These are just some of the things that piss us off as fans and allows negativity to build without addressing issues that holds back the club, statements that were put out to the public, never seems to calm us the fans down , but continues to irritate our nerves
Arsenal is a dead horse. Treat it like it, and who knwos you might get surprised for the better in the future
What Arsenal need is a new beginning, no fixing, but a new start, and you cant do this with the ones who are at fault for our demise
The mans preparing for the injury excuse again for not winning the league this season. Notice last season there wasn’t any big injuries that ruined title challenge, instead he used his ‘uncertainty over future’ as a different reason why they didn’t win.
I have a strong feeling he’ll be soon sacked. Players were obviously sabotaging him for playing the wrongest possible squad. And they’ll keep on doing that until he changes or leaves. And the latter seems more possible to be honest.
Oh how I wish I shared your optimism. If you are correct, I will be celebrating! Thanks for the good times AW and good luck, but it clearly hasn’t been working for years and we need something else badly. On a team with real ambitious and management with some commitment and balls, yeah he could well be out. I just don’t see it soon unfortunately. If protests are systematic, well-organized, and get media attention and the greedy bosses start worrying about their cash flow, then maybe. We could really use an angel investor who wants the team to compete for titles to throw so much money out there that Stan and co. actually sell. Like crazy silly money, because otherwise they’ll keep milking it and refuse to sell.
Arsenal are better off without Wenger, simple as.
With kroenke we’ll never win the league, unless an odd Blackburn-Leicesteresque comes around again, and that’s understandable. We are a feeder club for the rest of kroenke’s financial endeavours, we should know that full well by now. BUT, a decent manager would at least keep us in an odd title battle from time to time, or at least earn us around 80 points on occasion. Not to mention that good managers attract good players even into a not really title winning club like Arsenal. Wenger is obviously not fit to run a football club anymore, and players know that the best. Why would they put out a display like the game against Liverpool? I’m pretty sure the players are sick of Wenger playing them out of position and trying dubious combinations that will never work, just so he can once again call himself a footballing genius. They’re doing a Leicester from 2016/17.
I’d like to see his back around January, ideally sooner than that, but January would do too.
Like good old Claude once said: “It’s time to go”.
satanK, Actually you will find the wise and realistic Claude and almost all on Arsenal Fan TV -not the deluded Ty- have wanted Wenger gone for ages. These wise home and away diehard fans will be at the forefront of the Wenger out campaign and they need all our help too. After starting in 1958, I stopped going a year ago, not able to stomach the clubs lies and deceptions a day longer. When the cancer is gone , I will start going again but no way on Gods earth, UNTIL THEN. This deeply dishonest club will not get a single more penny of my hard earned money til we have some honourable people back in charge again; the last such an one being David Dein, forced out in 2007, in a black and catastrophic day for Arsenal Self Destruct Football Club.
I think Arsenal are better without Wenger than a smaller squad. In modern football a good squad is needed, but Wenger holds our squad back. I would feel so happy without Wenger.
with 2 new additions to the side of course AW sees there’s no merit declaring himself unhappy with the transfer business done this summer, clearly to say otherwise would be counter-productive.
As far as a report that his plan all along was to effectively trim the squad. Bull****. he knew fans were waiting in anticipation of several new players before he spun us this latest yarn. even former players were lauding lemar not only fans.
If the squad is such a drain on the wage structure and quite a few of the players in it, then Q who endorsed that situation in the first place, who is responsible for adding players but the SWAG; stan/weng/& Gaz
if our league position doesn’t improve we’ll have no option than to call relegation escape master “sam” out from retirement. anyway you care to look at arsenal mis-management we going to need big changes.
The subject of the post was asking the question of the size of the squad. With few exception the replays to this seem to be concentrated around any subject apart from the topic raised. Yes we get it that Wenger looks like he may have lost the plot and Stan is bumming the club for profit, notthe topic raised in the post though. Getting bored of the constant same topics slightl reworded day in day out.
Surely it’s better to discuss other topics related to the club we love.
So yes, we wanted the deadwood and fringe-players gone and some have been removed so to keep this on topic yes the squad is better off without the players with little to no chance of playing.
If we didn’t reduce the size of the squad the club Wenger/Stan would be criticised for not moving them on, but due to the amount of ill feeling this is being touted as saving money in wages (which of course it does).
So did you want the deadwood gone or still hangin around, you can’t have it both way.
We are now in an era where you need to say some negative S** t about arsenal before you can be listened to, see as an intelligent and even get a good job. It is a case of you are damn if you do and you don’t with arsenal. People constantly here for years putting a ridiculous price tag on Gibbs and when he was sold for ” ridiculous ” price yet they complain.
bruva, All most people want is to get rid of Wenger, Kroenke, Gazidis. Compared to that matter nothing else is even close, in importance. DISCUSS WHAT MATTERS AND FORGET ALL THE PADDING ON OTHER LESS MIMPORTANT MATTERS. Even if you don’t , most others will, since we care about the club surviving the cancer slowly killing it. We must cut out that cancer before worrying over lesser matters.
Doesn’t make a difference Wenger having a smaller squad, he plays his favourite players regardless of form or fatigue, the rest are there to make up the numbers or if one of his favs gets injured. Is that sticking to the subject.
We have actually reduced in quality since the Liverpool match because we sold OX who was one of our best squad players. That’s why Liverpool and Chelsea wanted him.
Our CM still lacks enough quality
If we had Cazorla and Ozil was playing better it would be different but right now we don’t have anyone like Pogba, Matic, Kante, Gundogan, Wanyama, Gueye. Ozil is not playing as well as Coutinho, Mata, Fabregas, Erickson, De Bruyne, Silva.
Also, what’s the point of a small squad if Wenger doesn’t play our top players. Against Liverpool, we didn’t start Lacazette, Giroud, Mustafi, Walcott and Kolsanic. We started Welbeck over Lacazette and Giroud and started OX who we knew was leaving