Arsene Wenger has told Arsenal’s fans that they must get behind the team if they want to succeed this season, whilst refusing to rule out a challenge for the Premier League table.
The Gunners succumbed to successive league defeats last week, and fans have started to turn on Wenger having fallen to a whopping 12 points behind league leaders Chelsea.
The Frenchman has now called for fans to come together and support the team, and has called for his players to step-up and fight, using the competition for places as incentive to give their all.
“Competition is first of all a mental thing,” he said. “When you are a little boy you want a chance in life to show that you have quality. When you have it, don’t feel sorry for yourself, just show that you have it. That’s what it’s about.
“When you are in a competition you fight. You fight as far as you can.
“We are in a double fight, because we are in a fight to be in the top four. But we have to fight like we want to catch Chelsea, or you have no fuel. You have to refuse to give up.
“The players believe. We have 47 points, so that means we have won some games. Is it the hardest challenge yet to reach the top four? I’ll tell you at the end of the season. It’s hard of course but we have enough quality to do it. It has always been difficult but maybe it’s even tighter than ever.
“The title race is never over. We cannot behave or think like that. Even if people think it is, I don’t. We are in a pack that is very tight, where the fight for every position will be massive.
“If it is over for us, it’s over for everybody else. First we have to focus on staying at the top, then if we can reduce the distance between us and Chelsea after, you never know.”
“Our fans have a high level of expectation, as I have. But you cannot be a fan until last Tuesday [Watford] and not be a fan any more, not be behind the team on Saturday. It doesn’t make sense,” he said.
““All the other clubs, everywhere we fight, with Man United, Man City, Liverpool, they have big expectations as well. We absolutely have to be united or we have no chance.
“You have Tottenham, everyone is in the fight, and everyone is behind their team. We have to do exactly the same.
“What is important is that we focus on the next game and not give too much importance to one fan. It’s not me at stake, it’s Arsenal Football Club and Arsenal’s season at stake.
“It’s important that you have different opinions, that always happens. But what matters is not the opinions of people, it is the next result, and how we respond to a difficult situation. This is a period where we have to stick together.”
We have endured a tough couple of weeks now, and Wenger is right, we must rally behind our side and help them get over this slump. All the sides in the top six have endured slumps, and ours is nothing in comparison to Liverpools.
If we can help our side to win this weekend, we will be well back on track for our place in the top four, and will hopefully be within touching distance of Chelsea for when they finally slip up.
How long can Chelsea keep up their relentless streak for? Do we have to doubt our top four credentials?
Pat J
And how do you reward the fans? By consistently making similar mistakes hah? Even patience has its threshold, so we shall support but it has to be give and take.
“When you are in a competition you fight. You fight as far as you can.”
Is what we have seen for the past few seasons what you call fight, mr Wenger? Surely that isn’t fight.
Chelsea can afford to drop points. Arsenal will definitely drop some points here and there.
That’s why defeat to teams like Everton and Hull hurt so bad..
Try this formation.We will win every match
Ospina
Ballerin Mustafi Koscielny Monreal
Ox Coquelin Elneny Welbeck
Alexis
Giroud
Subs: Xhaka, Iwobi,Gabriel,Mertesacker,Ozil
Take Giroud out and let Perez and sanchez form a partnership up front. Doubt it will ever happen, Wenger will play ozil in that #10 role even if he only has 1 leg. Thats the one problem with our team selections, it is not ruthless enough, if you dont perform consistently then you should not play. Perez has done something everytime he has been on the pitch but cant seem to buy a starting role, whereas players like ramsey just get straight into the team as soon as they are fit enough to play… absolute rubbish
The tem I’d like to see is, but it will probably change at some point.
………………Ospina (next few games)
Bellerin..Mustafi..Koscielny..Gibbs (next few games)
…………..Elneny..Coquelin
………………..Alexis
…Perez…….Welbeck……..???????
Although, I don’t really like Elneny and Coq together, but Alexis might make it more dynamic hopefully. I’d be ready to bring Ox in there, for his dribbling quality, if slow playing from the back.
Admin, I hear you say, “…we will be well back on track for our place in the top four..” Why not on top of the EPL and to win it? Are you not sick and tired of repeating the same mistakes every season for these 13 years? I think it’s stupid to think that Arsene wenger is indispensable and that Arsenal cannot do without him. Arsenal as a club has been in existence for generations and will be for a long to come, long after the fraud that is Wenger is long gone. The British fans are letting Arsenal fans around the world down. They should use their power to boycott Arsenal matches and force Wenger out since the board are only interested in lining their pockets. Wenger is too stingy to have quality in depth. When he gets a coup of quality players, he overuses them until the weight of the team is too much to carry in the second half of the season and they eventually crumble. I have stopped watching any sort of football until Wenger is out of Arsenal.
He has a point, and he also has just as much right to question the fans as they do with him. I think it might be about that, see how they like a little taste of own medicine coming from one voice, and now imagine it was in numbers. I noticed as all did that our atmosphere can be truly awful, but then the one’s who go to away matches do say how great they are, and if only. I wondered about that and now think I know why that is. We have had one of the very best away form for near on two seasons back, it’s when we struggle is when the fans bury their heads, like the moment the first Chelsea goal went in.
Well done wenger, it’s the fans that pick the team week in week out, it’s the fans who buy the players that make up an inadequate squad, it’s the fans who keep the dead wood in the club. But IT IS THE FANS WHO spend their hard earned money to support the club and have to listen to his mumbo jumbo for years.
Yes Arsene we know, but the reality is Chelsea are 12 points in front of us and look VERY strong, whereas we look erratic and beatable by any team that comes with tenacity and tactics.
I’m still a fan, but this ‘nearly winners’ business every year is tiring and challenging when we see teams like Leicester last season and Chelsea this season riding their confidence and really showing what it means to be winners.
Realistically, we aren’t on the same page. Yes we have good (great?) days at times, but for a team that is consistent in its 4th place, you never quite know what team is going to turn up on the day..
So no, I won’t be a deluded fan who thinks we can win everything, I’ll stick to realism, thanks.
A Typical Wenger reaction when his ass is on the line?
Mr manipulator, twisting it around again, blaming the fans in advance, no doubt that the majority of fans at the Emirates will be singing “there’s only one Arsene Wenger” … just like last season.
And thank God that there is only one Wenger ? Otherwise we would have been in double-trouble ?