There are many Arsenal fans who are adamant that Mikel Arteta has had more than enough time to build his own team, and he will be judged on where the Gunners finish this season.
Obviously we have not had the best of starts in this campaign with 3 defeats out of 3, but with 105 points still up for grabs it is silly to write off this season just yet.
But to be fair to Arteta, we have just played the best two teams in the world right now, and against Brentford we were decimated by injuries and Covid. Not only that but we have brought in six new signings, of which five will take some time to integrate into the team.
Some fans are even saying that if we lose our next game Arteta should be sacked, but I think they are simply not grasping the fact that Arteta and Edu are in for the long haul, and success or failure won’t be taken into account until the rebuilding process is fully completed.
Edu made it clear that we are only halfway through the project, as he told Arsenal.com: “Just to give you some context, we renewed – in one year – five sets of contracts, and five of them are under the age of 23 for the first team. Then, in this period, summer to summer, we signed 10 players and seven out of the 10 are under 23 as well.
“So what I would like to explain is that is is not about this summer, it is about the project. It is about what we want to do. We have started the project, we are in the middle, so it is not just one window and go, it is window, window, window, window.”
He then emphasised that the project is far from over, when he concluded: “We see the balance in the squad is much better, but again this is not the end. People have to understand we are still on the journey to go where this club deserves to be.”
So, can we all stop with the #ArtetaOut rants, as it simply is not going to happen. Arsenal are going to slowly improve this season and start moving up the table, but it will probably be the season afterwards that we really see if the project is showing fruits or not.
We have no choice but to buckle up and support the team as it grows and develops…