I don’t really feel comfortable writing negative stuff about Arsenal, but when things are not moving on fine with Arsenal, I find it hard keeping quiet. Arsenal is in a serious hole right now and it is only natural that genuine Arsenal fans are bothered and are just hoping that things start getting better for the club.
When things started getting out of hand during the reign of our greatest manager of all time, many people were of the opinion that we needed a change of manager badly! The reasoning then was that with a change of manager, the club would gradually find it’s form back. He had become stagnant as a coach and should be eased out of the club, ‘so that Arsenal can move forward’. This was people’s thinking. But were they right in their thinking? Well, events after the resignation of Wenger, suggests otherwise.
Ever since Wenger, we have changed coaches twice! Each of the two coaches that have been at Arsenal, are coaches that came with pedigrees. Emery came with a lot of trophies to his name. He had coached PSG, a big club in France, the previous season before he came to Arsenal. His arrival at Arsenal was heralded as one that would return the club back to winning ways. Emery hit the ground running as manager of Arsenal; he signed players he felt he could work with, he bought a new goalkeeper for Arsenal to sort out the issue we had with the goal keeping department and he was all set for a fresh challenge.
He began the season with two defeats, back to back but as soon as he was done with the second defeat, he went on a run of 22 games unbeaten in all competitions. He had such a good first season and that made fans dream of a better second season of him being in charge of Arsenal. The defeat to Chelsea in the final of the Europa league, didn’t change fans expectations about him, although the defeat was painful. We all know how his second panned out right? So no need reminding us of what caused many fans sadness and bitterness.
Emery was relieved of his job in his second season in charge for not being able to motivate the team to do well. He was rightly sacked, if I may say. After him, Ljungberg was saddled to handle the team until a new manager was going to be appointed. Ljungberg tried his best but then, the task was too much for him to handle. He struggled to make an impact until he was eventually replaced by Arsenal’s new manager, Mikel Arteta.
Mikel Arteta came with so much promise and potentials and his coming was seen as the coming of a messiah. Seven games into the season and Mikel has won just 1 game and drawn 5 games. The fans, who were excited over his appointment last December, are starting to question if he is really the one to take Arsenal to the next level.
From all I have pointed out, it seems getting a manager would not solve our problems. But if a manager cannot solve our problems, who can?
We are Arsenal and we are proud.
Sylvester Kwentua