Do Arsenal need leadership and Hart?

I don’t know why everybody outside of Arsenal and some the ex Arsenal players keep going on about needing a leader on the pitch.

When George Graham was at Arsenal he had a team / squad that was picked and played football based on a particular methodology and, as a result it was easy for him to appoint a single leader on the pitch in the form of Adams that would oversea that playing methodology during games. Hence, with a singular albeit, perfunctory style of football it was easy for Graham to control his players and the way they went about their on pitch business and stuck to the method of play. This was also reinforced by Adams.

So it was a simple set up. Graham dicated how we played and picked the team to do that. The players knowing exactly what was expected of them and not to act autonomously stuck to the regime and Adams whipped them back into shape should there be any on field lapse or forgetfulness.

Nowadays it’s much different, especially in the last decade. Arsenal are a much more experimental team with players being allowed too much creative licence to do what they want which results in the team being unbalanced with many of the players pulling in their own direction.

In the past you had players like Diaby always wanting to hold the ball and do one trick too many before losing it, this is still prevalent in Ozil and Reine-Adelaide. You had Bendtner who was meant to be a striker, was never in the box because he thought he’d enjoy doing what Diaby was doing and came looking for the game in midfield. Again, this is similar to how Giroud plays his game. Doesn’t want to be a straight forward target man / striker, but wants to enjoy arsing around outside the danger area of the oppositions box. You saw last night with Ospin, who I do like messing around and not just clearing the danger as he should but instead, trying to play the ball from his own goal line, into the midfield as if he was an outfield players. And that’s not the first time he’s forgotten his role and tried dragbacks and flicks in his own 6 yard area !

Now if he’s out there doing his own thing as a goal keeper, you can see why Arsenal face the dilemma they do and come in for much criticism. It’s not becaused they are a bad footballing team, however, they’re not a very disciplined or scholarly team and too many players without that rigorous discipline are able plow their own furrow as opposed to working as a team.

There are players at Arsenal who are honest, earnest and comitted players but because Wenger is adamant that he’s going to succeed with his football revolution he often picks players based on that whimsical notion and plays an all too familiar expansive and fluid game which the opposition are well aware of…………even opposition from the lowest quarters of football.

If you don’t have a particular and worthwhile plan to overcome the opposition and fail to pick players on merit to facilitate the job, then there is no point in having a ‘leader’ on the pitch as no one is going to listent to him as they’ve already been given too much creative licence to do their own thing by the manager !

Koscielny, Mustafi could both be excellent captains and leaders on the pitch but could you really see Ozil, Sanchez, Giroud and some others taking orders from them ?

In a nutshell, we’re not short of capable leaders at Arsenal but what we are short of is a defined method of playing the game and the right selection of disciplined personnel that can achieve that end.

I don’t want Wenger to go but I would like to see him put aside trying to turn Arsenal into Barcelona and use what he’s got to it’s full potential. Once he’s realised and achieved that end it would be no problem appointing an on field leader.

As for the case of Hart being at Arsenal, I wouldn’t particularly feel any more secure with him between the sticks, he’s too flash for my liking and would probably be just as irresponsible as the type of player that I’ve been moaning about above !