How Arsene Wenger has evolved at Arsenal

The case of Wenger’s transfers and tactics by Briantole

Wenger has a long story to tell about his 19 years in charge of Arsenal. Facing a rift of opinions and reactions among players, fans and pundits alike. On his stay here we fans have witnessed a change of character from him over the years. So where did it all start?

When he first came here he was brought to bring success to Arsenal Football club. David Dein saw he was the man to do just that. At the beginning he was what we could call an old school manager. His tactics and mode of transfers were just simple: Have a solely defensive minded back line; a completely dominant midfield; and a pacey/clinical forward line. He became a very successful manager for the next ten seasons guiding the team to three Premier league titles, four FA Cups, an unbeaten “Invincible” season, and a UEFA Champions League finalists season.

He had a team capable of achieving all that, using ‘ugly’ tactics; playing a highly productive counter attacking football, protecting dodgy one nil leads. An early goal from the clinical forwards, aggression from the midfielders and defenders, with a fabulous goalkeeper making an array of wonder saves, were all involved in this kind of team setup, most notably Henry, Vieira, Kolo Toure and Lehmann creating the platform for this kind of tactical setup.

But Wenger saw the need for a change in football. He started to tinker with the mode of play on the pitch causing commotion among the fans. He started creating overlapping fullbacks, intelligent central defenders who read and interpret the game and introduced all rounded midfielders with fine movement and great vision, capable of scoring, assisting and defending. We started seeing the likes of van Persie, Fabregas, Ashley Cole, Clichy, Sagna, Hleb, Song and Adebayor taking over the pitch. Now to be fair to him this threatened to be a successful tactic until injuries came and destroyed the success that-was-to-be that never came. Then due to finances players decided to jump ship to go elsewhere to get better deals that suited them.

This became a problem for him and he could not re-live the success he once brought to the club. But fans only want to see success no matter how possible or impossible the circumstances could be. We all wanted him to buy players that we and the media wanted to see in an Arsenal shirt, but he was never convinced. Honestly the likes of Kondogbia, Schneiderlin and Pedro aren’t doing what we expected to see from them anyway. Wenger has put trust in his own judgement and his own players. He has assembled an exceptional team even though some fans are still saying that “if there was a top class manager in charge of this club he could have brought greater success without a doubt.”

But seriously does anyone really believe that ANYONE could have done a better job than Wenger during these circumstances?

Briantole

Tags Henry Vieira Wenger

12 Comments

  1. No sooner had Arsenal Fans rejoiced over Campbell’s performances, had a New article emerged …with a lame Title

    “massive blow as Top source confirms arsenal star set to exit the emirates”

    and to Think it came from a creditable Blogosphere….. BehoLd, it came from “Ooh to be a gooner” the enema bags

    some annoying websites really deserve planetary bans

  2. No sooner had Arsenal Fans rejoiced over Campbell’s performances, than a New article emerged …with a lame Title

    “massive blow as Top source confirms arsenal star set to exit the emirates”

    and to Think it came from a creditable Blogosphere….. BehoLd, it came from “Ooh to be a gooner” the enema bags

    some annoying websites really deserve planetary bans

    1. @TongaBull
      The only way that AFC are going to be able to “take it to another level”, is if we get rid of the continually injured and infirm, also the over the hill gang, and get in some dynamic players who aren’t so injury prone…

  3. I don’t understand what this article is actually about. Is it a commendation of the Boss hard work and trophy laden success at Arsenal over the past 18 years? Or a complain of the Boss not won the BPL titles in the last few years? If it’s the latter, let’s exercise a little more patient and cheer up. The Boss and the Gunners will certainly delivered 3 titles of: the FA Cup, the Barclays Premier League and the Ucl title to the we the Gooners this season to compensate those missing out on the bigger titles in recent past years. But he will need our belief to believe in him and the Gunners to deliver those 3 titles to us at once. And also will need our prayers to back him up and the Gunners exploits on the field of play and actions up as well to finally succeed. So I implore all Gooners to earnestly starts praying without ceasing for the Boss and the Gunners to succeed in their efforts to win the treble titles for us this season. Prayers move mountains for those that believes.

  4. Whilst I acknowledge that it was difficult for us to compete at the very highest level, with the lack of funds, star players leaving and our rivals spending like crazy, I still feel Wenger should have done better. Having to wait nine years for another trophy was ridiculous! During this period the likes of Wigan, Birmingham, Swansea, and Portsmouth all won trophies with lesser players and funds, so why couldn’t we? Not only did we not win, but we were barely competing at times.

    I actually supported Wenger until the 3-0 defeat at Everton in the 13/14 season, then I’d finally had enough. Now with hindsight, I can see why many fans wanted him gone a long long time ago. For years fans defended Wenger, saying that it was hardly any funds, star players leaving, and injuries that were the problem. Well since the end of the 12/13 season, Wenger has had the funds, he’s brought in star players, he’s kept his best players, and nothing has really changed. In fact we’ve become even worse in Europe, and if there has been any improvement in the league, then it’s only the tiniest of progression. In fact last season we finished a whopping 12 points behind Chelsea, which was almost double from the previous season, despite having a much stronger squad. One could argue that the injuries are still disrupting us, but then again they happen like clock- work every season, so why doesn’t Wenger do something about it?

    So if you judge Wenger from the end of the 12/13 season, because since then he’s been on a level playing field, then it doesn’t make great reading. Obviously the FA cup wins were great, but they’re not necessarily that tough to win, last season a case in point. But the League and Europe are very tough, and I have seen almost no progression over two and half seasons.

    1. Wow, you say Liverpool, Wigan etc won trophies and tgen you say FA cup is nothing special. Please do not keep so many things constant while doing an analysis.

  5. off topic:is there still people reading”oh to be a gooner”and”gooner,s den”and i thought caughtoffside were bad,those 2 sites shouldn,t be allowed to post on arsenal news!!do you agree??

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