There is No Conspiracy by Dan Smith
All gooners were frustrated on Tuesday. It’s never nice seeing your team lose, but one of the worst feelings is when you walk away with regret.
We arguably looked the best we have all season in the first half at the Molineux.
I’m not one to focus on referees. I have always disagreed with how VAR is being used and feel officiating has never been great in this country but I’m one of those who accepts things usually even themselves out.
Yet I can’t argue with those fans who suggest we only lost against Wolves due to officiating.
My own stance is I don’t see any controversy around Leno’s red card. He’s clearly handled the ball outside of his area so only has himself to blame.
Luiz is not so clear?
If he’s guilty of anything it’s slipping over but even then, I’m still not sure how much or if any contact he made with his opponent?
Video Technology is meant to help in these moments, and I don’t understand how replays have shown 100 percent the defender clipped the players ankle?
So we as a fan base have a right to be aggrieved. Yet is there a team who feels like that every week?
Think of the mess that was the handball rule earlier in the season when it felt like pens were given every other game. Players are being routinely told they are offside based on a toe.
So all football supporters have had that feeling in their stomach of ‘what if?’.
My personal favourite is how we would have won an FA Cup against Liverpool had Henchoz been spotted handling the ball twice. I still can’t get over it. Yet I equally accept there have been moments when we have benefited from a bad decision, and that’s why I feel it’s hypocritical to ever blame refs for our failures.
I have though never questioned the integrity of the sport. If I felt in any way it was fixed what would be the point of watching it? Why invest my time and energy into a product if I felt it was predetermined?
That’s why I felt some gooners have taken things a bit far since our recent defeat. Be disappointed? Sad? Angry? Of course ….
But suggesting that those in authority might have a conspiracy against us? That’s a bit too much.
I want to use a range of sources to give you a variation of some extreme opinions. On Just Arsenal, the reader Davi felt we lost to a ‘twisting of the rules’.
Top of predictions table Dan Kit, called the football ‘corrupt’ a word repeated across social media.
Talk Sport had a caller who believed Luiz had been judged on ‘his reputation’.
AFTV’s fan cams included a ref being called a ‘cheat‘, the game being ‘rigged’ and a bizarre demand for Craig Pawson to hand in his resignation letter. Especially as Pawson is the same man who failed to send off Mane when we were at Anfield in September.
Quite strong words ….
Say it out loud and it sounds ridiculous…. The FA hate Arsenal so much that the officials on the pitch are working with those at Stockley Park to screw us out of points? Why?
That’s quite self-involved
Yet that’s what terms like ‘cheat‘, ‘conspiracy’, ‘rigged’ and ‘agenda’ means; it’s implying that when a goal is disallowed or a booking made or not made, it’s not being made impartially. That’s a serious allegation and one that needs exploring.
The first hole in the argument is the Gunners themselves have been awarded three spot kicks this season and only conceded two. If there was a nationwide agenda against us wouldn’t we have been awarded 0 and conceded more than two?
Maybe Michael Oliver, Andre Marriner and Mike Dean are not part of the conspiracy as they gave us penalties?
Here’s a good one.
Let’s pretend for a moment that the game is ‘rigged‘, that refs’ ‘cheat’ that the sport is ‘corrupt’, wouldn’t those in power do everything to stop us lifting the FA Cup?
Remember the Final? A game where we got a penalty, and Kovacic got a second yellow even though he made no contact with Xhaka. If there was a conspiracy, I would like Ty from AFTV to explain that.
By his logic, the ref that day was a ‘cheat’, as was Xhaka for pretending he was hurt.
If Chelsea said that day we only won due to a ‘rigged game’, ‘corruption’, ‘cheating’, etc, we would tell them to grow up.
I believe everyone is entitled to their opinions and it’s healthy to have different points of views, but I also think the danger of social media is a younger generation of Gooner is wrongly educated by our history being rewritten.
Various fans have suggested that the reason VAR didn’t come to our rescue is because Mike Riley is the general manager of the Professional Game Match Officials (essentially in charge of officials in England).
A theory put forward by grown adults is Riley has a hatred for Arsenal so is back at Stockley Park manipulating our downfall. I would laugh if it wasn’t so sad.
Riley refereed the game that ended our undefeated streak at 49 games back in 2004. Did Rooney dive that day? 100 percent. Did Riley have a poor performance? You bet…
Did he have a bad day at the office 17 years ago? Yes, but I don’t think it was anymore then someone being incompetent.
This idea that a man at the top of his profession has spent the last two decades plotting our demise is arrogant of any fan to think. We are not unique. We are not special. Get out of your bubble, not everything is about Arsenal.
And again not true.
Since he done us wrong that afternoon at Old Trafford, he was in charge of another 12 Arsenal fixtures until his retirement. How many fixtures did we lose under the charge of a man with this dastardly conspiracy against us …… drum roll … 2! We won 9 and drew the other.
Since he broke our hearts that day in Manchester do you want to know how men pens this evil villain would award against us? 2.
He awarded us 4.
How many of our players did he send off as part of his mission to undermine us ……… ZER0.
Sorry, but in a court of law I think that’s overwhelming evidence that we don’t get treated any differently to other teams. I deal with facts not emotion, and the facts say some just make things up. So it begs the question, why?
I think we have fans who have blamed the likes of Mr Wenger, defended Kroenke, etc, and now feel that admitting we have gone backwards would be a sign of weakness.
So if you’re a fan who was predicting a title challenge, boasting how beating Man Utd would only put us 7 points behind them, or who say we are being managed well by Mr Kroenke, they have to find a reason for our failings.
So they try to convince a newer generation of Gooners that there is a conspiracy, the game is rigged, refs are cheats, etc; anything but admit we have serious problems at our club.
We lost to Wolves partly because Luiz was shown a red card but that’s not why we are 10th.
Our League season is over in February which is embarrassing.
Not because there is a conspiracy.
Not because the game is rigged.
Not because everyone is cheating.
Because we are not good enough!
We have youngsters we overhype; we have an owner with zero ambition, our recruitment is poor, our football is boring, and the squad has a weak mentality.
I’m sorry if it’s not what you want to hear…
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Dan Smith