The curious case of Gary Neville’s assessment on Arsene Wenger by Lethal Prince 9
Since last Monday, we are all hearing about the news that Gary Neville has called Wenger “arrogant” and “naive”. While some people have gone on to support Neville suggesting he was right in doing so, I decided to have a look on original video for the exact words that Gary said about Wenger.
Below is what Gary actually said:
“When Cesc Fabregas went to Chelsea last season, Jose Mourinho put Matic beside him. He put Ramires alongside him sometimes in certain games. Then you say OK, he influences the decision of Arsene Wenger. But don’t put Flamini alongside him. Now taking that forward, you could do one mistake with putting Flamini alongside and not being powerful enough. But he signs Arteta, turns him into midfield player, signs Rosicky, a wide player turns him into a midfield player. Ramsey plays midfield, even knowing that he is a wide midfielder. Cazorla now… so for ten years, it’s not just Fabregas, it’s a continual string of errors, for a sustained period of time. You could add more too, I am sure there are players playing in that central midfield who are small, dimunutive, good football players…. Coquelin, Oxlade Chamberlain too.
“I’ve got great respect for Arsenal as a football club. I think it’s a fantastic football club. Arsene Wenger’s job is absolutely amazing. (He also said that if it weren’t for Man United, he would like Arsenal to win the league.) But I just cannot get my head around why he would not sign players of power to assist these talented players that you’ve got to enable them to win the league.
“It is the one big, if you like black mark, against Arsene Wenger in these last 10 years in terms of why he hasn’t identified an issue with these types of players {points to Coquelin and Cazorla} – because they cannot win the league with them. It can’t happen.
“I also think that’s the strongest partnership (Cazorla and Coquelin), that they could have. But I think McCarthy and Barry are also a good pair, but they cannot win you a league. And measuring Arsenal as a title winning team, I think the pair are not good enough. They are not.
“I think that’s arrogance to not adapt to your midfield to change the impact on other teams who have strength. It’s either naive or arrogant, because they keep losing this way. It’s more as a misheld belief.”
But when Gary Neville slammed the policy of Arsene Wenger as “naive and arrogant” (all the words from media), Gunners legend Thierry Henry rejected the claim. Henry believes Wenger was trying to build a team around the now Chelsea midfielder, and that it triggered a change in approach from Wenger.
Henry said: “I don’t think it’s arrogance, I think it’s belief. Arsene and the players believe they can play like that and outplay teams at times. Whether people like it or not, it’s belief.
“If I would have been asked that will I bring Schneiderlin or someone else, I think I would. Since he didn’t bring any body in, I think that’s the strongest partnership that he can have there. And they showed against City that they can do it. I think sometimes against teams, especially away from home in this league, away form Man City, Man United, Chelsea, I think they need a different approach.”
Now, I would like to clear some things which was not reported by the media which further made it disputive. First of all, Neville praised that Arsenal is a fantastic football club also declaring that Wenger’s job has been absolutely amazing, which is something rarely you will hear from most of the pundits. Also Neville agreed that Santi Cazorla and Francis Coquelin were Wenger’s strongest partnership, but he just doubted whether they are good enough to win the league title. He just called Wenger arrogant or naive because he believes that Wenger can’t win the league with that pair.
Now it was only his opinion and on basis of that he called Wenger arrogant and naive. He hasn’t evaluated the pair’s performance during big games against big teams. Now if we actually go back to last season, Arsenal played that pair in midfield against Man City and won 2-0, against Man United won 2-1 and tied 1-1, against Liverpool won 4-1, against Chelsea tied 0-0 and won 1-0. Also when we played against mid-table teams, we won most of the games producing a brilliant performance along and as a result we won 8 consecutive league games. That alone is an achievement in itself. We also played that partnership in the FA Cup Final. And it turned out quite good against Villa beating them 4-0. By the way, the most important factor was that we paid more attention to our defensive tactics, but I can hardly agree that the duo weren’t an important part of him. So, when Arsenal weren’t able to beat the big teams in the past years, but started to grind out such results, Wenger thought that this can be his solution.
I can only say that maybe maybe Neville can be right about enforcing strength in your midfield at some point. It can and sometimes it works out for some of the teams. But how can he call Wenger arrogant or naive for trying to play a different approach by playing Cazorla-Coquelin duo which contributed most to the team without backing up his statement. He didn’t provided any example to support his argument.
Oh, and by that logic, there are issues in his own Man United team. What will be his reply when you ask him that whether Smalling and Blind are good enough to win the league. Also, Van Gaal also said that Man United doesn’t need to buy a center forward, and insisted that Fellaini, a central midfielder, can be his solution to provide support for Rooney. And I especially can’t forget the case of David De Gea. Van Gaal hasn’t used De Gea even as a squad member, who was being touted as one of the best goalkeepers in the world last season. Will he call Van Gaal naive or arrogant that he isn’t even trying to bring a better center forward and playing Fellaini up front, or bring a better center back to shore up the defence, or not playing or not even including one of the best goalkeepers in his squad?
Lastly if you heard Wenger after the game, he said that maybe Neville can be right and he can be wrong, but he insisted that everyone has got a different opinion.
Wenger said: “I don’t know what that has to do with arrogance. I just try to do my job and I leave it to other people to assess my work.
“Everyone’s entitled to their opinion. I could prove to you it’s not necessarily right – but let’s not go into that debate.
“You know, in football you have to accept that anybody can be right. [But] since January, we have conceded fewer goals than anybody else.
“The only thing I want is that when people have opinions, that it is documented and worked out before. Especially when it is football specialists. I accept you can be right and I can be wrong. But what you do not want is just an opinion that comes out, just because you feel like that.
“Look, I am not against opinion, people can say they don’t think Arsenal is good enough, I accept that. [But] it is dangerous to say that, ‘He will never be a player,’ especially when the comment has come from people in football.
“What is a concern is that it puts pressure on players. I believe that we, who are in a football job, people who have been in the game, I love that they go on television, but I would like them to help people to love football even more.”
In the end Wenger stated that sometimes others (professionals) can be right and he can be wrong. But he insisted no body should judge others only on the basis of one opinion without any proof.
Lethal Prince 9