Let’s face facts as a whole Arsenal fans of the last few years are pretty lame when it comes for sticking up for themselves, apart from one decent BSM ‘walk’ over that 6% ticket price increase. Prices since all-seater came in have just gone up and up and the promise of cheaper seats once we moved to the shinny new spacebowl was never going to happen and with no united Arsenal fan voice the club have pretty much done whatever they like with no real fuss from us. Oddly fans from other clubs have done more to embarrass the club with both Man City and Liverpool successfully getting the point across for the pricing of Cat A games.

Anyway onto Wenger, the argument of if hes the right man or not has finally been put to bed, no right minded person can now say he’s the right man to manage the club. I’m not calling him a C### I’m not wishing him anything but the best, I’m not acting like a tottenham fan and I’m not being knee jerk. Myself and the other admin on facebook.com/shewore have been very honest over the last 4years on our views and they haven’t changed, we must be saying something right to have the best part of 18,000 on the page, the vast majority being current or former match going fans, this aint a page with 100’s of moo moo comments on every status.

As for a Wenger out or any other protest I can tell everyone right now that none of the ‘official’ so-called supporters clubs who on a regular basis get invited to AGM’s, supporters forums, tea with Ivan etc, the people the club deem fit to speak on our behalf’s will arrange anything against Wenger’s time being well and truly up, the fools approved the highest non-corporate match ticket in Europe, that tells you all you need to know about them. None of the bigger Arsenal blogs will arrange a protest either over any kind of Wenger out and neither will I/we at SheWore, this should be down to the AST,AISA and RedAction to arrange, but of course they wont.

Over the 24 hours I/we have had about a dozen different people privately messaging me/us so we can help arrange their idea on a protest, my answer to them and anyone who ever asks in the future is DO IT get together with a few mates and do something. Trying to arrange and keep happy everyone on what slogan ? what game ? in the ground  ? before,after,during ? just will not happen, more chance herding cats. So my answer to everyone is simple and this is said with the up most respect, you do what you feel fit, don’t be a sheep, you don’t need someone else to tell what you can or cant do and when you can do it.

It costs very little to print or write on an A4 sheet of paper with the words WENGER OUT on it (for example), it costs very little if half a dozen of you get a small banner made up between you and I’m very sure by the messages we have received the other more imaginative of you can think of other things to do, just remember please don’t do anything that could lead to an arrest.  I’m very sure if you did this before/during/after the next few games you will soon find people on the streets and in the ground who will join you. Pass out the A4 sheets to people on the trains and buses, in the streets, in the pubs (or latte bar) and to people who sit around you, empower yourselves and the people around you.

Please don’t think that by joining a group on Facebook or moaning on twitter or even doing some direct action that you will get change, in fairness nothing we as fans do can persuade a lame duck CEO (who can’t sack his own employee) and a majority shareholder (who can vote to pay himself £3mill) apart from not going to games, but as we know by now the club will be more than happy to have 60,000 tourists at every game who will spend big in the club shop than people whose families have been going for generations and have a deep emotional involvement, so not going is a lose lose.

As some of the good lads and ladies who I stood alongside and spoken to who did try some direct action over last years 3% increase say, at least we did something, we didn’t just moan and do nothing, we tried. The club need a change at all levels, if we do not tell them, if we don’t get the message thro they will think we agree with the direction they are heading. I’m a firm believer that we are the club, not the owner, not a manager, not the players THE FANS. We will still be there after Wenger, Stan and there apologists have long gone.
Up The Arsenal….

Follow @shewore

Personnel Problems

Two games played in the last week and two games that exposed the already obvious personnel shortcomings in our squad. In the Anderlecht game, it was a combination of having no proper holding midfielder and playing a backup left back at centre half. Sound like a broken record much? The fact that not many Arsenal fans, or anyone else for that matter, was terribly surprised that we blew a three nil lead says it all really.

We are supposedly the fifth richest club in the world and yet started the season with only two established centre halves, a right sided midfielder converted to a holding role – whose legs have gone – and a headless chicken that we picked up on a free transfer. At 3-0 Anderlecht, didn’t have to do anything complicated, it was direct and it was effective. Granted the first goal was offside but the momentum of the game had already shifted at that stage and you would have fancied that the Belgians would have got the breakthrough anyway.

The penalty and equaliser came about because of route one balls targeting Monreal. Perhaps if we had a more effective holding midfielder or our advanced players weren’t still charging forward looking for another goal, Anderlecht wouldn’t have been able to play the balls in that exposed Monreal. The fact is though that we seemed incapable of stopping them.

Against Swansea, the warning signs had been there in the first half. Calum Chambers struggled badly to cope with the pace of Swansea winger, Jefferson Montero. It was obvious that the Ecuadorian had the beating of Chambers, and beat him he did, time and again until Swansea were eventually rewarded with the winner. Our goal was a classic example of how we should be playing away from home, with the pace and talent we have in attack.

It was a great counter attack which is what makes the proceeding capitulation all the more galling. How at 1-0, did we find ourselves in a situation where our left back was pursuing a Swansea midfielder through the centre of the park? Why was Gibbs in such an advanced position? Gibbs did the only thing he could in the situation, which was to give the free kick away. The result being Sigurdsson levelling the scores.

Credit where it’s due to, Garry Monk, because unlike Wenger he recognised that Chambers was struggling with Montero’s pace and substituted the tiring Bony with the six foot plus, Gomis, to target Monreal. Low and behold, Montero burnt Chambers one last time and Gomis’s first touch was header into the back of the net having “outjumped” Monreal. Chambers was roasted numerous times in the first half and inevitably picked up a yellow card in the second.

The obvious solution, would have been to bring on Bellerín as he has more pace and can’t have struggled any more than Chambers did against Montero. We could’ve then sent Chambers to centre half, as it’s unlikely that he would have struggled as badly in the air as Monreal did. Bellerín should have been on at halftime but Wenger doesn’t make substitutes before the sixty minute mark. Chambers was booked after 61 minutes and we scored after 62. Why wasn’t Bellerín brought on when we took the lead?

With the issue Chambers was having and given the fact that he had already been booked, one of two things was bound to happen. Either he would get a second yellow or Swansea would eventually be rewarded for Montero’s endeavours. In the end, it was the latter. Wenger probably thought that by leaving Chambers at full back he was showing faith in him but all that happened was, Chambers was left on to suffer which can’t have helped his confidence. In the end he was substituted for Yaya Sanogo, a player who has never scored in the Premier League, at a time when we were to chasing the game instead of closing it out.

I really like Calum Chambers and think he’s going to make a very good ball-playing centre back for club and country. However for a team that plays as high a line as us and with a midfield that offers the defence very limited protection, full-backs with pace are not optional, they’re a necessity.

Mutual Cluelessness

Paul Merson’s comment post Anderlecht, that Arsenal were clueless was blunt and general, but ultimately deserved. His assessment incurred a pretty barbed response from, Arsene Wenger, to the effect that, Merson, as a man who had never managed wasn’t qualified to make these comments.

Firstly, Merson, has managed albeit unsuccessfully and further down the leagues with Walsall. Secondly, Wenger’s fatuous pivot shows either a man backed into a corner or a man who feels he is above criticism from 99.9% of the people. Merson, may not always hit the nail on the head but he cares about the club and is only saying what is (A) blatantly obvious and (B) being said by a lot more people than just, Merson.

The Muddy Waters of Transfer Funds

At the AGM, Ivan Gazidis, attempted to dispel the idea that we have a considerable transfer fund sitting untouched. It’s possible that he’s downplaying the fund so that we’re not held over a barrel when it comes time to negotiate with other clubs. This is a very logical and reasonable approach.

It’s also possible that he’s protecting Wenger from criticism for not utilising the fund. Or it may well be true that there’s not as much money in the fund as has been calculated by others. Personally I think it’s the first one but let’s say for argument’s sake that the last is true. Why did we spend so much money on a luxury player when our squad had such rudimentary weaknesses?

I’m delighted that we have Sanchez. In my opinion he’s our best signing since Bergkamp, but at the beginning of the season every man and his dog could see where our squad was thin. Ultimately Wenger is responsible for signing players, and there are glaring issues with squad balance, so he has to wear any criticism for transfer failings

If the first scenario is the actual situation, then there’s no excuse for the state of our squad. We simply should have spent the required money to recruit another centre half and a defensive midfielder. We have missed an opportunity to really push on this season. Chelsea are starting to look uncatchable, but it didn’t need to be like that.

It’s unlikely that we would’ve had enough to finish above them even if we had signed the two players needed but we would have put up more of a challenge. It’s also less likely that we would currently be sat behind Southampton, Man City, West Ham and Swansea in the league and staring at another second place finish in our Champions League group.

A second or third place finish, in the league this season, would have represented progress for us but we look destined for our usual fourth place at best and as such it’s hard to argue that we’ve progressed. If scenario two is true and Gazidis is in fact trying to protect Wenger, then surely the time has come to hold him to account for the embarrassing situation that’s been allowed to develop with our squad’s imbalance.

Rory

Follow @bjesus49

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