It’s a familiar story, one that we’ve heard for the past eight years. Arsenal’s season is coming to nothing. No trophies. No accolades. No celebrations.
Some say that the man in charge needs to be sacked. That this is not acceptable. That he is a dinosaur of a manager and his methods are ineffective in these days of billionaire owners and oil money.
Then there are others who say he is doing a remarkable job given the environment and the conditions he needs to abide by.
That fourth and an exciting cup run is more than acceptable when your organisation was paying off an amazing new stadium, while other teams are throwing millions at fourth choice strikers such as Fernando Torres.
There are no doubts Arsene Wenger is a quality manager – a legend who will always be mentioned alongside Sir Alex Ferguson as one of the best managers of an era.
The keys to his success was his ability to build the right team, the winning team, the team that could do the job he wanted them to do – and trophies followed.
Not necessarily signing the big names, but the right names to fit his plan. The right ingredients, if you will, for his experiment. Le Professor was always cooking something up – usually a dynasty-creating team.
So what happened? What is so different now?
It is important to firstly look back in order to get an idea as to what issues plague the team today.
Wenger has created two distinct teams during his tenure as Arsenal’s boss. His earliest side bought him early success and made his name in England. It was the team with the English backline and backbone. It had mercurial talents such as Nicolas Anelka and Marc Overmars, and was crafted and managed with peculiar care.
It won him trophies and established Arsenal as a force of the 90s.
The team stayed together for years, but when father time caught up to most of this squad, Wenger went back to the laboratory and started creating again. Perhaps the best team of his tenure and arguably the best team of the Premier League era – The Invincibles.
This time the team had a French backbone – Patrick Vieira, Emmanuel Petit, Sylvain Wiltord and Robert Pires. It had mercurial talents, English stars and modern greats such as Freddie Ljungberg, Ashley Cole, Sol Campbell, Dennis Bergkamp and the best of all – Thierry Henry.
An astonishing team, and an astonishing achievement to go a season undefeated.
Wenger’s plans had come to fruition. His creations had come to life. His experiments were bearing fruit and trophies.
But this time when father time came knocking, Wenger’s ideas didn’t exactly go to plan.
Eventually he had to replace the irreplaceables – Henry, Vieira, Pires.
So, sticking to the formula that worked so well before (namely, building an exciting, attacking team), Wenger went to work. But one of the first signings of his new project set the tone of the misfortune to come.
Jose Antonio Reyes was supposed to signal the seamless transition from one era to the next. A big name signing coming across with high hopes. A man playing the style of football that would seamlessly fit right in to the Arsenal system.
And he started very well. But eventually things began to changes and something just wasn’t quite right.
Reyes did not take to Arsenal like Henry, Pires and Bergkamp did before him. And you could see he was distracted. Eventually, after an embarrassing radio prank call in which he confessed to wanting to return to Spain, Reyes had his bags packed.
This was an omen for Wenger, that this transition wasn’t going to be as straight forward as he planned.
And so it proved to be. Star after star left. Captain after captain left. The plan was in tatters. The formula was not right. Wenger had planned to build a team similar to his previous two. He had the personnel set out.
But this time, the personnel wanted to be somewhere else. Guys like Cole, Samir Nasri, Cesc Fabregas and Robin Van Persie. No one wanted to stay.
Others didn’t want to come. There was more money on offer. There was a homeland to return to. There were trophies to be won. Every reason under the sun denied Wenger to create the team he envisioned.
Perhaps this was Wenger’s planned third iteration of Arsenal.
Squad
Reina – chose Liverpool, and chose to stay there despite interest from Arsenal
Vermaelen
Koscielny
Clichy – went to Man City
Kolo Toure – went to Man City
Wilshire
Walcott
Fabregas – went ‘home’ to Barcelona
Nasri – went to Man City
Song – went to Barcelona
Van Persie – Man United
Injuries also played a part in hampering Wenger’s plan – Abou Diaby and Tomas Rosicky were earmarked for bigger things. Other players just didn’t seem interested – Andre Arshavin was on the outer for months before his return to Russia.
So Wenger had to be content with a lot of plan Bs, when his first choices didn’t work out. Good players, but stopgaps and not the ones he planned for.
His plans usually result in success, as seen with his first two teams. But the third iteration of Arsene’s Arsenal was held together by band aids. It had a few desired cogs – Wilshire, Walcott, Oxlade-Chamberlain.
But too frequently they were surrounded by players who were not Arsene’s first choice. So he kept chasing his tail to build the team he wants/wanted – and is still doing so today.
When Arsene gets it right, he gets it right. But this time around he was not afforded the luxury of simply building the team he wants, due to outside factors and more attractive offers.
It’s not a lack of money, as many fans claimed especially during the Emirates build era. Arsene consistently says the funds are available and a war chest is always referred to. It’s a lack of the right players, and the situation Wenger’s is facing for the first time where his players want to be somewhere else.
And as long as there is more money (higher salaries) on offer elsewhere, and the longer success eludes Arsenal, this trend will continue.
Arsene Wenger has had an extremely tough time trying to perfect his third Arsenal experiment. But if he manages to find the right formula, it will surely be his best success yet. He has the track record, the only question is whether he will have the time.
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