We could barely muster a win away from home in Wenger's last season, and that trend set in the season before. Knowing how stubborn Wenger was, I doubt that record would've improved much, even in covid times.

We could have bought better of course, but that probably would've had nothing to do with Wenger. Let's not forget we were buying crap like xhaka, Mustafi, Perez, lacazette while he was still here.

Yeah but you have to factor in that Wenger replacing needed on and off the field. And Emery wasn’t great by any means, those that slunk in behind the scenes were actually terrible to the point of being destructive.

Sanllehí and Joorabchian rinsed the club of ridiculous sums in such a short space of time that even our famously hands-off owners got suspicious enough to step in.

That is one area we might have been better off had Wenger still been around. Though even that’s debatable given the signings he made towards the end of his reign.

And tactically he was too entrenched in the past.

I genuinely think people who think we’d still be top 4 under Wenger are fantasising over a manager that doesn’t exist anymore.

Great man though, and I’ve all the time in the world for him as a person. Total legend. I’m glad as much of his legend was allowed to remain in tact as there is.

Yeah but your home record was decent. I think you’d have been able to accumulate enough points to be in and around top four given what was needed the last couple of years.

I was talking more about what you could have done after Wenger. The transfer policy has still been shiiiiiit. Especially with regard to the attack. As you say, he wouldn’t have left it like this, though. But Arsenal didn’t need to do it with Emery and Arteta. It’s just poor squad building, regardless of the crippling wages.

You’re just making the same mistakes we did. But we’ve worked from a higher base so haven’t ended up as bad as you have.

I think that’s why it annoys me that I’ve seen you do it.

The football would be better, don't get me wrong, and we'd have a few more points, but we just wouldn't be going anywhere as a club.

I know things look bad now, but we're trying to change the culture at the club. Not easy when theres so much rubbish in the squad and you're trying to undo nearly five or 6 years of awful transfers.

*sorry, terribly written. Still getting used to using an iPad

What I meant was, if you think we got it wrong with whom we chose to replace Wenger the coach, who replaced Wenger the talent spotter and negotiator were ten times worse.

I genuinely think people who think we’d still be top 4 under Wenger are fantasising over a manager that doesn’t exist anymore.
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Nah it’s more that I’ve seen shiiiiiit United and Chelsea sides finish top four. And West Ham are currently in there this season. I just think a manager like Wenger brings a floor - where winning points is concerned - that isn’t far off the CL places. Just because he wouldn’t break through a glass ceiling doesn’t mean he couldn’t keep you ticking over at the level needed for that goal.

I completely agree that Wenger needed replacing as well. I just think you’ve completely ballsed up that process, and why you are now worse than had he stayed.

We'd be around top 6 fighting for top 4 but Arteta took on a difficult job and a club in decline so you can't really compare. After such a long serving manager you almost have to go back before going forwards and some of our problems now are still because of bad decisions made years ago. But it shows how great Wenger was that when he was past his peak and making so many mistakes he still gave us that level of consistency.

Ultimately, Wenger wouldve got us Europa League football last couple of years, and we've achieved that, whether through the league or the cup. Would the football have been better? Certainly at the Emirates.

This year has been bad, but things are slowly improving, and we're gutting the squad of all the overpaid rubbish and poison that Wenger filled it with under that regime. Seems we've made a mistake with Willian, but I like the other signings.

But it shows how great Wenger was that when he was past his peak and making so many mistakes he still gave us that level of consistency.
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Yeah that’s what I mean. For all his faults, just would never have had you in the position you’ve been in the league for the last two seasons. With the wealth of experience he has managing in this league.

But you didn’t need to be in the position even without Wenger. You’ve just made even worse decisions than he did.

And the ownership have a lot to answer for. It’s mental that Arsenal are in 11th with 13 games to go.

Tbh, I'm still conflicted on whether arsene had a say in blowing 70M on xhaka and Mustafi.

He's signed chit players in those positions before of course, but for very low fees.

Doubt he’d have signed Pepe for £72m. Even when he was losing his eye for talent he’d always manage to bag a top attacker, or even just a good prem one, from somewhere. His last signing was Auba, wasn’t it? You’d have been really facked without him.

Yeah, and he only signed auba because he saw lacazette for a few months and panicked

We've just been a complete mess, debating wether we'd have been better under Wenger is like debating who is the tallest dwarf.

I really don’t think it is, Wenger’s mess was a giant in comparison. You’re below Leeds ffs.

I dunno. We're more competitive in big games, not getting destroyed like we used to. And we smashed Leeds just the other day.

It's bad, but I've been seeing signs of improvement of late. Reeeeeeally slowly, but it's happening. Just gotta get the next transfer window right.

comment by Tu Meke - AinsleyForRightBack (U3732)
posted 4 minutes ago
I dunno. We're more competitive in big games, not getting destroyed like we used to. And we smashed Leeds just the other day.

It's bad, but I've been seeing signs of improvement of late. Reeeeeeally slowly, but it's happening. Just gotta get the next transfer window right.
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Defensively we have been sooooo much better. If Wenger had done half of what Arteta has done for the team defensively, he would have won more. However, Arteta cannot get us playing well going forward as well and consistently as Wenger could at his best. Granted, when teams figured out, Wenger struggled and we were pretty poor going forward in his last couple of seasons.

Wenger was finished due to his inability to adapt and his stubbornness about playing some players. Arteta is not ready. 2 years in the championship would have made him much more ready for this role. At this point in time, he is not the answer. He has to win the Europa league or it's over in my opinion. I hope he proves me wrong and goes on to grow.

Come on, it’s a mile away. People wanted Wenger out because you couldn’t kick on and win the big prizes. And then because you dropped out the top four for a couple of seasons, whilst still being competitive.

Being midtable for two seasons now is incomparable. And the worrying thing is that most wouldn’t look at this squad and say they are massively underperforming either, it’s a really shiiiiit squad.

There’s obviously been some promise, but I don’t think it negates the overall grim picture of where you’ve got to. Wenger got bantered but it was inconceivable that it’d get this bad back then.

https://www.ja606.co.uk/articles/viewArticle/382492

I'll just pick out the 13/14 season:

6-3 loss away to man city
6-0 loss away to Chelsea
5-1 loss away to Liverpool
1-0 away to a fecking Moyes United
3-0 loss away to a fecking Roberto Martinez Everton

I don't think you can quite understand the humiliation sitting those results can bring unless you've experienced it. I 100% would've finished midtable if it meant getting a 0-0 draw in all those games.

One of the reasons why I just can't give a shiiit about top 4 anymore. I know we need it for money, but the best way to get it is to put everything you have into winning the league. You won't win it, but you'll probably get top 4.

comment by MaineGunner (U10130)
posted 12 minutes ago
comment by Tu Meke - AinsleyForRightBack (U3732)
posted 4 minutes ago
I dunno. We're more competitive in big games, not getting destroyed like we used to. And we smashed Leeds just the other day.

It's bad, but I've been seeing signs of improvement of late. Reeeeeeally slowly, but it's happening. Just gotta get the next transfer window right.
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Defensively we have been sooooo much better. If Wenger had done half of what Arteta has done for the team defensively, he would have won more. However, Arteta cannot get us playing well going forward as well and consistently as Wenger could at his best. Granted, when teams figured out, Wenger struggled and we were pretty poor going forward in his last couple of seasons.

Wenger was finished due to his inability to adapt and his stubbornness about playing some players. Arteta is not ready. 2 years in the championship would have made him much more ready for this role. At this point in time, he is not the answer. He has to win the Europa league or it's over in my opinion. I hope he proves me wrong and goes on to grow.
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Arteta has crap attackers to be fair, as we've got rid of all our creative players. The football has been improving since Smith Rowe and odegaard have come in, but they're not ready yet.

That’s fair enough, I know how much you’ve hated those humiliations. But I just think the overall picture of where Arsenal are right now is far more humiliating, looking from the outside. You’ve then got to look at the short, mid and long term financial health of the club, and that’s a mile away from where you were when you had a fairly consistent level with hopes and aspirations of being top dog in England again - and they weren’t massively unreasonable, hence why Wenger needed to leave as he held you back.

Now you’re talking having to have a complete rebuild just to try and get back to the position you were in for all those years.

I’m not trying to put a downer on you, that’s just how see the situations differently.

There is promise, of course. Arsenal football club is too big to remain like this indefinitely. But you’ll probably need to start behaving more like Liverpool, Leicester and Spurs, than Man United.

It is what it is mate, I wish I could just wave a wand and make all those terrible transfer decisions into good ones. We're talking from 2014 here, there's still players hanging around, cluttering up the squad from then. We've needed to detox the squad since Wenger was here.

That’s fair enough, I know how much you’ve hated those humiliations.

===

thanks mate.

We would not have been near the relegation zone under Wenger

Fact is Arteta has taken us from a top 6 team to a mid table team. He has made us more defensive and we dont create chances against anyone even remotely set up to stop us.

comment by Donny The King van de Beek (U10026)
posted 11 hours, 9 minutes ago
That’s fair enough, I know how much you’ve hated those humiliations. But I just think the overall picture of where Arsenal are right now is far more humiliating, looking from the outside. You’ve then got to look at the short, mid and long term financial health of the club, and that’s a mile away from where you were when you had a fairly consistent level with hopes and aspirations of being top dog in England again - and they weren’t massively unreasonable, hence why Wenger needed to leave as he held you back.

Now you’re talking having to have a complete rebuild just to try and get back to the position you were in for all those years.

I’m not trying to put a downer on you, that’s just how see the situations differently.

There is promise, of course. Arsenal football club is too big to remain like this indefinitely. But you’ll probably need to start behaving more like Liverpool, Leicester and Spurs, than Man United.
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If it gets us back to the top, it's much better for us to properly rebuild and accept finishing mid-table, than to carry on with the short-term sticking plaster approach that has seen us gradually slide down the table under Wenger, and then Emery.

There are two things Arteta has done:
(1) made us a team that can defend properly - our defensive record is now one of the best in the league
(2) reduced our attacking potency - we have really struggled to create as many chances or score as many goals, and this has been in long-term decline for a few seasons. Arteta has yet to figure this out, but the emergence of ESR and Saka, as well as Martinelli last season, have helped to offset the decline in performance from Auba and Lacazette. However, our attack is still very hit and miss, and currently very fragile - it only fires when ESR is playing as far as I can see, although maybe Odegaard can start to fill that void. The attacking midfield position is a key piece of the jigsaw in the way Arteta sets out his team, and the idea Willian could play there was a clear mistake.

Our central midfield is still a huge issue. Perhaps had Partey stayed fit we'd be significantly higher up the table, but the truth is all our other CM options are sub-par. We need to sign some better options here if we are going to compete for the top four or higher. Until Arteta has had the chance to improve the midfield this summer, I think it's unfair to pass full judgement. According to statistical analysis, we have improved as a side this season, but whereas last season a lot of the games decided by a single goal went our way, this season they've almost all gone against us especially with red card decisions. Our league position is a bit misleading - according to Fivethirtyeight's analysis: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/soccer-predictions/premier-league/, Arsenal are now the 5th best side in the premier league (based on stats like XG, attack strength vs defensive strength), albeit only slightly head of a whole host of other sides like Leicester, Spurs, West Ham, Villa, Wolves and Everton.