jones wrote:
Burnwinter wrote:
Well I'm not questioning your reasoning. Yes, this club should expect to be fourth or fifth based on its revenues and resources over time.
What I wonder about is the emotional structure there's a choice or otherwise to inhabit, where this season becomes a misery trap unless a particular metric is achieved that isn't the only measure of progress.
That's why I went "mid table realist": after the Wenger years became absurd, the Emery transition failed, the squad was a problem and the executive layer was chaotic and troubled, deeper changes were necessary. The first step out of that is admitting the problem, including admitting all those Prize™- winning years were quite stagnant.
Seventeen years since a major trophy, we qualified for the Champions League in almost all of them. Clearly that alone is far from enough.
I don't look at it all that philosophical or abstracted, I try to look at it from the talent available to the manager and the concrete options available to him on the market. For example in 10/11 or 15/16 we could've won the league had Wenger not been as stubborn and brought in a defender (2011) or striker (2016) in the winter. No managerial nous however could've gotten us anywhere in 06/07, 08/09 or 12/13. Similarly I don't blame the coach for the 16/17 summer window despite it turning out disastrous because Xhaka and Mustafi had the right profile and showed great potential before they came. The summer of 15 however was indefensible no matter how you put it, looking at the end result only either blinds you or leads to pointless conclusions what's important is an analysis of the paths and knowledge that were available.
That's why I think this season and squad are wasted on this manager, he's never shown that he could get his team to play consistently good football regardless of whether it's a defensive or attacking outfit. It's even possible that we somehow fluke our way into the CL with him especially without European football this season, plenty of teams go far despite their managers - look at Milan under Pioli right now or even Chelsea in 14/15 under Mourinho. Fundamentally however Arteta is not a good manager and will hinder us more times than he will improve our chances of success with a squad that has plenty of talent.
I couldn't disagree more with this.
You have a position to defend re Mustafi and Xhaka, but Wenger and co., get no allowance from me. Extensive scouting was not required to see that those two were not players we should be signing and certainly not for £70m.
They're fundamentally flawed footballers, and that is that. Any perceived potential upside should have been thrown out immediately on watching Xhaka receive the ball with his back to play, or trying to defend on the run, or taking a first touch with those breeze-block feet. And Mustafi is footballistically retarded. Which shows in every single thing he does. Even in the midst of a good performance, it's there. Obviously there too.
And, as you mention, that summer came off the back of such disgustingly poor recruitment the summer before that we couldn't stop Leicester winning the League when all the other big, cheaty sides miraculously had a stinker.
I don't really care for looking back, but that is incompetence on such a massive scale that is almost unforgivable.
It's the recruitment that has given me hope with Arteta, especially this summer. It feels like we have been building something good for a while now - I could see the idea behind the squad building.
It's why a loss against Liverpool wouldn't be too damaging to the good feeling around the club, and I think it's where it differs from good runs we had towards the end under Wenger and the one good run we had under Emery. They were cobbled together teams, most with older, middling players. There was no real reason to expect the level to go up, and it was obvious more often than not that we just had a kind run of fixtures rather than being genuinely good.
We'll find out how good this team is when we go to Anfield, but regardless of exactly where we're at right now, there's every reason to think that, as partnerships continue to form and characters continue to emerge, this team will get better. And if you believe Arteta knows a player and knows the team he's trying to create - as I do and I think many Arsenal fans are starting to cautiously hope is the case - then there's every reason to think the recruitment in the next couple of windows will be just what is needed to continue improving.
