When Arsene Wenger signed his contract extension following Arsenal’s FA Cup final victory over Chelsea last May, he remarked that the uncertainty surrounding his future had contributed to an “absolutely horrendous” atmosphere at some points last season.
With that doubt now removed, he expressed the wish that all at the club could now look forward to a successful year with everyone moving in the same direction.
At Anfield on Sunday, there did seem to be a unity of purpose from Arsenal.
The board, the manager and the players all possess a similar lack of ruthlessness, a shared failure to do what is required and a structural tendency to coast right up to the point where they collectively crash up against the rocks.
Arsene Wenger didn’t grant himself a contract extension in May. He may be the most powerful figure at the club and a man who is deserving of the greatest respect, but the board were the ones who decided he should stay and, in doing so, ultimately condemned a man who has done so much for English football to the ugliest possible of exits from the club he loves.
That is inevitable after the Liverpool defeat, but then again it has seemed inevitable for some time and yet nothing happens.
2003/04: The Invincibles
2017/18: The Invisibles pic.twitter.com/tpAj0PgE94— JOE (@JOE_co_uk) August 27, 2017
There is no point saying that Wenger has to go. It seems cruel to keep repeating something so obvious and when it happens it may not even be enough. Who would trust the club that granted him a contract extension to make the right choices for the club in the future?
Arsenal’s players performed on Sunday as if they are aware of this existential drift. In neglecting the very basics of what is required from footballers, they could point to similar failures at other areas of the club.
Arsenal have some players who are massively overrated and who neglect some fundamentals, but it was a display which suggested that this is a club imploding with a manager incapable of improving things and nobody prepared to take the action that is necessary.
Alexis Sanchez right now… #LFCvsAFC pic.twitter.com/IwMoH21I2T
— JOE (@JOE_co_uk) August 27, 2017
When Wenger’s contract was agreed, Arsenal released a statement which said that “Arsene and chief executive Ivan Gazidis have conducted a full review of our on and off the pitch activities to identify areas for improvement to build a sustained title challenge”.
This review would make interesting reading as whatever areas of improvement it identified it clearly didn’t identify the area of players making the same mistakes, of drifting through games and ignoring some key demands made of professional footballers.
Other than that, it must have been a comprehensive review as Arsenal can’t even get out of September without being in crisis.
Some players may leave the club this week and there may be a temptation to make some desperate signings. They won’t make any difference. Arsenal are too far gone, too committed to a model that is pre-programmed for failure and now may be about to fail even on its own terms.
Wenger will be the fall guy, sacrificed thanks to his own failings which now outweigh his faded genius and the failures of those at all other levels of the club.
When Arsenal won their first trophy in nine years in 2014, it was an opportunity to suggest to Wenger that he walks away. Each year since then has compounded that failure. The backing for the manager, which is portrayed as strength, is turning out to be the core weakness of the club.
The idea that the uncertainty over Wenger’s future had any impact on performances was always nothing more than a cliche and the new contract has done nothing for the form of Arsenal players.
And it did nothing to promote any greater sense of permanence around Wenger. Contracts don’t really do that anymore, certainly not at a club where their failings are so well known and inexplicably have never been addressed, despite a full review into on and off the pitch activities. Only a fundamental change in the approach of the side would have done that, but that clearly will never happen while Wenger is manager.
The opportunities to recruit the players who would make real change over they years have been missed while simultaneously the window to thank Wenger for his years of remarkable service and gently prod him towards retirement in a dignified way is closed.
Instead Arsenal propel themselves towards a meltdown thanks to an inability of the powerful at the club to recognise that a man as driven as Wenger needed to be guided away from the job once it was clear he was no longer effective.
“I love this club and I am looking forward to the future with optimism and excitement,” Wenger said back in May.
Nobody could question his love or his ability to imagine the best for his players, but despite a Cup final win over Chelsea, somebody should have interrogated the grounds for that optimism.
Instead Arsenal have sleepwalked through another summer making many familiar mistakes.
Yet if Arsenal fans thought that with Wenger in charge they were doomed to repeat the same season over and over again, they might have to think again: if anything it may be about to get worse.
