da 888casino： After Monday night’s humiliation, Arsene Wenger fronted up to the media about his team’s abject performance, yet would give no indication about his future.
da brwin： Both of those things are to be expected: after every poor performance, Wenger does, to his credit, answer uncomfortable questions with grace and poise, whilst a post-match press conference certainly isn’t the time to announce whether he’ll stay or go. The aftermath of a tough defeat, in the presence of baying journalists and with angry fans standing outside is not the time or the place to announce you’re staying for another two years. Nor is it right that such a servant of the club should have to announce his departure in such an environment either.
And yet, it is hardly revelatory to suggest that Arsenal could be doing with some clarity.
Newspaper back pages led with Arsenal – alongside the worrying events in Dortmund – once again, and you get the feeling that none of the reports are coincidences. There are reports that either Arsene Wenger or the board themselves, depending on who you’re reading, are stalling over their decision on whether or not to give the Frenchman a new deal; reports that Arsenal may look to bring in a director of football, with former Gunners winger Marc Overmars – currently in the same role with Ajaz – apparently in the fray; and all the while, reports of big-name players looking to leave the club have been circulating, too. There was even the now-annual report that Arsenal would have hundreds of millions of pounds to spend in the transfer market this summer, too.
Wenger’s post-match reaction may have been predictable, but all of what happened next was Peak Arsenal.
All taken together, it’s hard to escape the image of a club falling apart at the seams. It’s hard to take each one in isolation, too. Uncertainty over Wenger’s future is sure to lead to uncertainty over player futures, too.
Reports of players leaving – or players arriving – are certainly not uncommon for this time of year. As clubs gear up for the summer, they start to identify areas of their squad to strengthen, and in order to zero in on potential targets, they need to know who will be available and who will be out of reach. Players know this, too.
It is more damaging, however, that nobody knows whether the manager will be staying or going. The uncertainty leads to the obvious chaos.
But it is also interesting that Arsenal could even be thinking about appointing a director of football this summer. For the last two decades, it has been Arsene Wenger’s job to control almost every inch of the club’s functions, from taking a keen interest in the finances to scouting players and picking the team.
In those 20 years, football has moved on and become a bigger business within a global arena. That means you no longer just need to scout players from Britain and Ireland, but from the rest of the world, too. That was, initially, one of Wenger’s big strengths: he knew France and bought well from abroad, ushering a new era into British football. But one man can’t do every job. Not anymore.
And yet, football has been like that for a long time. It’s not a new phenomenon. So why insist on a director of football now, after 20 years of Wenger at the helm?
The obvious explanation might be that the manager is indeed leaving, that the whispers of a new appointment higher up are just the first steps towards the post-Wenger restructure. But in that case, the question shouldn’t be who will be director of football, it should be who will be the manager?
The other answer could be one that muddies the waters somewhat. Is there a sense in which Wenger, asking for a new contract in the middle of a disappointing season, must accept less than absolute control over the club? Is appointing a director of football whilst still giving Wenger a new, final contract a way of rubbing the sharp angles off the news that many angry Gunners fans dread?
And if that is the case, will anyone who vehemently wants Wenger out already be pacified by the idea of a director of football, even if it means giving the Frenchman a new contract? Will anyone see that as progress?
If Arsenal are indecisive, it is likely to be down to fear. Whatever happens to Wenger’s contract, some around the club will be left unhappy. But the most worrying element is letting fear drive them to inaction: having seemingly failed to line up a successor to Wenger so far, the board may have no other option but to keep their manager as the alternative would be an even bigger leap into the unknown than it would have been even with a manager they’d groomed for the job.
The problem is, indecision could cost them more than just another two years with Arsene Wenger: they could lose their Champions League spot, their attractiveness to new players, and their place amongst the European elite. Sometimes change is a good thing. But change, done badly, never is.