English Premier League: Arsenal must prove that they are contenders
It’s been around five year since Arsenal last won a major trophy in club football. A club that aspires to be competing with the likes of Real Madrid and Manchester United certainly doesn’t want their barren run of success to continue much longer. But why is it that Arsenal can’t do it at the final hurdle? A team that has so much talent has been second best and sometimes even third best in certain competitions.
A few years ago, Wenger made it clear that his team was in a transitional phase with Thierry Henry leaving the club and the likes of Flamini and Cesc Fabregas coming into the Arsenal first team to gain experience. All the fans understood that for the next 2-3 years, the club would have to practice patience due to the relatively youthful nature of their squad. Fast forward five years and Arsenal F.C is still playing the same old card. Same old trick which says that they have young players who are still learning the trade.
Arsene Wenger has no doubt been a fantastic proponent of attacking football in England. Ever since his arrival into the English game in the mid 1990s, football in Britain has taken a turn for the good. He has brought in various man-management techniques and also played a huge part in ridding the game of its drinking culture especially when it came to the players.
But is the old Frenchman losing the plot now? On television, it is heard every day that football is a form of art. If that was true then the French would be the best at the sport. That is certainly not the case. Anyone who tells you that football is a form of art is lying. It may be on certain occasions but mostly it is a sport which is perhaps the most passionate in the world and is played in different ways by different teams to win trophies at the highest level.
Two games into the new season, Wenger has come out with the old charade of criticizing aggressive football. Arsenal, who play in the English Premier League have had trouble against what can be termed as relatively more physical sides in the English league. Teams such as Blackburn, Stoke Sunderland and Bolton Wanderers. It is true that these sides do adopt an unfair level of physicality in certain situations but that doesn’t mean that what they are doing is wrong.
If Blackburn had a Ronaldinho and if Bolton had a Messi, they wouldn’t have to do so. Such teams only employ an aggressive style because they have no other choice. To compete against the big boys with their low budget squads the likes of Stoke have to try something different and that is to rattle the marquee players in the opposition, out of their comfort zones.
However, some people (read Arsene Wenger) are not at ease with such an approach. In his post match comments after Arsenal’s 6-0 win over Blackpool, Wenger said that the match between Tottenham and Stoke at the Britannia stadium was more like a Rugby match than a football one. To win the English Premier League not only do the contenders have to beat their rivals but also such menial outfits like Blackburn. Coincidently the team Arsenal play this coming weekend.
By dishing out the lavish feast of condemnation to the way Stoke played, which is the way Blackburn are also likely to play, Wenger has only reaffirmed that his team are scared to get their hands dirty when it comes to a footballing fist fight. If Arsenal are indeed to overcome their lack of success in recent years, then one thing is for sure, there will be times when the going gets tough and when that happens, the tough get going. Something that Wenger should learn sooner rather than later for Arsenal F.C’s sake.
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