Arsenal Stagger into Fourth

After Sunday’s 1-0 victory over Newcastle, Arsenal secured the best they could have hoped for this season - a fourth place finish. This gives them the last of the vital Champions League spots and entry into the elite and extremely profitable competition.

This season provided very few glimpses of the Arsenal of old. The moments where they played the elegant, glamorous, and fast moving football that has made them so famous and successful under Arsene Wenger was rarely seen.

Too often, Arsenal fans were demoralizingly privy to spiritless and scared football. They were easily handled by the big boys of England that once were close rivals, and struggled against teams far below their wage bill whom they once dominated and made into spectacles of their superiority.

The supporters are unhappy yet satisfied that there is at least the possibility of continental football in the echelons of Europe’s most prestigious club competition next year.

In addition, Arsene Wenger is quite pleased that he has secured a 16^th straight season in the Champions League, albeit in a clumsy and deteriorated fashion. That hasn’t stopped him however from offering his proverbial press snippets of a desire to improve the team for the upcoming season in order to challenge those at the top for some long awaited silverware.

If the last 7 years has anything to show us, it’s that his words can be rather uninspired. His end of the year address is more of a feeble attempt to maintain the peace among the Gunners faithful and preserve his tall frame against the manager’s chair in one of those cheesy Citroen sponsored seats.

Because of Wenger’s stringent philosophy of financial self-sufficiency and counter culture transfer and wage policy, 4^th place is like winning the league to him now. It feeds his ego and perpetuates the belief that what he does is successful and on his own terms.

At the end of every year, as long as the team has managed to claw its way into the top four, he cleverly ensures the media and fans that he will attempt to improve the squad without offering a definitive commitment.

He speaks in circles, the way any good diplomat does, talking of the ‘need to improve’ and a desire to ‘strengthen the group’, but never promises anything.

Instead, he commends his team’s performance, talks about how much character the players have, and lowers everyone’s expectations for the transfer window by redirecting all blaring inadequacies his squad has, and highlights misleading statistics and how rich oligarchs and sheikhs are abusing the financial side of the game.

After the win at Newcastle, Wenger had this to say:

“Since February 1, we have taken more points than everybody else in the league, and I don’t believe that’s just down to coincidence, but just to the fact that the group has grown. This team has grown through the season.”

“In the last three months, I believe we have been remarkably consistent. We have won every away game, so it is a good springboard for next season, to transfer that belief into the start of next season.”

“…we need to have stability and strengthen our group if possible because there are many clubs out there with a lot of money, so the competition is very hard and there is not as much talent as money today in football.”

First he reminds everyone how well the team has performed after an unmentioned horrific start and drastic slide down the table. Then he reinforces the idea that the team and players he has are indeed quality, right before reminding everyone that there are many rich teams and that players are overpriced these days, thereby giving him an excuse when he doesn’t buy anybody while he sells the years best performers.

However, there is talk of this year being different than the others. There are clear indications that Wenger has a lot of money to play with. The papers say Arsenal will spend big.

And yet, this has all been said before. It was said last year after the sale of Robin Van Persie and it was said the year before that after the sales of Cesc Fabregas and Samir Nasri.

The results were panic buys and miscalculated risks on players that Wenger thought were gems in France’s Ligue 1, Ligue 2, or wherever it is he thinks gems come from. The players he bought were never going to replace the ones he sold.

The fans don’t expect the manager to go out and spend 100 million euros the way Manchester City, Chelsea, Real Madrid, and as of late, Paris St. Germain do every year. They just want quality to be replaced with quality. They want the manager to spend the money he makes from the players he sells.

They don’t want to watch him waste the summer flirting with signings and then returning in late August empty handed and telling the world that all football clubs have gone mad.

In my experience, the one person who says that everyone else is crazy, is usually the one that’s crazy.

People understand that the market is bigger and more congested. There are new variables with endless resources that drive prices up, but that doesn’t mean Arsenal can’t compete for quality names. The last time I checked, according to the best publication that reminds you how poor you are - Forbes, they’re the 4^th richest football club in the world.

The fans don’t want any more rhetoric; they don’t want justifications and lowered expectations for an inadequate squad. They want Wenger to spend the money he has. They want to see the players they have lost, replaced. Simply put, as they have chanted so many times this year, they want their Arsenal back.

Also it wouldn’t be so bad if Arsene looked a little more debonair on the sidelines.