I made a post not long ago that was quite similar to what @Phoebica is saying, the thrust was basically that I don’t understand how or why people aren’t bothering to watch Arsenal matches because they are fed up of us being shit and didn’t want to waste their time. It has since been explained to me that what it comes down to is the lack of hope and everything feeling like a bit of a foregone conclusion, and that it’s more this rather than us being shit that causes their lack of interest.
I somewhat understand and agree with this argument. I am less passionate about Arsenal at the moment, in the sense that it just isn’t affecting my mood in the same way it has in previous years. Recently when we lose I have a moment or two of being pissed off, then I figuratively shrug and get on with my day, because ultimately I don’t expect anything more than that from us at the moment. In the past a bad Arsenal result would totally ruin my day, and sometimes the following one. I’d sulk like a 5 year old and be utterly shit company lol
But at the same time, if we became a truly shit side who at finished in midtable every season and literally never won any of the trophies contested each season things would be far more boring and monotonous, there’d be a complete absence of hope and excitement. As bad as things are in recent seasons we are in the final and have some chance of winning our third FA cup in four years, things can get a lot less exciting than this. If you can’t be fucked watching Arsenal now then I highly doubt you’re going to be tuning into most matches if we were in the situation outlined above. So in that sense I can totally see why Phoebica would use the term glory/fairweather fans, even if it perhaps a bit too harsh/contentious a phrase for my liking, and not the one I’d necessarily throw at anyone on here.
Maybe it’s just different strokes for different folks. Personally I can’t really imagine a context in which I don’t watch virtually every single Arsenal match (ofc everyone misses the odd one or two unless you put football above everything else in your life) that I possibly can. So the idea that people might not bother watching the last ever North London Derby at White Hart Lane, or feel ambivalent about being convincingly beaten in it, is one that I struggle to comprehend.
Hopefully Wenger goes and we get a new manager in, energising the fanbase and making forums and social media more enjoyable and hopeful places to be. But those who blame it on Wenger and the depressing sense of inevitability he’s created around this side, I’d be curious to see what they say if they aren’t watching us regularly because we aren’t very good under the next guy.
I somewhat understand and agree with this argument. I am less passionate about Arsenal at the moment, in the sense that it just isn’t affecting my mood in the same way it has in previous years. Recently when we lose I have a moment or two of being pissed off, then I shrig and get on with my day, because ultimately I don’t expect anything more than that from us at the moment. In the past a bad Arsenal result would totally ruin my day, and sometimes the following one. I’d sulk like a 5 year old and be utterly shit company lol
This is the first season in 17 years of watching Arsenal, that I have little remorse in missing games. Knowing how lackluster and hopeless we play and have become, I am not going to torture myself sitting through a game only to walk away with disappointment and tears.
At this point, I would much rather watch us play games and be mid table under a new manager than more of the same hopeless dross served up by Wenger.
I am done watching Arsene FC. And for good reason. Call me whatever you want.
But if we were midtable then that would mean the new manager would be serving up hopeless dross to a greater extent than Wenger. You’ve invited us to call you what we want, so I’d go for “confused”.
I think the fact that these two have been our starting options in the striker position in recent seasons, illustrates why we aren’t going to be playing CL football next season.
They are average at best and no where near the quality we are used to and deserve.
Tbf their part of the reason that we do play champions league football usually. More realistic to say their not good enough to compete at that level.
Welbecks injury this season is worrying too as his comeback has been quite lackluster tbh.
No Jakey. It’s far away from confused, as I know exactly what I want: something new and to have something new, Wenger must go.
I rather be stuck in mid-table with mid table players, playing football that is different from what we play now under a different manager.
Arsene FC is an embarrassment. The way we play with the players we have is pathetic. Wenger is lucky that it only happened this season that we will miss out on Top 4. It could have already happened in the past, but with luck and 1 or 2 players dragging us to top 4 towards the end of the season, Wenger’s obvious shortcomings had been masqueraded for another season to come.
Similar to United, a transition won’t be easy. But for the sake of our love for this club, let this man go away now and not even later. It’s like keeping a virtually dead person on life support, but we all know we should pull the fuckin plug.
I pretty much agree with this whole post. The only thing I can’t get on board with is the notion that things would be better if we were genuinely midtable with totally mediocre, midtable players. To me that just makes no sense.
I understand it makes no sense, but it just illustrates how desperate I am for change. Change in manager, change in play, change in personnel. Don’t get me wrong. I would like us to change managers and be competitive and I believe we could be. But sticking with Arsene, because the alternative might be worse isn’t cutting it for me anymore. I rather do a United and have some upheaval, we might be dross, we might be mid table, but I will be watching and with hope and illusion again that things might get better.
Under Wenger all of that hope and illusion has been exhausted.
Exactly.
All I want is something different.
Every season is too predictable, from the transfer windows, persisting with players that aren’t good enough and the injuries to same players, to the drop in form and the top players wanting to leave.
On top of that, hearing the same old tired excuses from Wenger, and his pathetic promises of not being afraid of spending to hearing how he “tried” to buy world class players.
Then we will hear how my players showed “character” “mental strength” 'unity" “desire” etc, when we all know it is just a pack of lies.
The team he has assembled is the weakest, mentally, I have ever seen at the club and Wenger himself has allowed the club to stagnate to a level that is going to be difficult to rebuild.
The game yesterday just highlighted the way a top manager should behave and get the best from his players.
I said last season Pochettino is potentially the best manager in the PL and I think, along with Conte, he actually is.
He is everything Wenger used to be, and now has overtaken him by some margin.
I can guarantee there is no way he will ever be better than Pochettino after this season, because he is a manager on the way down and Pochettino is on the way up.
It’s just a shame he is at our biggest rivals and next season we are going to have to watch them in the CL, challenging for the PL title, while we are going for the fourth place trophy which looks out of our reach.
I would struggle to comprehend that too, I can more than buy the thing about zoning out during the turgid games (remember drawing 0-0 at home to Middlesbrough?! ) but anyone who can’t get invested in a fixture like yesterday (to the point of not watching ?!!) is a very ‘different’ Arsenal supporter to me, to frame it politely
I agree.
I’m old enough to remember when spurs were nearly always better than us and they had better players and played more entertaining football.
I can also remember trudging up to Highbury and watching fairly turgid football in the early eighties and early nineties but always wanting us to win even though I knew that a lot of the other big clubs were bigger and better than us.
In fact, I quite liked it when we were known as boring Arsenal and were not challenging for the League because there was no real pressure.
Just remember, spurs might be above us this season, but unless they win the PL three times, get to a CL final, win the FA Cup a few times and play some of the most entertaining football in Europe, they still will struggle to achieve what we have since they last finished ahead in the PL.
Also, how are a club as small as them going to keep hold of the best nabber in the PL after moving to a new stadium and having to pay for that?
Really letdown after that performance. My only gripe prior to the match was starting Giroud over Welbeck. I didn’t say anything about no Holding until after the 2nd goal was let in, and hindsight 20/20 from me on that. But Holding held his own these last three matches switching to the 3 at the back formation, especially considering he was against ManCity one of those matches with that attack.
But keeping a clean sheet against Jaime Vardy twice this season, and despite his drop in form, you would think Vardy would feast on an inexperienced player. Regardless, the whole team bar Cech, and perhaps even Ramsey were poor. The team selection was wrong, the subs came too late when Giroud should’ve been sent back to France at halftime. The midfield overrun, Oxlade-Chamberlain exposed playing that RB hybrid or whatever he was trying in defending, and the attack non-existent. Alexis and Ozil were nowhere.
Seeing Spurs close down Arsenal have have that extra step was just the reality of how timid Arsenal play when a team presses them. The bad passing, the lack of creation up front, nobody to rally the team, and of course the classic capitulation after allowing a shitty Stoke fucking goal from a throw-in.
Spurs should’ve scored 2 in the first half. And when they went up 1-0 OK FINE, shit happens, but calm down and re-collect yourselves. No, from our own kickoff we let a penalty happen within a minute? Pathetic. And I do think Harry Kane dove for that penalty, stuck his leg out, cunt.
All in all. Outclassed by a better prepared team. Fast forward to the FA Cup and send Wenger out on a high with that and move the fuck on. Oh yeah and hopefully Chelsea win the league, ugh.
No, I’ve either not expressed myself well or you’ve missed the point of my post, or both.
We want to feel that Arsenal has some kind of plan, or some kind of coherence toward meeting the aspirations of the club. Without that, and without the feeling that that is even close to the horizon, it is hard not to feel disillusioned and extremely jaded with the thing.
) but anyone who can’t get invested in a fixture like yesterday (to the point of not watching ?!!) is a very ‘different’ Arsenal supporter to me, to frame it politely