Are Arsenal Too Reliant On Wenger, Arshavin and More

So what’s new in the world of Arsenal? New away kit for next season, preserving the commemorative status of the current version. In no way whatsoever is this a commercial exploitation on the club’s part, No Siree Bob. As it happens there is nothing wrong with the blue – it’s blue, whichever way you look at it, not Midnight Blue, just as the away strip a while back was not Anthracite, the shorts were, well God alone knows what colour.

Robert Pires made a few interesting observations regarding the manager’s dilemma about his future, even if the quandry no longer exists:

I must say that Madrid are above Arsenal in terms of status and for their history. Arsenal need Arsene Wenger more than he needs Arsenal. His youth policy will pay off in the future, no doubt.

An interesting proposition put forward. Is the club dependent on Wenger to the point of over-reliance? Personally, I am not so sure that the issue is as black and white as Pires has stated.

Project Youth is by no means the finished article, the consistency required to win is coming through. To that extent, and it is a point that Pires made, Wenger most likely would not abandon a project in which he has staked his own reputation and a considerable amount of physical, mental and emotional energy. However, that does not mean that his head cannot be turned by a substantial offer from a club with Real’s history.

The issue becomes clouded simply because it is Wenger who has built the systems and procedures that sustain the scouting. In a time when money is an issue at Arsenal, these are of the utmost importance. Keeping the wheels well oiled would be crucial for long-term sustainability of the direction that Wenger has chosen yet the club would not risk appointing a novice as his replacement.

Pires identified a potential replacement in Pelligrini, whose background and playing philosophy appear similar to the Arsenal manager. There is no doubt that Wenger’s eventual successor will need to be someone with experience of football at the highest level and be able to build on the Frenchman’s foundations.

There exists a mutual dependency between the club and manager. Wenger has returned the club to the top of the English game, something that had slipped in the latter years of Graham’s reign and not substanitally improved under Rioch although in fairness to him, he was building a platform on which he could build. Wenger has built his reputation at Arsenal and has total control over the playing staff, a state of affairs not necessarily available elsewhere, even if he were to go to a club with the remit to start over again.

Anyway, it’s all supposition because Le Boss has stated he is going nowhere and so has Ivan Gazidis.  Matt Hughes in The Times proposes that the players about whom he and his peers continually speculate should actually stay put. The general theory fits the notion that Arsene has been a reasonably good judge of character about when to terminate a player’s Arsenal career.

There is no denying that he has done well and some players have made ill-advised choices in the timings of their departures. Equally there are those who have been successful post-Arsenal – Vieira, Henry, Overmars spring immediately to mind – it is all down to luck and wise decision making, as well as a healthy dose of subjectivity in deciding how to define success. The crucial thing is that Arsenal will go on long after any player departures and has done so for the best part of a century and one quarter. There is no reason to believe that situation will change.

One man not looking towards an Arsenal future is Philippe Senderos:

I feel very good here and I would like to stay. I know that the decision does not depend on me, but on the two clubs.

A tinge of sadness about that because I believe Senderos will go on to become a highly regarded centre back. At Arsenal his confidence was battered and he needed a change of scenery to recover that. He appears to have done so with reports suggesting that he has had a good second half of the season. Best of luck if he does move, welcome back if he does not.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, Andrei Arshavin is keeping dictaphone tape manufacturers in business during an extensive round of interviews in the past week. Like almost everyone else, he has some advice for Wenger:

I think we need to buy two or three players, but it is up to our manager to decide which positions he wants to strengthen.

At least he recognises that it is Arsene’s job to decide who joins. Arshavin seems confident that the squad is not as far from completion as the recent barrage of cynicism suggested:

I would not say we lack experience…but sometimes we could do with a bit more maturity or composure. It will come, you just need time.

As an experienced professional, you would expect him to see the signs of what was lacking this season rather better than you or I. The situation has not led him to plumb the depths of negativity though, the Russian confident that a full pre-season will see an even better Arshavin and a positive campaign in 2009/10:

I have settled in quickly, though, and am looking forward to the challenges of the new season – one that we all hope will see us bring some trophies to the club for the players and the fans.

’til Tomorrow.