Wenger's Wrongs

Stubborn people are hugely frustrating. As a stubborn person myself, I have observed my friends’ faces drop with exasperation as I again dismiss their solid, well thought out argument rather than at least partly entertain it.

This trait, along with a love of late-renaissance Italian loft conversions, I share with Arsene Wenger.

He’d rather fail than change. After all, how could he be wrong? He’s studied at great length every league in Europe from the bottom to the top every day of his life since he was three and a half, has a PhD in footballology and listens to re-runs of radio commentary from Ligue 3 games through headphones whilst sleeping in an oxygen chamber.

He is the Einstein of football, a sporting scientist to the purist, most devoted degree. If football had a bible, he’d burn it.

So maybe it’s Faith he’s missing.

Some things cannot be explained, and are not always what they seem. Space, deep sea ocean life, the hidden functions of the brain, and female intuition: these are just a few examples.

Wenger has the following theory:



RVP x Cesc / 4-3-3 + Nasri squared = the square root of Arshavin



Now if we count ‘RVP’ as 1 and ‘Nasri’ as the provider of the assist, then Arsenal should, obviously, win every match they play. But they don’t.

This is because football is played by humans, creatures far too complicated to apply logic and scientific reasoning to.

Psychology, Wenger’s least favourite subject at school, also has its part to play, as well as certain other truths rooted in common law, dismissed from Wenger’s progressive school of thought for being ‘too boring’. Par example:

“If one man should jump at the same thyme a fellow man should jump, and the first man is taller, it is the first who’s forehead glances the leathersphere toward the onion bag…………so sayeth the Lord. Amen.”

Let’s apply some common truths and psychology to Arsenal.

Truths

1. If you don’t shoot, you won’t score.

2. If you don’t stay goal side, you can’t defend.

3. If you can’t beat your man in the air, he will get to the ball first.

4. If they always beat their man in the air, your team won’t score headers.

5. If you can’t beat the first man with a cross, don’t bother trying.



Psychology

1. If they score first, it makes the game twice as hard, never let that happen.

2. If your defenders have no faith in their keeper, they will lose confidence in themselves.

3. If your midfield has no confidence in your defence, they will lose confidence in themselves.

4. If your strikers have no confidence in the midfield, they will have no confidence in themselves.

5. If you’re 28 and five foot nothing, and have to constantly try and create space by running like a madman the entire game only to ultimately be barged off the ball by two great hulking defenders who are watching you like a hawk, it’s going to make your head drop.


More could be applied. The point is Wenger has to look beyond the factors that come up in sour-faced post match interviews.

It wasn’t so much the second goal that defeated us as the first. We weren’t concentrating on the first ball into the box but apart from that we played well. They played a physical game and marked our players well.

Do those phrases sound like something you need a PhD in footballology to work out?

No. Because they’re chop-smackingly OBVIOUS.


Remember that Chris Rock sketch about mothers who say, “I look afta ma kids!” and Chris’ response is, “YOU’RE SUPPOSE TA!”

Well Wenger, “YOU’RE SUPPOSE TA!”

Your team is supposed to always concentrate, always make life difficult for the players who are supposed to be marking them, suppose to take their chances, defend corners and complete crosses. These are the basics and Arsenal are in the top class doing advanced studies alongside clever kids like Barcelona, when they’re still struggling with their ten times table.

I love this team and their manager, and I know we can be successful again….but how I wish Wenger knew the solution to his problems is as plain as the nose on his face.