Arsène Wenger to Step Down at End of the Season

[Dave]

1 hour ago, SirBalon said:

I applaud all the great years under Wenger and thank him for all the good things he managed to achieve with us. He won’t be forgotten... How can he be! Great moments but overall almost what seems an eternity as manager.

He already has a bust in one of the main entrances to the stadium which I always cringed at because for me that should happen when you’re gone and not still active. So no more statues required to be honest.

If we ever get the right to name our own stadium, it should be named after the man the put Arsenal on the map, the man who without him Wenger or anyone of esteem would never have even taken a second glance at us... That man is Herbert Chapman. 

What i'm getting at is Wenger played a large part in deciding the club's stadium design, putting them in a position to move, and maintaining their status on a limited budget until the debt was cleared. It's a fitting tribute.

Surely there's another way to honour the legend of Herbert Chapman. Isn't there already a statue?

[roversgirl]

It will be so strange not seeing him at Arsenal next season, but it is the best decision for everyone involved I'm just sad that after everything he has done for Arsenal and the Premier League that it has come to this stage. I really hope the Arsenal fans give him the send off he deserves and remember the good times such as the 'invincibles' who I am proud to say I watched live at Ewood. It has been sad to see the demise of such a great manager but his time at Arsenal has now come to a natural end.

Really interested to see who they appoint, but my big worry is this will be a big rebuilding process and it may be some time again until we see Arsenal back at the top of the league and winning trophies.

[Bluewolf]

1 hour ago, The Palace Fan said:

What i'm getting at is Wenger played a large part in deciding the club's stadium design, putting them in a position to move, and maintaining their status on a limited budget until the debt was cleared. It's a fitting tribute.

Surely there's another way to honour the legend of Herbert Chapman. Isn't there already a statue?

Agreed,

When you consider what he has helped achieve overall or had to manage for the club as well as keeping them reasonably competitive and in a fight for at least the top 4 for god knows how long now in the face of serious financial clout elsewhere around him has to be admired in itself...

I don't think there could be many that could keep that up and for so long... In that respect he cannot be matched. With such heavy investment in the stadium itself I wonder how many seasons he was simply unable to spend much and had to make do with the resources/youth at his disposal... 

[bozziovai]

......... dunn dunn dunn !!!!

 

 

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/arsene-wenger-resigns-next-arsenal-manager-luis-enrique-contacted-a8313681.html

[Inverted]

44 minutes ago, Dan said:

How old are you? I'm surprised you're that young if I'm honest

I'm 21 , born the November of 1996. So it's not a huge gap, but Wenger's Arsenal career is a few months older than me. 

[Dalmore]

just heard it on the news (cause I'm not into English football apparently) and they've been talking about a successive manager who's considered to be on the elite of managers and other stuff like that but what success has he really brought to Arsenal all these years? I mean I can't remember the last time Arsenal won the Premier League. How is he supposed to be on the Elite?

[Dr. Gonzo]

He's a legend in English football as well as an Arsenal legend. It really is the end of an era and it will be a bit weird seeing a different manager at Arsenal after all this time.

I think it's probably for the best for Arsenal. I hope they can win the Europa League so he can go out on a bit of a high after a few years of stagnation and regression. Those years of downturn though might give the new manager a bit of time, which can be helpful to a new manager.

I think the Brendan Rodgers shouts are a bit funny. He's done well with Celtic... but when he was with us he demonstrated more bad than good in trying to crack into the top 4 in his tenure, and much of the good was down to Luis Suarez and Sturridge being healthy. And at the worst of times, there would just be major tactical inflexibility, even if we were on a run of poor form. We would just stick to plan A and when it failed, just continue to keep failing. But at his best, he did demonstrate a hell of a lot of tactical flexibility getting Suarez and Sturridge to constantly be a threat with their movement in that one season - which puzzled me that once Suarez left, it seemed like Barca also bought Rodgers' ability to creatively find ways to get his strongest players always involved.

And while he learned how to consistently win at Celtic... they are the strongest side in Scotland. And I'm not sure that experience will be good for his already inflated ego, which I think is what lets him down the most. Maybe that's just because he strikes me as a very arrogant person, but he does seem to have a big ego and his time with us was marked with him being pretty unnecessarily stubborn.

I have no doubt if you give him a side with good attacking players, you will get a side that plays attractive football. But to take Arsenal forward, I think you're asking him to have to do what he tried to do with Liverpool. I think Arsenal have better options available from the continent.

[Cicero]

@SirBalon @Chaaay AFC @VanPaddy @Gunnersauraus

Mail reporting its Enrique 

[Panna King]

I am not sure what Arsenal need as a coach right now but it needs a big rebuild, the keeper, defence and midfield are a mess.    Enrique was pretty poor at Roma and Celta, he had success at Barcelona but that team never needed rebuilding, I am pretty sure that Enrique for this Arsenal team is the wrong man, unless the team needed a little bit of tweaking. 

[Asura]

I dont have a lot more to add than what everyone said above that he is a club legend and a great manager in english football who changed so many things in the late 90s. I will always have great respect for him and he is the reason I started to like Arsenal football club with the way they played great football.

However, I think he has left the team in shambles now and didnt do a good job in the last few years, he should have left when they won back to back cups two years ago and with a decent squad for the next manager. Now Alexis is gone, he brought in two over priced average strikers (may be not so much with Auba) and the central midfield and central defense is bad and let some important players' contracts run down into the final few months. That was very poor and Im not sure who will be the next manager that would be coming in but they have a huge task ahead of them. To be honest I dont think any big manager like Ancelotti, Allegri would be really interested to take up the job as its going to be a huge amount of work.

I guess Arsenal need to find someone like Mourinho and Truzzt the procezzzz 

[Danny]

Mad to think it took Arsenal twenty years to win three league titles and then Wenger came along and done it in 6 years. Regarding Arsenal's current drought, they've regularly gone 1-2 decades without a league title, this isn't something that's new to Arsenal Wenger.

[SirBalon]

1 hour ago, Danny said:

Mad to think it took Arsenal twenty years to win three league titles and then Wenger came along and done it in 6 years. Regarding Arsenal's current drought, they've regularly gone 1-2 decades without a league title, this isn't something that's new to Arsenal Wenger.

The argument on Arsenal having droughts is true but that doesn't mean it HAS to be that way.  The club has evolved, the club has through various benefiting factors created more wealth, wealth creates power and with it the subsequent resources.

But aside from that mate... Only a foolish Arsenal fan would argue the point on "winning" league titles... The point with the dissent isn't the winning but the lack of competitiveness, the slow and obvious decline with the evident economical and resourceful growth of the club.  But fundamentally the problem has been the evident satisfaction in living in what seems to have been for the shareholders that control the brand name... Living satisfactorily in a world intertwined in mediocrity of finishing in a position so as to qualify for a tournament that the club in no fashion were trying to vie to win.

You see, not all of us are satisfied with mere participation, especially in sport.

[Danny]

2 minutes ago, SirBalon said:

The argument on Arsenal having droughts is true but that doesn't mean it HAS to be that way.  The club has evolved, the club has through various benefiting factors created more wealth, wealth creates power and with it the subsequent resources.

But aside from that mate... Only a foolish Arsenal fan would argue the point on "winning" league titles... The point with the dissent isn't the winning but the lack of competitiveness, the slow and obvious decline with the evident economical and resourceful growth of the club.  But fundamentally the problem has been the evident satisfaction in living in what seems to have been for the shareholders that control the brand name... Living satisfactorily in a world intertwined in mediocrity of finishing in a position so as to qualify for a tournament that the club in no fashion were trying to vie to win.

You see, not all of us are satisfied with mere participation, especially in sport.

I would say you had about a decade after your last league win of being competitive, you just "bottled" it/didn't win anything. Throughout your time of not actually competing for the league you've won four FA Cups.

I get your issues with the board, but Wenger or any manager will never be able to sway a board to part with more money than they want to.

Essentially you've been spoilt by Wenger because he almost done to you what no other manager has and that's done what Ferguson did to United and Shankly and Paisley did to Liverpool. Wenger single handledly created the mindset amongst modern Arsenal fans that you should be competing with the very best all the time, something your club has only ever done sporadically.

I do get a need for change, but he's been slaughtered the last few years and yet name a manager who's won as much as he has in the last 5-10 years in England.

[Machado]

10 hours ago, Kitchen Sales said:

Looks like Wenger retired 15 years ago

It does seem like he got lucky because of his connection with French football. His early years coincided with the golden era of French football.

 

[Harry]

7 hours ago, The Palace Fan said:

What i'm getting at is Wenger played a large part in deciding the club's stadium design, putting them in a position to move, and maintaining their status on a limited budget until the debt was cleared. It's a fitting tribute.

Surely there's another way to honour the legend of Herbert Chapman. Isn't there already a statue?

That's not what he did though. He allowed the exodus of top talent that moved to direct competitors thats completely drained the spirit of the club and smashed the arsenal brand. They've drifted from being a force in the league to being a happy with top 4 side by being conservative and responsible while others have been being brave and you can see it with how jaded players have become. 

It was silly to take a stance of thinking the award should be won based on how quickly they could pay off the debt and in hindsight that has to go down as a mistake. 

[Chaaay AFC]

13 hours ago, Cicero said:

@SirBalon @Chaaay AFC @VanPaddy @Gunnersauraus

Mail reporting its Enrique 

Not surprising considering he has links with Raul Sanllehi, who is our new head/director of football. 

Gazidis stated yesterday they are looking for someone to play progressive football who can also integrate young talent. I'm not entirely sure Enrique is that man, as @VanPaddy said he wasn't that great at Roma and I think he was just ok at Celta. 

I just hope the club take their time a bit. We have a lot of coaches after this job.

[Honey Honey]

I'd love to see a statue of him trying to zip his coat up.

 

[Bluewolf]

1 hour ago, Kitchen Sales said:

I'd love to see a statue of him trying to zip his coat up.

 

I will miss his bumbling around with his coat.... funny stuff

Has a quick glance around to see if anyone's noticed his bumbling... 

And the "fuck it" can't be arsed to go through all that again and make another tit of myself.... 

I did enjoy this one as well.... 

"Wankers!! I said Still not Sparkling"

[6666]

8 hours ago, Danny said:

I would say you had about a decade after your last league win of being competitive, you just "bottled" it/didn't win anything. Throughout your time of not actually competing for the league you've won four FA Cups.

I get your issues with the board, but Wenger or any manager will never be able to sway a board to part with more money than they want to.

Essentially you've been spoilt by Wenger because he almost done to you what no other manager has and that's done what Ferguson did to United and Shankly and Paisley did to Liverpool. Wenger single handledly created the mindset amongst modern Arsenal fans that you should be competing with the very best all the time, something your club has only ever done sporadically.

I do get a need for change, but he's been slaughtered the last few years and yet name a manager who's won as much as he has in the last 5-10 years in England.

How dare you add context.

One of the main issues with the moronic "Wenger Out Brigade" isn't that they thought a new manager could take us further but that in their desperation to validate that opinion they tried to pretend that Arsene Wenger never did anything worthwhile and didn't move us forward as a club. We were barely spending compared to the big clubs until Mesut Ozil arrived and during that period we were actually lucky to have him as I doubt any other manager with a name would have even bothered managing us under those circumstances.

It's been a weird moving of goal posts from his critics. Went from "you won't get top 4" at the start of a season to "top 4 doesn't matter, trophies do" at the end of a season which has recently turned into "The FA Cup doesn't count, top 4 is more important"...

He has been a great manager for us and seen us through a tough period but now is probably the right time to step aside. Funny seeing people that were insulting him as a person now talking about how great a man he is.

[SirBalon]

42 minutes ago, Bluewolf said:

I will miss his bumbling around with his coat.... funny stuff

Has a quick glance around to see if anyone's noticed his bumbling... 

And the "fuck it" can't be arsed to go through all that again and make another tit of myself.... 

I did enjoy this one as well.... 

"Wankers!! I said Still not Sparkling"

I miss him already now! 

[Panna King]

13 minutes ago, SirBalon said:

I miss him already now! 

 

[Stan]

1 hour ago, Kitchen Sales said:

I'd love to see a statue of him trying to zip his coat up.

 

 

1 hour ago, Bluewolf said:

I will miss his bumbling around with his coat.... funny stuff

Has a quick glance around to see if anyone's noticed his bumbling... 

And the "fuck it" can't be arsed to go through all that again and make another tit of myself.... 

I did enjoy this one as well.... 

"Wankers!! I said Still not Sparkling"

no way. the statue has to be either of these...

[Bluewolf]

1 hour ago, SirBalon said:

I miss him already now! 

I feel the need for one of those sad moments with a message is in order... 

The next Arsenal Manager won't be the same as Froggy...... just different.. 

 

[Dave]

1 hour ago, Bluewolf said:

I will miss his bumbling around with his coat.... funny stuff

Has a quick glance around to see if anyone's noticed his bumbling... 

And the "fuck it" can't be arsed to go through all that again and make another tit of myself.... 

I did enjoy this one as well.... 

"Wankers!! I said Still not Sparkling"

My favourite memory of him was at the World Cup in Brazil. You had all this focus on the football and then they'd cut to the atmosphere at the beach in Rio where after an intense season he was strutting around without a care in the world in his tight shorts. Really captured what the atmosphere of the tournament that year was all about.

 

[SirBalon]

17 hours ago, Bluewolf said:

Which clap are you going for mate??? 

The enthusiastic, really does mean it type clap as a mark of respect and admiration... 

Or... 

The "Yea, Well Done" sarcastic style so often seen when the whistle blows on another 90 minutes of watching Arsenal play away... 

Hahaha... I hope to go to his last home game with us and I guarantee you that my feelings and how I demonstrate them will be very emotionally charged, with full respect and ovation.  He is a club legend without a doubt but it has been being ruined... Sorted in time thankfully.

16 hours ago, The Palace Fan said:

What i'm getting at is Wenger played a large part in deciding the club's stadium design, putting them in a position to move, and maintaining their status on a limited budget until the debt was cleared. It's a fitting tribute.

Surely there's another way to honour the legend of Herbert Chapman. Isn't there already a statue?

Mate, all of that is very subjective.  I totally understand how you're seeing all of that but he was the manager, he was successful during his Higbury era and obviously the direction the club were looking to move in coincided with the sporting success Wenger was directing on the pitch... It's something that's occurred at other clubs but has to be taken for what it is, the job in hand.

14 hours ago, Cicero said:

@SirBalon @Chaaay AFC @VanPaddy @Gunnersauraus

Mail reporting its Enrique 

It's all speculation right now, it will definitely continue with all sorts of names.  As for Luis Enrique... There are positives and negatives mate.

9 hours ago, Danny said:

I would say you had about a decade after your last league win of being competitive, you just "bottled" it/didn't win anything. Throughout your time of not actually competing for the league you've won four FA Cups.

I get your issues with the board, but Wenger or any manager will never be able to sway a board to part with more money than they want to.

Essentially you've been spoilt by Wenger because he almost done to you what no other manager has and that's done what Ferguson did to United and Shankly and Paisley did to Liverpool. Wenger single handledly created the mindset amongst modern Arsenal fans that you should be competing with the very best all the time, something your club has only ever done sporadically.

I do get a need for change, but he's been slaughtered the last few years and yet name a manager who's won as much as he has in the last 5-10 years in England.

Its well documented on his relationship with certain board members shareholders and the esteem they have for him, that without going into the relationship he has with that leech Stan Kroenke. I don't even want to go down that path anymore because he is now stepping aside and I don't want to bad talk him anymore to be honest.  I have always said that I have tremendous respect for all the positives he's given us and that can't change although his overstaying has been damaging the sentiments many fans have for him and that's sad.

I also feel that making comparisons with any manager isn't the way to go and not just with Wenger.  Every football club has had their own unique issues and the successes that have been achieved with each respective manager at the clubs they managed are there to be analysed only for that.

As for being slaughtered (mainly by some of the press) is almost of his own making due to consistently saying he has the capabilities to take the team forward and blaming the press for the fans' subsequent reaction over the past three years... It's been the opposite, we've been declining, slowly but clearly.

1 hour ago, Chaaay AFC said:

Not surprising considering he has links with Raul Sanllehi, who is our new head/director of football. 

Gazidis stated yesterday they are looking for someone to play progressive football who can also integrate young talent. I'm not entirely sure Enrique is that man, as @VanPaddy said he wasn't that great at Roma and I think he was just ok at Celta. 

I just hope the club take their time a bit. We have a lot of coaches after this job.

Look at Luis Enrique's record at youth levels mate, most notably with the Barcelona 'B' team. He is excellent with youth and his time at Celta was fantastic @The Rebel CRS.  His negative sides are his temperament and his no holds barred blatant disregard for anything he sees as harming what he wants to achieve which includes the press and the players.  I know for a fact that had he been coach over the past few years Özil would no longer be with us, he would have sent him to boot duty.