The lessons to learn from Arsene Wenger’s fall
It’ll be interesting to see what price Arsenal are willing to pay now for better results, and whether his values endure
The leader of what was once considered one of the best-managed football clubs in the world stepped down on April 20 and the Twittersphere erupted in two opposite directions: jubilation and sadness.
Half of English football fans seem to regard the departure from the Arsenal Football Club of 68-year-old Arsene Wenger as coming years too late. The other half rues the brutality of a changing industry that turned his virtues into handicaps. He was enormously successful and his club was nicely profitable, but his fall is a reminder of how quickly industries can change — and how even a great leader’s fortunes can turn if he doesn’t change with them.
Nobody contests his impact on the game. He changed the way football was played with his focus on attack and the passing game. He was among the first to use statistical data to assess players before purchasing them.
The crisis that ended Wenger’s tenure says much about the rapidly changing business of English football where, in contrast to rival German clubs, the financial stakes have grown massively in recent years. In the three seasons ending in 2016, Premier League clubs generated operating profits of $2.24 billion, more than the total of the previous 16 seasons combined. Wenger thought the influx of foreign money into English football was a passing phase; instead it was the new game.
Arsenal were such a pillar of fiscal prudence that fans began complaining that the bottom line was more important than the score. Wenger hadn’t had a title in 14 years and fans questioned his loyalties. There is an inexorability about a leader’s exit, whether it’s a politician or corporate chieftain or sporting hero. A few losses become a steady stream of bad news. Journalists pounce; or, in the case of football, hyper-critical fans.
It will be interesting to see what price Arsenal is willing to pay now for better results, and whether Wenger’s values endure. He was a pillar of the community. When an activist who was moved by the plight of children sickened by the Chernobyl nuclear disaster wrote to Premier League managers asking help, only W en ger responded. Arsenal provided football gear and books. Arsenal invited 400 firemen who battled the Grenfell Tower blaze last year to be guests of honour at a match.
Soccer fans like an argument that runs and runs. Punters will debate Wenger’s legacy (and succession) until the taps go dry. They are the same questions posed about Travis Kalanick at Uber and John Cryan at Deutsche Bank, two ousted leaders.
They are the questions that are being asked of Mark Zuckerberg at Facebook, British Prime Minister Theresa May and US President Donald Trump: Is the vision right? Is the management style effective? Is it time to go?