What a spectacle
Circus over Wenger’s new deal is entertaining for neutrals
LONDON: For all us neutrals, it’s a thoroughly entertaining and macabre circus.
And the best news is it looks like we’re only going to have to wait another two years, rather than three, until the next Arsene Wenger “will he or won’t he sign a contract?” saga.
This year, they’ve even added an air show, with rival “Wenger In” and “Wenger Out” planes circling the skies above West Bromwich.
As the hours tick down towards the inevitable announcement that Wenger has selflessly decided it is in the best interests of Arsenal that he signs a new £16mil (RM88mil) deal, they will hopefully upgrade this spectacle.
Those of us who work on the sports pages of newspapers love nothing more than men shouting at one another. And for the next 10 days, men shouting at each other is pretty much all we’ve got.
Surely there will be Arsenal players ready to hurl a few insults at Wenger while they’re away from their club’s thought police? There usually are.
Alexis Sanchez and Mesut Ozil are favourites to break ranks, but these days it could be any of them.
So anyone in the media wanting Wenger to bow out graciously on compassionate grounds has no regard for the gaiety of the nation during the pitch blackness of an international break.
Arsenal satisfies the bloodlust of the masses in peace time.
Over the past decade, that is what it has been there for.
And the biggest thrill of all will come when Arsenal’s board attempt to justify the new contract with the caveat that Wenger has promised to change – a line they’ve been secretly peddling for weeks.
Hand him a new contract out of dewy-eyed sentimentality or Utopian dreaming if you like, but please don’t pretend he’ll change.
After 21 years, the one thing we know for certain about this bloke is that he is neither willing nor able to do that.
Changing, adapting, moving with the times, is simply not what Wenger does.
He is a pig-headed ideologue to the core of his being.
Five years ago, there was some surprise when Wenger apparently relented to outside pressure and appointed his former defender Steve Bould to his first-team coaching staff.
Yet whatever Bould is actually allowed to do all week, it does not extend to teaching Arsenal’s players how to effectively defend corners – as was twice exposed by West Brom during Saturday’s 3-1 defeat.
Other apparent changes in emphasis, such as the signing of a new centreback and central midfielder as part of a £90mil (RM497mil) overhaul last summer, were rendered pointless when it became apparent that Granit Xhaka can’t tackle and Shkodran Mustafi can’t head a ball.
Individual players have stopped progressing under Wenger as they once did.
Two or three years ago, the core of the England team was being built around young Arsenal players.
Where are they now? Theo Walcott, Jack Wilshere, Kieran Gibbs, Calum Chambers, Carl Jenkinson?
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain is with England in Dortmund but only to show up the nation’s awful lack of midfield talent.
These days, promising youngsters go backwards at Arsenal.
Wenger has fostered a culture of comfiness and complacency, of sixpack selfies to celebrate unremarkable wins and a limp acceptance of defeat.
Saturday afternoon was the moment even the most blindly loyal could see Arsenal are staring at Thursday night Europa League football.
And so that was the moment – after six defeats in their last seven matches against top-flight opposition and 21 goals conceded in the process – when Wenger announced with a coy grin that his future had been decided.
Not that he was going to tell anyone, except for an old rugby-coaching chum, who then inadvertently spilled the beans.
How wonderfully that must have gone down among the now-dominant Wenger Outers.
Not only is Arsene staying but we get to find out via the dark lord of anti-football, WBA manager Tony Pulis.
Roll up, roll up. And send in the clowns. — The Sun, London