Arsenal film snub shows how little a club’s past means to today’s players
THEY are a proud lot, George Graham’s boys, but even so, the turnout for the premiere of 89, the film about their magnificent last- minute title win at Anfield, must have hurt just a little.
Only one member of the current squad, Jack Wilshere, bothered to make it. ‘I feel it’s something they would benefit from watching together,’ mused Paul Davis, ‘if only to capture what we had back then.’
The showing was on Wednesday, November 8, in the middle of the last international break. A number of players had obvious commitments for their country. Laurent Koscielny and Alexandre Lacazette were with France, Mesut Ozil with Germany, Granit Xhaka with Switzerland — but Arsenal do not have as many current internationals as one might think.
None of their Spanish players were called up, for instance, and none of their English; three of their Frenchmen were at home and two of their three Germans. Aaron Ramsey was picked by Wales but withdrew injured, Chile and Bosnia- Herzegovina did not have games and Petr Cech retired from international football in 2016.
It’s quite a team the current Arsenal could have fielded that night, actually: Cech, Mathieu Debuchy, Alexis Sanchez, Ramsey, Olivier Giroud, David Ospina, Theo Walcott, Rob Holding, Nacho Monreal, Santi Cazorla, Shkodran Mustafi, Calum Chambers, Danny Welbeck, Hector Bellerin, Sead Kolasinac, Francis Coquelin. Even the manager, Arsene Wenger.
Yet only Wilshere, a player who appears to mean less and less to a club he clearly loves, was motivated to watch. It is not as if those who skipped it have too many title-winner’s medals to their name, either — certainly not in this country. As Davis pointed out in Sportsmail’s The Verdict yesterday, just because an event happened before the Premier League era, it does not make it irrelevant. Yet would a similar occasion at another Premier League club be very different?
Graeme Souness said recently that he doubted whether many of today’s players even knew of his career, and he didn’t exempt those at Liverpool from that. Increasingly, the team, even managers and coaching staff are passing through. What a club represents, its past, its famous names, means little to them.
When Bill Nicholson died on Saturday, October 23, 2004, Jacques Santini, the Tottenham manager, did not even pay passing tribute to him because he was upset at losing 2-1 to Bolton. The club press officer pleaded with him to do his duty and attend the post-match press conference, because he knew how bad it would look, but Santini would not budge. As floral tributes piled up outside White Hart Lane, he sulked in his office. ‘Jacques is a passionate man, and he is upset at losing,’ the club official insisted.
No, he wasn’t. He was an arrogant fool who didn’t have a clue about Nicholson and Tottenham, did not respect either, and was sacked within a fortnight anyway, unmourned.
Increasingly, in the Premier League era, we are losing our connection to history. There will always be players, like Pablo Zabaleta at Manchester City, who develop an affinity for a club despite being an outsider — but the fact that Phil Foden was born into a family of Manchester City supporters will still count for more. Few do a better job for Tottenham than Jan Vertonghen or Christian Eriksen, but it is only Harry Kane who is one of their own.
On the final day of the 1995-96 season, after Newcastle had missed out on the title to Manchester United under Kevin Keegan, the players walked around St James’ Park to thank the fans. Most were happy, smiling and waving, pleased with a good campaign even if the outcome was a little disappointing. A lone figure trailed in their wake, devastated.
Steve Watson, born in North Shields, an academy graduate, and at the time of his debut the youngest person ever to play for Newcastle, was the only one who really knew what had been lost, the only one who had lived all his life with the legends, the stories, the failures, the frustrations.
For the same reason, Steven Gerrard’s mis- step against Chelsea in 2014 was, strictly in the sporting sphere, tragic. No Liverpool player shouldered the weight of history as he did; no one deserved that agony less.
It says something that Wilshere, alone among the current squad, sought connection with Arsenal’s champions from 1988-89; that their story compelled him to make the short journey to Holloway Odeon in north London — with his wife — to share their night.
The images from the evening are lovely. Everyone laughing, smiling, sharing jokes, reminiscences, reliving memories of the greatest shoot-out in the history of English football. Yet there is something else radiating out, something English football has lost: a sense of place, of what a club was, and what it should still be.
Davis is right. The modern Arsenal could learn something from 89; if they would ever deign to give something so ancient their precious attention.