Frenchman faces greatest challenge of his career
Arsenal stuck by Wenger rather than stepping into unknown, but it is a big risk, writes Jeremy Wilson
It is a familiar enough argument. Win a recordbreaking seventh FA Cup and then seize this supposedly “perfect moment” to retire to the quiet, country life of your beautiful home village of Duttlenheim, in Alsace.
Recharge those 67-year-old batteries for a few months, spend time with family and friends you have seen only sporadically during 33 continuous years in management, and then maybe return to Arsenal. Unveil a statue of yourself and head for the boardroom, where you can enjoy that balance of involvement with what you call the “club of my life” while freed from the incessant responsibility and pressure of results.
It would be an alluring enough option for most people, but a choice that Arsène Wenger would probably regard as a cowardly affront to his very personality.
Not while he still feels so fit and healthy. Not while he believes that he is at least the equal of this supposed new breed of superior managers, and not while he thinks (as he invariably always does) that his team are on the precipice of greatness.
Wenger, you see, does not think about fairy-tale endings, and would much sooner leave Arsenal in 2019 with the disappointment of knowing that the ‘Invincibles’ of 2004 really were his last Premier League-winning team than with the regret of looking down from the directors’ box at Arsenal believing that he could best men such as Mauricio Pochettino, Antonio Conte, Jürgen Klopp, Pep Guardiola and Jose Mourinho.
Some will say that he is deluded – and the challenge that awaits is clearly the greatest of his professional career – but to think he would make any other decision would be to overlook a competitive obsession with football that is unique. As Wenger himself put it
after hearing that Sir Alex Ferguson was so enjoying his retirement, “But Sir Alex has horses. I have no horses”.
Wenger’s desire to fight on, then, was rarely in doubt, but that did still leave two sizeable obstacles. The biggest was the fan base. Can he convince Arsenal’s own deeply sceptical supporters that his team can win the Premier League again?
It makes the start to next season imperative. If they begin poorly, especially if there has been accompanying disappointment in the transfer window, then we all know what to expect. Patience will quickly snap, and Arsenal could very easily be sucked once more into the “horrendous environment” that Wenger identified as one of the biggest problems during this past season. Fans first became edgy – and in some cases rebellious – on the opening day against Liverpool, and then following defeats by Everton and Manchester City in December, even after a 19-game unbeaten run.
Can any manager or team thrive amid such tension and division? It is what makes this such a risk, but we should also acknowledge how the recent upturn in results has demonstrated qualities in both Wenger and his players that looked lost. It would be churlish, then, to dismiss the past few months, but it is even more important to address the worrying patterns that returned in February and March. Both factors explain why the situation became so finely balanced. It was perhaps also significant that the alternatives were so limited and, while eventual succession planning will surely now accelerate, with the streamlining of some of the practices around Wenger, Arsenal were scarcely ready for such monumental change.
Indeed, faced with effectively gambling on the club and his investment with an untried new structure and manager, it is little wonder that Stan Kroenke ultimately kept faith in a manager who has delivered something very tangible – whether a top-four finish, a new stadium or an FA Cup – even in each of the leaner years of his tenure.