Maybe Arsene Wenger is doing what his owners are asking him to, which is maintain minimal spending while remaining in the Champions League. But it seems Arsenal have taken some sort of step back every season, with this one, or at least it’s start, looking especially disastrous in potential.
Meanwhile, while Arsenal have been waving the huge amount of money they have to spend, they’re not actually doing anything. Or at least Wenger isn’t. He isn’t the only person in this pretty big system in charge of acquisition, but it does seem as if he’s obsession with “raising” players and developing from within has run its course, leaving Arsenal with a very limited squad, plagued with a rare injury epidemic that puts them at risk of not making it into the Champions League.
Wenger is saying that there aren’t players to sign, trying to calm down the wave of anger from fans who watched Arsenal look bad in a 1-3 loss on the opening weekend to Aston Villa. But fans aren’t supposed to find players for Wenger. He’s had three months to improve a squad with players, adding them to a squad that barely made it into the top 4 last season, and clearly needs some outside help.
Arsenal fans spend more money on home matches than any other team in the Premier League, but the aspiration of their manager and the club, unfortunately, isn’t to be the best. It’s to generate profit while remaining at a certain level of competitiveness, but all the talk about being able to challenge for titles with the current squad, something we’ve been hearing from Wenger each season, time and time again, is simply lying to fans in order to keep them bankrolling this very profitable operation.
There’s nothing wrong with setting lower standards than the highest. Not every team is supposed to win titles and reach the final of the Champions League, or even aspire to it every season. But when you take so much money from fans in order to finance a manager who is well past his peak in terms of recognizing what’s happening on the pitch and in the transfer market is borderline criminal, even if this is a privatized operation and no one is forcing the fans to actually but these season tickets year after year, setting themselves up for disappointment.
No one is saying fire Arsene Wenger, but the voices calling him a genius are fading away. Even the voices calling him to stay aren’t that loud and vocal as before. Arsenal have put themselves in a difficult situation for the second time in three years, without any signings and without a lot of time to make any significant ones left. Unless Wenger is planning on pulling out some magic trick out of his hat, it seems that sticking to his outdated beliefs and principles is leading Arsenal towards a very abysmal season.