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Reality Check for the Wenger Out and bring David Dein back brigade.   

Here is David Dein in his own words:

[Quote]
[size=14pt]Former Arsenal vice-chairman David Dein believes Arsene Wenger remains the best choice as Gunners manager.[/size]

Arsenal have not won a trophy since 2005 and pressure has been mounting to bring silverware to the Emirates.

Dein, the driving force behind Wenger's appointment in 1996, told Sportsweek on BBC Radio 5 Live: "People have to remember what he's done and achieved.

"It's easy in life to get rid of people but then what? Getting someone better is the trick."

Dein, who left Arsenal in 2007, is still good friends with the Frenchman and is convinced trying to replacing him would be a huge task.
Continue reading the main story

Arsene is very focused and determined, He still has as much fire in his belly as he had when he started

David Dein

"How do you follow Arsene Wenger?" Dein said. "That is not going to be an easy exercise.

"He has got a talented array of players and obviously he wants to improve and I know for a fact that he is looking to bring in two or three more players if he can."

The Gunners have signed Gervinho and Carl Jenkinson and are still looking to sign a centre-half - with Everton's Phil Jagielka very much in their sights.

But even with a few new faces, Dein feels it would be foolish to demand Wenger delivers a trophy this season.

"Any chairman or manager who comes out publicly and says they are going to win a trophy is deluding themselves," Dein said.

"Who know what can happen in football? Mistakes happen, you get injuries, suspensions.

"But Arsene is very focused and determined - I see him regularly and he still has as much fire in his belly as he had when he started. He wants to win. I do believe in his ability.

"Arsenal are expecting success all the time but that's not easy - you cannot turn on a tap and guarantee to win games.

"He will admit he has probably had the most difficult couple of years of his career - for two reasons. One is the fact the game is getting more competitive. There is money coming in and it is more intense.

"Secondly, he had to contend with the fact that he hasn't achieved what he would have hoped to achieve - albeit he has done remarkably well in the quality and style of play, but he and the fans want to win trophies.

"But you under-rate Arsene at your peril."[/quote]The one thing I can't understand about people's criticism of Arsene is this, both old and new people on the board (who are in the know) continue to insist he is the best man for the job (and that includes Usmanov who is plotting a takeover) but the fans on the periphery without a clue of what goes on internally are the greatest noise makers tearing down the man.
It says much about people's understanding of the Arsenal conundrum that the people fans are clamouring to come in and save the club from their media induced perception of a meltdown are the greatest backers of this much maligned manager.
What the hell happened to the concept of Supporting your club first and not getting involved in things you know nothing about hei? 
As for me, na siddon look this season, the only thing I'm almost sure of is that in the worst case scenario, Arsenal will still make top 4 come what may. Now I hope I haven't gone and jinxed that. 

Laudable thread, thank you OP.
All tribes are full of wonderful people.
Its some individuals that give the collective a bad name.

proudly9ja:
Ive seen Lansbury play for our reserves and for Norwich and also for our CC team and I know he'l do better than Denilson if given a chance. Moreover, I don't expect Lansbury to play in the first 11. But Im certain he'l do well as back up to Jack/Diaby. As long as AW doesn't play him out of position, that's another story altogether.

Seconded, he may not be as technically good or with the same passing range but Lansbury will run all day and won't stand still on counters like Denny.
A big welcome to the OX, I liked what I saw of him last season and I believe he'll be good for us. Besides, its good to have a prospect choose us ahead of Manure again like Ramsey with Phil Jones and Smalling opting for them in recent time.

proudly9ja:
[b]Our midfield is also looking seriously messed up and with Cesc and Nasri's futures not yet sorted, [/b]we just seem to be in serious excreta right now. We look more like a mid table team tbh.

Good thing for me though is I reckon only United and Chelsea* are capable of finishing above us in the coming season. I forsee a big gap between the top 2 and the rest this season.

I believe this to really be the source of our problems at present, until that is sorted it doesn't look like we even know where we are going this season. How many teams will remain good when they aren't playing with their first 3 choice midfielders at all?

proudly9ja:
@dudu, Arsenal youngsters show passion lacking in many of the first team members but Il have to agree with debo on this one, they have to prove they are good enough for the first team like Wilshere has done. The story would have been different if we had a few trophies in past 5/6 years on our cabinet but now is not a good time to experiment.

I see your point but Arsene has begone to show a reluctance to give some promising youth players a chance, maybe its because he got burnt by people like Denilson I don't know or maybe its because he still sees those ones as works in progress but it is important to remember that Wilshere was enroute to Bolton on loan last season until Cesc got injured and he had to stay to make up the number of Midfielders. He would have gone to Bolton while both Denilson and Rosicky would have stayed behind to give us more of the lack of bottle people complain about, mind you it was already clear from pre-season that the boy had it and that Rosicky was waning.
Also, Nordtveit whom we sold due to lack of opportunities was one of the stand out defensive performers in the win for Monchengladbach against Bayern at the Allianz, I remember agonizing over it when that boy was about to be sold.
Atimes, its not even about replacing the player totally but subbing them off and lighting a fire under them.

debosky:
Was Lansbury not put on against Benfica, wasn't Miyachi put on? What promise did he show in turning the game around? The fact is, unlike many of the Arsenal youngsters, the United ones are good enough to play in the EPL.

One game was a pre-season match away from home where your opponent could change the personel on the pitch at will, the other was a competitive match at Wembley. Circumstances totally different , stakes a lot higher to get the adrenaline flowing.

debosky:
You like to make silly parallels sometimes when we aren't talking about the same class of players. Cleverley, Jones and others have excelled at EPL sides. [b]When we have such youth, then we can throw them on to cause a turn around.

Throw them on first and lets see, except yu're telling me that Jones is now suddenly better than Vidic and Rafael better than Evra. 

chamotex:
Did you watch the first half or you listened to it on radio?

It is the result that speaks jare, I've seen Arsenal boss teams a lot more than that and still go home empty handed with one moment of madness from the likes of Clichy.

follypimpi:
@Apostle Dudu

Did you see the passion, drive and hunger of wearing a Man Utd's jersey in Ashley Young, Cleverly, Wellbeck, Jones & Smalling. Thats what Baba fergie impacted on his players, now thats a team that want to outclass barca.

Abeg jare where was the passion and hunger in the first half?  
When some of us ask the younger players who show promise to be trusted more, a lot of people on here say NO but it took Fergie replacing a first choice backline with such young players in the game to turn things around.
Let us not forget that we also beat Manure in the CS of 2004 with a largely young team which included a 16 year old Cesc and very young RVP, Aliadere, Clichy and even Justin Hoyte but things have gotten much worse since.  
I won't respond now, we shall see, the season is very long.
I look forward to seeing those guys do it weekly in the PL.
Kudos to them, they mugged City exactly the same way they mugged us in the FA Cup last season, overcome the opposition with an high octane tempo (that 2nd goal was beautiful sha I gree) and Fergie couldnt have asked for much more than that.

Cristalz:
Nasri can never fill Cesc's boots. . .if he stays.

Nasri can never replace Cesc (like for like) that much has sunk home to me now. Thanks to Slimshay
If Cesc goes this team will have to change the way it plays
If, people have forgotten how good Cesc is, I will remind you of what you will be missing next year

[flash=400,400]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REKuFOBtpes[/flash]

And this was in an injury plagued season.

Nasri is good o, but missile is different from measles. Abeg if we dey cry make we dey try see small small.

I hope manmustwank is okay sha. 
wetin cause the riot sef? 
I hope its not cos they've finally released Luka to fly?

City, be careful when buying Arsenal players. Why didn't Clichy clear the ball? that is how his occasional indecisions always finished us.

That was a well worked goal and nicely taken by Nani sha. What happened to City? Arsenalitis?  

Money talks

Proudly has asked for an injection of positivity and I am glad to oblige.  

Firstly, one needs to put last night's match in perspective, the team that finished that match was in no way anything like what will be our first 11 for this season. What you could call a rag tag team like that coming up against seasoned professionals like Aimar and Saviola along with upcoming players with solid reputations like Witsel could under normal circumstances be tagged men against boys and the boys almost deserve a pat on the back if not that losing is unacceptable in Arsenal at any level.

Secondly, we lost the game tactically at the beginning of the 2nd half when Benfica brought on their heavy hitters in midfield who raised the tempo of the game while our midfield was unable to respond and as was apparent last season, with the increased pressure, our defense was ultimately breached with kudos to Squillaci in particular for a lesson in how not to defend 1v1 situations. 2 players I noticed were particularly unable to respond to the increased tempo were Ramsey and Rosicky who weren't doing anything meaningful at either end of the pitch, using 2 players with such low off the ball work rates IMO wasn't such a good idea, we were actually trumped even in the possesion game. Whithin the first 15 minutes of the 2nd half, Benfica basically overran our midfied. Bringing on Lansbury IMO stiffened things up and at a stage he and Frimpong actually got the Benfica MF ruffled but he also showed that he was not yet really part of the first team because he and Ramsey were unable to put any meaningful attacking moves together in the usual Arsenal fashion hence we were unable to get an equalizer.
It should also be pointed out that Benfica made this game more competitive than your average pre-season game and are far ahead of us in terms of competitive readiness having already played a 2 legged UCL qualifier tie.

In my opinion, for the first time in a long time, Arsene is experimenting a lot in pre-season either by choice or by forced circumstances, I can't quite recall when we last had this large turnover of players in the first team (Ryo, Lansbury, Frimpong and Jenkinson are all young new players all appearing at the same time and likely to be at least squad players next season) and they will take time to gel but the experience is invaluable particularly from a game made so competitive by Benfica yesterday. Arsene will also have learnt a lot about some players he has given so long a rope to pull and should rightly be considering some action in terms of transfers.

The downside for me are not the new players but some of our old players who are now showing us the reason for our Jekyll and Hyde performances last season, yesterday Rosicky and Squillaci in particular once again had no place to hide but 2 players who impressed me were Gibbs and Traore. I personally don't think there is any need to worry about Clichy's departure with what these 2 have shown so far in pre-season (And I know this would surprise most people but from a defensive view point, I'll make Traore first choice for now. He is a bit of a better defender as players still get past Gibbs atimes). It is easy to flay Chamakh but did he really get any meaningful balls from MF? if I'm not mistaken RVP was also looking very uninvolved until the goal and that was in a much better first half team performance. If your striker is more involved in your first third of the pitch, he is not likely to be dangerous to the opposition.

Looking forward to the new season, I'd say that for the first time at this stage in the buildup to a new season there is still a lot of unknowns. Normally by this stage we would know our first team and would be flying in pre-season (even though I recall us getting beaten 2-0 by Valencia in our final pre-season game in the 09/10 season but not playing as badly as we did in patches yesterday). As things are now, 80% of what we will start with this season is already in the club. Even if Cesc stays, he won't be starting the season with the first team and I don't think any new players we get can be expected to slot in so quickly within a week as well so I expect us to start slowly (untypical of Arsenal I know) with the negativity reaching an all time high but the team subsequently getting better as time goes on. I'm praying we get past Udinese first of all, it isn't going to be easy.

If I were Arsene, I would seriously consider not reading the newspapers for the first 2 months of the season.  

[size=14pt]Duduspace: I Fully Support Sir El.[/size]

In an unexpected twist, Duduspace who made the original allegations that led to the El-gate scandal has come out to provide some much needed support to the head of the NLFPL Sir El who has increasingly come under pressure from various quarters who seek to usurp his position as chairman of the NLFPL.

Speaking to a correspondent of the bizzybody news agency yesterday, Duduspace made it clear that he bore no grudges and that he accepted from the onset that Sir El's job was difficult with many interests to consider, being a full blooded male himself he said he was aware that the delectable frames of women have influenced the course of history from time immemorial and challenged any of Sir El's accusers who had never been influenced by sumptuos bosoms or well endowed backsides in the past to cast the first stone and subsequently come out fully from their closets.

He also stated that the late season slump by Dudu Flames last season, had not helped Sir El's decisions in any way and that the campaign of calumny against Dudu Flames chiefly led by Wolfgang Kaiser (the manager) due to differences in opinion over the 'bumming' culture instituted by the manager and actively propagated in Wolfgang Kaiser (the club) soured the NLFPL boardroom and ultimately led to the events of the past few days.

In summing up, Duduspace said he was very willing to build bridges and would be open to reconsider his earlier withdrawal from the FA H-2-H cup if changes are made to ensure fairness and that there was nothing to this storm that couldn't be solved by a pleasure boat trip to the Maldives in the company of the said female manager and her bevy of hotties, with a sly wink to indicate that such arrangements were already in full gear

We might not have heard the last of El-gate but Duduspace is already looking forward to starting the season in grand style with the Ageless Wonders.

Tall Tales Reporting.

dayokanu:
Every football analyst knew Bayern and Arsenal can not be draw together as shown by this statement

But Gayyner being eternally reetarded folks who cant even locate their arse with their 2 hands cant even understand the logic

I'm sure you forgot both clubs were seeded cos yu were too preoccupied with lining up to view other guys' junks with the rest of the munchies team hei? stinkin perverts. 

I didn't even wait to see who Bayern got sef, Rubin Kazan would be a good test for them. Damn they got FC Zurich.

I just knew we would get Udinese. Not sure that is what I would have opted for. Italian teams and defending, the types of clubs that can defend 1 - 0 leads.

debosky:
Lukaku is a regular first team player who has consistently played at the top level in Belgium. That is completely different from a Fab4 who was still in the youth team (not even reserves) when he joined Arsenal.

Lukaku is 18 and a full Belgian International, fully developed by Anderlecht no contest. DK needs some detox. Who's got a supply of chinese tea? 

dayokanu:
My point is if you buy a player who has already shown promise in a FIFA, UEFA competition.

E.g Waidi was the star at the UEFA or FIFA U17,  and was a Bolton youth, after the tournament Wigan buys him and 3 yrs later he became a star which Youth team should he be credited to?

I would say both, drawing from the secondary school analogy, if yu change school between JSS and SSS, what secondary school would yu claim to have attended? the one on yur JSS certificate (if there is such a thing) or the one on your SSCE certificate? mind you its important as well to keep in mind that Cesc actually came to Barcelona aged 13, does the amateur club he played for till then not also deserve to be credited with his development?

dayokanu:
Also Owusu Abeyie is different from fabregas

Owusu Abeyie has achieved nothing at Ajax as a 16yr old, Fabregas while playing for Barca youth team has been Highest goal scorer and Player of the tournament at a FIFA tournament.

Would you now combine the two in the same bag,

Owusu has not played a game for Ajax senior team same with Fabregas Thats where the similarity ends.

One was a Youth star at a FIFA tournament and known worldwide one an unknown player who people had doubts about, Wenger bought him to turn into a world beater and we see the result right now.

Oh, so shining in FIFA U17 youth competitions is now indicative of a coming of age with no further development to be made and is as well an assurance of future success abi? pray what happened to Opabunmi, Chrisantus Mcauley, Pongolle and Le Tallec who all got awards at that level? why aren't they wanted at elite clubs like Barcelona if they were already made because they won awards at U17 level? why are Pongolle and Le Tallec considered failures of the Liverpool youth system?

ritchboy:
How can you call a player who was already average before joining an Arsenal youth?

Succintly put, oya DK answer.

edoyad:
pardon me sir, but aren't the under 17, 20 and olympic tournaments considered Youth Tournament's by FiFA ?
Your brain has got gbese to settle with Intelligence inc., hope you know that ?

I nor understand DK again o, he has got some gbese to settle with Arsene in the next world. 

okay, DK to try and acheive some sort of devil's truce here, if we agree to remove the "Youth Policy" tag and call it a "Young Professional" policy would that suffice? 
Note that the Nomenclature is an attempt to differentiate between those developed fully in house (15 and below), the fruits of which we are just starting to see, and those that came between 15 and 18 after showing some promise from other clubs or starring in Youth competitions of any sort (FIFA, UEFA or CAF).

The major point I'm trying to help yu see is that it is wrong to label Owusu Abeyie a failure of the Arsenal youth/young professional policy or whatever yu choose to call it and refuse to label Cesc Fabregas a success of that same policy when they both arrived at London Colney at the age of 16 with the difference between them being that one had been dropped by his previous club due to attitude problems while the other had just being named the Golden Player in both UEFA and FIFA youth competitions. You either say both are not Arsenal youth players and start to judge the Arsenal youth policy from Wilshere/Lansbury/Gibb's set or accept that both are products of the same policy with one being a success and the other a failure.

dayokanu:
Any player who has made first team appearance at another club can not be said to be your youth player

E.g If a club should buy Jack Wilshere last season when he was under 18, Can they also claim he was their youth player? or if Bolton buys Benik Afobe can they claim he was their youth player?

The question would be, why on earth would we sell him?      but I'll pass on that for now.

If Bolton for example start to buy players between 15 and 18 who have been dropped by richer academies like Arsenal and Manure and commit to giving them playing time in their first team, what sort of policy would you call that?
It is not about who claims a player as a youth player, it is more about what the "Youth Policy" of Arsenal is.

If the Arsenal Youth policy started about the time of the move to the emirates about 2004 (or shortly before that if it had been in the pipeline) surely it would be a stretch to expect all the 9 - 13 year olds taken in then to have suddenly taken over the Arsenal team within a 7 year period (the oldest of them would be about 20 FFS). The first set of 9 year old intakes at Hale's end academy in 2001 (3 years after Wenger arrived) actually include Wilshere and Frimpong who have been nurtured all through to the first team frame with the likes of Aneke and Afobe not far behind.

It was necessary to supplement that with a good scouting network to identify precocious talent in the age range of 15 - 18 (Hence why players like Senderos, Aliadere, Clichy, Song, Fabregas, Owusu Abeyie, Djorou, Bendtner, Wellington, Miyaichi et al were bought) now some of them might have shown more initial promise than others like Cesc and Vela both doing well in FIFA U17 competitions or Clichy and Song having first team appearances for whatever lower division french league club they previously played for, but they are still far from sure bets to make it into the Arsenal first team even less likely to be players of the calibre to deliver trophies so are still quite a risky prospect. I think it is double standards to label the failures as part of the Arsenal youth project but then find technical grounds to discount the successes as not being part of that same youth project due to a perception that they were always good.

In short you DK are a wombiliki wombia to want to eat your cake and have it. 

dayokanu:
Fabrice Muamba which club would he claim as his youth team, Arsenal, Birmingham or Bolton

Any player who has starred in a FIFA organised tournament before joining cant be said to be a youth of your club.

E.g Should someone buy Toni Kroos in 2007 after being the best player at a FIFA tournament Would he be considered a Chelsea youth or

If Palermo bought Pele after winning the World cup at age 17, Would he be considered a Palermo youth?

After applying these 2 constraints, Clichy, Song and Vela do not count as youth products, but you do realise that its the same policy that brought the likes of Bendtner, Senderos and Owusu Abeyie to Arsenal that also brought all those that are now disqualified by your constraints (i.e. scouting of precocious talent).
Having said that though, I agree with you that full Internationals should be discounted, anyone representing their country fully is no longer a boy but a man (and would actually qualify for a UK Work Permit) hence my reason for discounting both Rooney and Ronaldo apart from being over 18 when they were bought.

I don't count Denilson as a youth product as well cos he was 18 before we bought him but a 16 year old is in no way a complete player no matter how expensive he was. What really is the criteria you use to classify a player as a youth product? age when bought? price bought? 1st team appearances with previous clubs?

Maybe you need to define that first so we know what our terms of reference is, personally I use age and eligibility to play in the FA Youth cup. Any player bought before 18 as far as I'm concerned is a youth product of the club but that takes nothing away from the contribution of previous clubs.

dayokanu:
So where does Barcelona feature in the history of Cesc or where does Southampton feature for Wankott?

Where does a surrogate mother feature in the history of a baby? 
If you count Denilson who came at 18 as a failure of our youth policy, why would you then discount Theo and Cesc who came at 16 as successes?

Cata kini? most hated currently at the emirates
hope yu were supporting them long before La Masia started delivering the goods sha?
I don't respect all these fair weather supporters who flock to success, na those people wey don dey support when yu were RM's binshes I dey respect.

Chrisbenogor:
I haff run and leaff dem oh 

Haaaa, not you too. 
I'm sure Mazaje, Huxley, Ogaga and co are holding it down sha, I took a break and never went back after finding the Arsenal thread and losing Bawo.
Deepsight tried to lure me back but I just couldnt be bothered.
Anyway, welcome to sports, its a lot more relaxed here provided yu're not an Arsenal fan which I'm fortunate enough to be 

@Chrisbenogor

Nice to see you in sports, how are my people over there in the religious forum.

debosky:
Don't say I didn't tell you Dudu. . . .but as usual you couldn't but rise to the bait.

Yu know say I nor dey disappoint naa. 

dayokanu:
Dudu what youth policy are you still talking about when majority of your starters were bought from other clubs.

Youth players are Sczezny, Gibbs and Wilshere in 7yrs of youth policy

Even if a youth policy produced 3 players in 7 years then that is major progress considering that the first set would need 4 years to clock 20 first if they are brought in at 16, effectively meaning 1 per year. If it continues at the same rate, it will produce about 5 in 10 years.
But FYI, youth recruited starters for Arsenal as things stand now include Wilshere, Cesc, Theo, Szczesny and Gibbs. That is 5 and not 3.   

follypimpi:
[font=Lucida Sans Unicode]
Should RVP by any chance gets injured around Jan then we only have Vela as a backup.

That January thingie is scary o, did Morroco qualify for ANC? 

dayokanu:
Oya I dey vex, Eldee Gimme codes to carling cup make I go form local shampion on some people

No wahala, I dey kampe for you in the main league. I nor do H-2-H this season 

debosky:
Ok Dudu, tell us where you finished.

You were 22 as of February before your epic collapse mirrored that of Arsenal.

Post the final placements jare and stop asking unnecesary questions, I wasn't counting because there was never a rule about final placements or even points last season. I maintain my stand.  Until those final placements are posted here there is no assurance of fairness in what has been done.

debosky:
Arsenal’s Ignasi Miquel has won the European Under-19 Championships with Spain.

Good to hear he's gotten regular football over the summer. . . .from his performances last season, he surely can't be worse than Squillaci can he?

PS - this is no invitation to rants about youth.

What the hell does this mean? are we not supposed to celebrate our own?  
We are going to either swim or sink with our youth project anyway so why not view it with some optimism?  
I forgot, negativity is the in thing cos we are goint to get relegated next season anyway.

While we are at it, Gilles Sunu has gotten 2 goals for france in the WYC and Coquelin isn't doing too badly even though France conceeded 4 goals in their opening game.

I've repeatedly asked for the final table for last season to be posted but I still await it, I don't deal in old wive's tales,
a false assertion often repeated seemingly assumes a semblance of truism in the mind of the less discerning. 
If it is posted and I'm not in the top 28, I will renounce that post and I will apologise to Eldee
All I ask for is transparency.

debosky:
Angelieldee ton pin recodes oju re da oh!

Dudu I challenge you to go into the Carling Cup and win promotion to the H-2-H league. 

To be honest, I wouldn't have minded to play in it, but it turns out there are only 3 people in it. I'm staying off H-2-H this season but I hope the precedent has been set this season and next season entrance into the H-2-H will be based on points gathered from the previous campaign with no shifting of the goalpost after the ref has blown the whistle
I'm looking forward to wiping the floor with all of you in the main league. 

I still consider it dodgy and unfair that I didn't get an entrance into the FA or whatchamacallit H-2-H when people who didn't even compete last season did but then so it goes. Eldee had a difficult assignment but IMO did not handle it well as there were no clearly defined criteria for exclusion or inclusion. I detest anything that suggests backdoor manouvers and so will not be joining the H-2-H league this season.
Have a good season in your FA cup y'all.