Arsenal News » 2010 » January » 23

By Walter Broeckx

Some hate us for what happened to them in the past. The 1989 Liverpool victims. Or the ones like Shearer who came across Arsenal and Arsène Wenger in his Newcastle days and almost always lost in the league and in cup games.

Then you have the Tottenham connection like Linneker and if you take any name out there in pundit land and think of the past you can understand why they have started to hate us and Arsène Wenger.

It all started at the beginning of his career at Arsenal.

I can imagine the pundits some 14 years ago:

A Frenchman ????? Yes.

A FRENCHMAN ??????? Yes.

A Frenchman as manager from Arsenal ??? Yes.

Tell me you are joking ? No.

And when they saw Arsène Wenger for the first time I can imagine their comments:

That guy with his glasses and with the attitude of a teacher is going to be the manager of Arsenal ???? Yes.

He wont last for one week, one month, one season….

But he proved them wrong and still is at our club.

If you want to make enemies in pundit land you just have to make them eat their own words. There is nothing they hate more than having to admit they were wrong. So by succeeding at The Arsenal our manager has made them all look stupid and this is something they will never forgive him.  So we have a manager who they don’t like at all.

The second reason why they hate him is for the fact that he is successful. Not only did he prove them wrong on staying that long but also he showed them that he is one of the greatest managers in the EPL. For some it won’t matter that he is French but I can imagine for some pundits this is making things even worse.

By being successful he has not only made them look stupid, not only because they were wrong, but also for the fact that they had laughed at him with his strange habits and changes he brought in the game and in the tactics. Another reason to dislike him and his club.

Another reason is that Arsène Wenger walks in one direction and all the others run blindly in the other direction. For years Wenger has been telling everyone that he wants to keep Arsenal in good financial health and that he never would allow himself to put the future of his club in danger. Unlike other managers we all know and have seen in the game.

And in his teacher-like behaviour he lectures others in how to spend and mostly on how not to spend the money, plus how to run the club on a tight and controlled budget.

And this is another thing the pundits don’t like. The pundits want to see money moving around, signing of big names and praise the managers that splash the cash around. And when the club goes down, the pundits tell them to spend even more money.

Then comes our manager and says: “Listen up every one, you are all doing it wrong”. To take lecture from a successful manager from Arsenal who is wrong… this is to much for them. Certainly when events are proving him right.

So those pundits like to write us off. “Arsenal will drop out of the top 4″ sounds very good in pundit land. And when that French cunt then says: “No we will fight for the league” they just laugh it away.

But by mid January that French bloke had taken his Arsenal side to the top of the league. And so they start realising that they were wrong, totally wrong again. And again it is that damned Frenchman that makes them look likes idiots once again.

So how can we let people forget that we screwed up as pundits and showed our total lack of knowledge is the word that spreads around pundit land… ?

Let’s focus on the bad things of Arsenal: Oh look Gallas has stepped on someone’s foot ? Shame, disgraceful, horror, the pundits are rolling over each other in expressing their disgust of… another Frenchman.. who just has made the most horrible tackle ever made in football history. He must be hanged for that at least. And by trying to hang Gallas they hope that it puts Arsenal in a bad day light. And Arsène Wenger as well.

Well dear pundits you maybe fooling some people but you won’t fool us by diverting the attention to Gallas, instead of giving Arsenal credit for overturning an 11 point deficit in less than two months. No you, once again, follow the escape route in the hope people forget you screwed up on Arsenal and Arsène Wenger once again.

It must be difficult to eat your own words and admit you are wrong… And as I have a good heart but a bad character, I really enjoy the fact that we are top and the pleasure is even bigger now I see you twisting and turning to avoid another humiliation by the hands of that bloody Frenchman.

ELSEWHERE….

The moment 100 years ago this week, when the world of Arsenal changed for ever.

The book of 100 years ago which covers the whole story of the creation of the modern Arsenal.