Wednesday, June 22nd, 2011 « Untold Arsenal: Arsenal News. Supporting the Lord Wenger; coach of the decade
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By Walter Broeckx
For those who just sit there…..
As there still is a bit of time before we start playing again I find it the right time to look at the new season. And in fact I don’t mean the season in terms of games of results. No I refer to the new season for us as supporters.
As every year the transfer period is a period where a lot of fans get very nervous. Maybe even more nervous than when we actually play a game. I am a bit of the fan who gets more nervous before we play and in this time of the season my mood goes from laughing out loud to shaking my head in disbelief to very angry. Depending on the stream of rumours that I read.
Of course we don’t have much to say or influence on the signings that will be made. We can suggest dozens of names, nobody at Arsenal who works in the management will say to Wenger: “You know blog X said we should buy player Y this summer, shall I offer him a contract?” We can suggest all of the players to be sold because there are rubbish or want to go or are greedy …. We still have no influence on this.
But there is one thing in which we fans do have an influence. I think we fans and in this case I certainly look at those fans who attend the games in person as they can really make a difference and influence the transfer market.
To explain this I will go back a few years in time. We just had been robbed by the refs of the title in 2007-2008. Adebayor just had his wonder season. And in the closing season he went to the media and gave press conferences on how good he really was. And how he was wanted by ….well any top club in the world. And to convince him to stay at Arsenal he only needed a very big pay rise.
He stayed but the fans didn’t like his behaviour at the time. They didn’t like him asking more money. I can understand those fans. It doesn’t feel nice to hear a player talking about other clubs, demanding more money when you still have a few years left on your contract. We fans are loyal and we ask the same from our players. But on the other hand if we are doing a great job for the company we work for, we also would like to see the boss giving us some more money. This is human and understandable.
So I didn’t have a real problem with Adebayor asking more money. I had a bit of trouble with him talking about those other teams, but well I never have been highly impressed with the intellectual capacity shown by Adebayor. So I put it down to that and I must say that later on he proved me right each time with his stupid statements and remarks.
But when Arsenal played their first game in the Emirates the next season I was there. And I heard a certain part of the fans boo him. I didn’t boo him. As I never boo a player. Not an Arsenal player in fact. Never an Arsenal player.
Because I think that from the moment a player has signed his contract for Arsenal I embrace him and I support him. I may not like his attitude. I may not like his personal life. I may not like the way he does his hair. I may not like the way he behaved during the summer. But when the ball starts rolling I only have two categories of players. The good ones who are wearing the Arsenal shirt and the bad ones who wear another shirt.
But other fans thought it necessary to boo Adebayor. And I think from that moment on it was clear that he was on his way out. The only way he could win those supporters back was by scoring another 30 goals a season. But as he felt not loved and not wanted any more you could see him dropping his shoulders. And he was a shadow of the player he was the season before. He became ever more lazy than before , was offside a dozen times each game because he came back to slow. And these are the only things I have always said in a negative way about him.
The relation between Adebayor and the supporters was broken. First of all by his behaviour in the summer period but also because a part of the fans felt the need to boo him.
And this is where I think we should have learned our lesson by now. Whatever is said and done in the summer season doesn’t matter any more when the ball starts rolling again. If a player is still an Arsenal player we should support him. No matter how we may think about him when they are Arsenal players they need our support. And my support they will get.
So when I was speaking about us fans having an influence on the transfers (in and out) it is by showing our support to every player who is an Arsenal player. Because Adebayor didn’t feel loved any more and wanted out (and also wanted even more money). But the same could happen again with other players.
At the end of the day I don’t think a player will stay because we supported them. But I do think that a player could leave when he is being booed by the fans. But I also do think that a player that is being booed by the fans will not produce what he can produce. Would you work your socks off if you get nothing but bad words from your surroundings? The chance you will say f*ck *ff is a real possibility I think. Well the same goes for our players.
And so we fans could be the most important transfer that Arsenal can make this season. Why don’t we start by supporting the players no matter what happens. Some players have hinted at games in which the Gooners in the Emirates raised them to a higher level. Barcelona, Everton, Manchester United,…. Games that for various reasons was won with the help from the supporters in the Emirates.
So let us all transfer ourselves this summer. Let us transfer ourselves from the fans that are just sitting there in the Emirates to supporters who support the own team and all the players. Transfer ourselves to supporters who breath in the neck of the players of the other teams. Transfer ourselves to supporters who put pressure on the ref. All this could make the difference for the players on the field. No need to say this doesn’t apply for those who already have supported the players like it should be. They just can carry on like they did before.
But no excuses any more from next season on. Each Gooner that leaves the Emirates should have lost his voice while singing and shouting during the game. Because when we demand passion from the players on the field, we should also show our passion in the stands. And when they are exhausted after the game, we also should be exhausted from supporting the players. The players shirt should be wet after the game, but our shirts also should be wet after our support.
So let us do the best and the biggest transfer business of the summer season: let’s give our team the loudest and the best support 60.000 people can give. Now that would be a major signing for the team. Why don’t we all be one of those 60.000 new signings.
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