DEDICATED TO ARSENE WENGER: THE FOOTBALL ARTIST

Last of a dying breed

The World of Football is a really funny place, while it brings us so much joy and happiness, the fans are fickle, the media has short term memory and paper supersedes
what happens on the pitch. Everybody strives to be the best, to achieve that, your stars have to align.

“….I believe the target of anything in life should be to do it so well that it becomes an art”-Wenger

The derogatory manner with which one of the game’s greatest ever managers  name is mentioned is bothering on disrespect at least. This is a man that was shot into the spotlight as an unknown and made an instant mark in World football. As he got older, he became more sentimental but referring to him as an “obsolete” character in the game like most media outlets describe him to be is simply offensive.

“…..I believe one of the best things about managing people is that we can influence lives in a positive way. That’s basically what a manager is about. When I can do that, I am very happy”Wenger

It is not new information that in his first full season as an Arsenal manager he finished it with a league and FA cup double but that’s not why he’s so highly revered. The Professor added brain to the brawn that previously existed in a team that had steely characters like Tony Adams, Winterburn and brought in players like Viera, Overmars, Bergkamp, and Henry. He also introduced dieting, as Ian Wright complained that the worst part of Wenger’s rule was his insistence on players taking broccoli. He also influenced players life style outside in a bid to shapen the team in his own image, which culminated in Arsenal going unbeaten for a whole season, a historic feat that still hasn’t been achieved in modern football history, the simple truth is that a team playing in Wenger’s image can do this.

“…One of the things I discovered in Japan was from watching sumo wrestling. At the end you can never tell who has won the fight, and who has lost, because they do not show their emotion because it could embarrass the loser. It is unbelievable. That is why I try to teach my team politeness”-Wenger

Time and trends have changed and just like the tides rise and fall, the old will be replaced by the new, however, In Arsene, we see a man that instead of simply fitting in with the trend, has constantly remodelled his blueprint to anul the excesses of the system(Le Chatieler’s Principle, it’s Chemistry).

A lot has and is still being made of the fact that he hasn’t lifted the English Premiere league title for 12 years and Gunners faithful are right to feel aggrieved by this but statements that question if he still has anything to offer the game are way off the mark, This is a man that’s clearly driven and hungry to succeed.

The football universe is at a point where winning at all cost supersedes everything, even if it means ripping out the soul of the game, the World is trophy-crazy due to the emergence of Pep Guardiola and Jose Mourinho and the average life span of a top flight manager is somewhere around 18 months. Arsene is the last of a dying breed, the representation of what football is and should be; “I take pride in the fact that people go home having felt that for 90 minutes today, life is beautiful-and that’s it, basically. That’s why Professional football exists”-Arsene Wenger, 2012, there might never be another like you and I'm grateful to have witnessed all you've given us and hopefully more to come.  Happy 20^th Anniversary Le Proffeseur.