In Defense of Wenger (Not Transfer Related)

The Premier League is jumping for joy, rubbing its hands in glee and creasing itself with laughter. Its favourite pastime is back. Welcome to another round of the ritual humiliation of Arsene Wenger.

I opened this blog by speaking of Wenger, and I have leaped to his defence on numerous occasions since. I have no qualms, however, in doing so again. Despite a wealth of evidence to the contrary, the Premier League and its media companions will not stop until they have irrefutably proven Wenger to be anything between the Devil and a lunatic in need of sectioning. Or more preferably a combination of the two.

It is one of the Premier League’s greatest tragedies that a man as eloquent and honourable as Wenger should be routinely hounded into a position of immense pressure by unconsidered conclusions. The Wenger Question is one of those arguments like Dawkins’ case against religion or the death penalty: its only real merit is in the sheer size of its public support. Any true objective onlooker can see that Wenger is a man to be revered, whose achievements at Arsenal are second to none, both for footballing and financial reasons, and that to revel so heartily in his misfortune is closer to sadism than analysis. And yet we are dragged along under the immense peer pressure. Wenger is wrong; his policies are ineffective and his faith in attractive football is risible. If you deny it, you deny the law of Alan Hansen and Martin Samuel, and as such you cannot truly know anything about football.

To give them their credit, many of Wenger’s critics have finally come round to sense in that they no longer disregard his immense success at Arsenal. When putting the Frenchman to the verbal sword these days, it is considered only fair to do so with a brief and reluctant concession of his team’s continued presence in the Champions League and the astonishing lack of debt which so defines them as a club far more admirable than their direct rivals. But with the acknowledgments out the way, the bile can flow ever more freely. No trophies in six years and the departure of certain key players; unchallengeable proof, they say, that this man has reached the end of his time. Two games into the season, and Wenger’s team are already in crisis, according to many respected British national dailies. Gleeful pictures of him under the north London rain were plastered with increasing malice over the back pages this weekend. Named and shamed: the man who dared to defy the Premier League’s recipe for success.

For this – what else? - is the reason for the Wenger hatred. It is not that people are blind to his success, it is that they fail to accept that it is just as remarkable as Manchester United’s stack of Premier League trophies, and far more impressive than the heavily subsidised glory of plastic teams such as Chelsea and Manchester City. Wenger’s idea of success transcends silverware, and extends to dignity and long term prosperity – two things which Arsenal have in abundance and other teams have forgotten the meaning of. The media accept this, but they cannot understand why anyone would accept it over immediate riches and trophies. For instant gratification is the core value of the Premiership, and this long nosed meddling foreigner with his fancy brand of football should not have the audacity to negate it.

But who is the real loser? Is it the public and press, who sneer and jeer at Wenger everytime his team get knocked out of a competition or a player leaves? Is it the Arsenal fans who have been so persuaded by the media witch hunts to abandon reason and turn on the most brilliant manager of their club’s history? Or is it Wenger, who in spite of all the pure hatred and disrespect being thrown daily into his measured face, retains an intelligence, an eloquence and a dignity which is simply nowhere to be seen in most of his contemporaries?

The Premier League really does eat itself, and Wenger is the prime example of this. In Premier League logic, Alex Ferguson is held up as the model for all good managers; even when he cuts deals so transparently crooked as the signing of Bebe or behaves in such a disgustingly infantile manner as to refuse to speak to the BBC, the pundits and observers just laugh it off with a knowing chuckle: he’s Fergie, he can do what he likes. When Wenger, a man who refuses to buy into the corruption of the English top flight, even if it costs him silverware, makes the odd mistake, he is portrayed as a madman. Is this the right message? Of course not.

Not that the right conclusion will ever be drawn – when Cesc Fábregas left Arsenal this summer, it was widely accepted to be at least partially a result of the club’s empty trophy cabinet. And yet on his departure, did Fábregas – as considered and mature a professional as any – laud the pace and excitement of the Premier League? Or did he express his deep regret at having to leave a man as admirable as Wenger, to whom he owed so much? The honesty of Fábregas’ emotion was something which no Ferguson and no Mourinho will ever inspire in their players, for all their trophies. Loyalty, yes, but not on this level. The tears of Cesc Fábregas were testimony to the brilliance of Arsene Wenger.

The latest fad is to suggest that the Arsenal manager may be losing his marbles. That his time has come, and he should leave before he goes mad. It is the pettiest and ugliest form of insult. That Wenger will stick to his guns no matter what is said about him is what makes him such an incredible manager and individual. It is part of the reason that his services are still coveted by Real Madrid and it is why, if and when he does leave Arsenal, he will leave with his dignity firmly intact, no matter how many trophies he has won. If that makes him a madman, then send me to the asylum with him. It can’t be any madder than the Premier League.