So, by all accounts, Arsenal went into media lock-down after what happened at Stamford Bridge.
The pre-game press conference, scheduled for today has been cancelled, and the club will provide some quotes for the papers/media outlets ahead of the game. I guess that will include some team updates in terms of injuries, and especially in relation to Laurent Koscielny who was withdrawn at half-time on a Saturday with a calf problem.
The official social media outlets have been quiet, along with those of the players, and I’m absolutely fine with that. I don’t need to hear anything from any of them, and while it sounds like a cliche, the only appropriate response is to perform on the pitch tomorrow night. No Twitter apology, or Facebook post, or post-match interview is going to do a single thing to put things right.
And maybe, as horrible as this current situation is, it might bring to an end this growing trend for footballers apologising when things go wrong. It’s little more than a sop for the neediest people out there. I’d suggest most of us can accept that footballers are human, sometimes they play well, sometimes they don’t. Sometimes they’re in good form, sometimes they’re not, but there’s no need to bow to trumped up media pressure and bleating idiots on Twitter just to say sorry. Just let your feet do the talking (another cliche, I know, but it’s appropriate).
So, bearing that in mind, you ought to treat any stories purporting to be from inside the Arsenal dressing room with the disdain they deserve. What happened at Stamford Bridge is bad enough without the need for the kind of shit-stirring which is little more than self-promotion. Nobody knows what’s in the mind of the manager. We can all speculate on how he might be thinking, or how we might think if we were in his position, but even those points of view might be informed by our own opinion on where we go from here.
And on that, as appalling as the performance at Chelsea was, the reaction from some people (I’m struggling to refer to them as fans) online has been disheartening in the extreme. I get that it’s a very small minority of people, but the comments we’ve chosen not to publish on Arseblog News this weekend would make you despair.
What is wrong with people that they can’t express an opinion without resorting to personal abuse, vile language (and you know I like a good swear) or phrasing it in such a way that wouldn’t leave them, or us, open to legal action if it were published?
Being beaten by Chelsea like that was awful, but as melodramatic as you would like to be, it’s not at all like being raped. And when your comment is not published, don’t email me to suggest the only reason it isn’t on the site is because we won’t publish negative opinion. Look at the comments that are there – most of them are negative this weekend. Maybe you should step back and think about why we’ve chosen not to pollute this website with your nonsense.
I know I’ve said this before but it’s got to a point where the worst thing about losing a football match is seeing these kind of people – who have nothing to say otherwise – crawl out from under their cyber-rocks to make sure everyone pays attention to them. Internet cockroaches, and like their scuttling friends, they seem almost indestructible at times. Zero tolerance, fuckers. Remember that.
Anyway, I’m sure that there’s been some kind of inquest behind the scenes because, let’s face it, there needs to be. This group of adults needs to get things out in the open and find out why what happened at Man City and Liverpool happened again at Chelsea. That goes for the manager, coaching staff, and the players. There has be frank and open discussion and if some feelings get hurt along the way, that’s fine too.
The players might feel the manager’s approach to the game was wrong. The manager might feel some of his players have let him down after the trust and faith he’s shown in them. And there’s probably truth on all sides, so when something like this happens for the third time in a season, then finding that truth and dealing with it is important.
If feelings are hurt, so be it. That’s often necessary in situations like this. And I’d suggest in this case it’s almost a requirement. I won’t say it’s a positive, in any way, but sometimes it takes something extraordinary to really accept there’s a problem, and this third humiliating defeat in the one season ticks a lot of those boxes.
What is most important is that we find a way to pull things together between now and the end of the campaign. We have a game tomorrow night, then Man City come to town on Saturday, before we go away to Everton the following weekend to play them in an early kick off (this time 13.30, not 12.45 – as if it makes any real difference anyway).
We have the FA Cup in our sights too which provides us with a fantastic chance of winning a trophy this season. It’s a way down the line yet, of course, with plenty of league football to play in the meantime, and while there are bigger questions to ask, and be answered, now really isn’t the time.
However, speaking of questions, feel free to send them myself @arseblog and @gunnerblog on Twitter – using the hashtag #arsecastextra – as we prepare for this morning’s show. It’s likely to be a light-hearted romp as we look back over a fun-filled weekend. The podcast equivalent of Requiem for a Dream. But with more opiates. Probably.
Hoping too to have a special guest on today’s show, so fingers crossed for that, and it’ll give us some interesting perspective on what happened at the weekend. Not 100% but we’re working on it. If not James and I will have to suffice.
Until later.
