Losing To Chelsea Wasn’t Wenger’s Fault – He Is My Hero….

Never write when you are angry. It’s something I try to live by. I don’t think you should write about a match immediately after it has finished because feelings are still raw and open to exaggeration.

I’m angry, a match has just finished and I’m going to write about it. I’m angry about the appalling refereeing in this country. There is no possible way to predict what would have happened had Gabriel stayed on or Mike Dean sent off Costa as well. It’s no secret he is anything but nonpartisan when it comes to Arsenal – he once celebrated a Spurs goal with a jig – but he could do a better job of masking it or his paymasters should do a better job of acting like they care about neutrality of their officials.

The red card completely changed the game. I’m not arguing that Gabriel deserved to stay on, in fact his behaviour was petulant and irresponsible and he deserved to go off. As good as he has been for Arsenal recently he is demonstrating that, mentally as least, he isn’t quite ready to be first pick for Arsenal because he can’t be trusted to keep his cool. He’s shown he is easy to rile and scummy sneak-thugs like Diego Costa live to play against defenders like that. He was immature and paid the price for it. My issue is that Costa got away with three offences worthy of a red card. It’s inconsistent refereeing.

I can deal with poor refs if they are poor to everyone but Dean seems to save up all of his incompetence especially for us.

Part way through the second half I said I was looking forward to seeing how this is somehow going to be Wenger’s fault and was not surprised to see a host of inventive theories as to why Wenger should have trained the team better to avoid Dean giving greater favour to Chelsea. I was less surprised to receive a litany of tweets accusing me of spin, being a Wenger ‘apologist’ (probably the most annoying term used on Arsenal Twitter these days), deluded as to our failings and “accepting mediocrity by shifting blame to the ref”.

Well, if thinking the referee should be consistent counts as being a Wenger apologist then sure, that’s what I am.

Santi Cazorla was sent off towards the end of the match for a second bookable offence and I was irked by it because I’m not sure the referee had to give it. The tackle itself was probably deserving a second yellow but lets add a bit of context here. Mike Dean had let Chelsea off quite a few bookable offences so for the sake of balance and consistency he could have let that one go. Also, it was late in the match and the ref knew that it would mean sending the player off. It was not a malicious challenge and most referees would have let that slide because there were only ten minutes to go.

I think Fabregas’ acting classes paid off and his theatrics left Dean with little choice.

I’m genuinely not sure what to take from that match. I don’t think we looked terrible but we also didn’t look overly threatening. I think Cazorla is massively off the pace and I’m not sure why he is being picked every week at the moment. Alexis looks jaded and I’m also miffed as to why Wenger is persisting with him when it’s clear the guy needs a break. There is the argument that we don’t have anyone to back him up but whilst everyone spent the summer moaning about a DM, I was saying I wanted a goalie and a winger. I got half of my wish.

Winger didn’t seem a priority for many as they felt we were well stocked there but I felt we only had one senior starter – Alexis. I saw Walcott as more of a striker and I’ve been saying for months I don’t know why Oxlade-Chamberlain is fapped over so enthusiastically when he’s so errant in possession, his decision making is poor and he’s a defensive liability. He makes exciting runs but to what end? He’s explosive but more like a French banger than a stick of dynamite. He makes a loud bang and a decent flash but he isn’t making any dents.

I spoke to a friend of the podcast recently about our summer window, and Wenger, in great detail and I expressed the view that I believe Wenger to be persisting with Oxlade-Chamberlain because he is succumbing to crowd pressure. You may disagree but that’s what I believe and I consider it to be a massive sign of weakness and a great flaw. So in my view we needed a winger and whilst young Jeff Reine-Adelaide looks a real prospect – one that I am truly excited about seeing more of this season – I think we needed someone ready to play. The injury to Welbeck probably screwed us a bit in that respect but I consider him a striker.

Our line-up today is pretty much what I would have chosen based on available players – despite my complaints about Cazorla and Alexis looking jaded, which I feel highlights perfectly the fan phenomena of thinking we know better but in actual fact having nothing even remotely resembling an answer; unless you count “should have bought XYZ” as a water-tight argument.

We looked like we had learned a little from our mid-week fiasco which I was also accused of spinning because I didn’t kick off about the 6 changes. In hindsight they were the wrong choice but I’m not going to chide Wenger for that. Not because I’m an apologist but because I think it’s one of those things that either work or don’t and it would be fickle to rage when it doesn’t but hail him as a genius when it does. I try not to be drawn into the extreme polarities of opinion or to be fickle. I don’t always succeed but when I do I’m an apologist or AAA – there are always those who seek to label you if your opinion doesn’t tidily align with theirs even if it’s not dissimilar.

I feel like the only thing I can take from this match is the bitter feeling of being denied a chance to win on merit by shitty, inconsistent refereeing but I won’t say that because that would be apologising and as you can tell from this post, I never say anything bad about Wenger and think he’s infallible….

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