Fucking Arsenal

"When, as captain, some players come up to you and talk to you about a player...complaining about him...and then during the match you speak to this player and the player in question insults us, there comes a time where we can no longer comprehend how this can happen." 

- William Gallas, the leader no one's following

What's going on at Arsenal? 

Right now, we're a shit team that squabbles amongst ourselves at half-time. We're not good enough to win anything, and yet, we've got such inflated egos that we think we're champions already. It's depressing. And I can't be bothered writing something soulful about it. My heart isn't in it. I think, like Cesc, that this team is going nowhere, and I can't put my best efforts towards something that is doomed. 

There was a time when we were successful. That was the team of Vieira, Pires, Henry and Bergkamp. The reason for that success wasn't purely talent - it was the unique team spirit that had been forged through years and years of playing and training together. It was in the way the whole Arsenal team bowed before Pires when he won the Player of the Year award. It was in the way Henry took the mickey out of Ljunberg's Calvin Klein modelling contract by parading through the dressing room with a sock stuffed down his shorts. It was so strong that Vieira rejected Real Madrid because he didn't want to break up the family. It led to the Double, the Invincibles, and some of the most beautiful football ever played in England. 

And now, we're shit. We gutted that team and promoted kids too soon. The kids have had too much, too soon. And now, they're spoilt and weak, and greatly deluded about the extent of their abilities. They need someone to give them a huge dressing down. But that's not going to happen. 

Arsenal are a side bereft of leaders. All that experience that was garnered through the 90s has been discarded, and now, there's a leadership vacuum at the heart of Arsenal. It's a problem that cannot be solved merely by parachuting experienced players into the side. It takes time and success to earn that position of leadership. Without it, you're just an old guy barking orders that don't make immediate sense.

Gallas is right - it's hard to comprehend how this can happen. How the fuck did we end up like this? This was supposed to be the Golden Generation, dammit. Cesc was the new Vieria, Denilson was the new Cesc, and we'd have little baby Cescs all the way down to the under-9s. We were supposed to be WINNING stuff by now, not just showing our potential in fits and starts. 

It's so utterly, utterly depressing.  

Anyway, screw it. I'm in Belgrade for two days, and I'm going to go get something to eat. After two and a bit weeks in Turkey, I'm sick of kebabs. Arsenal can go hang themselves. 

Fucking Arsenal.