Forget Fourth: Spurs 2-1 Arsenal

Progress at last... from bad to worse.

After seeming to stand still for so long, Arsenal are now clearly going backwards.

Barring an absolute collapse from Chelsea, Arsenal will not play in the Champions League next season.

Ignoring for a moment the bigger picture, the derby was far from Arsenal's worst performance of the season, but it was compromised completely by goal-costing errors at one end, and absolute toothlessness at the other.

For the first part of the game, up until the opening goal, Arsenal were quite dominant without creating much of note. Giroud and Walcott both threatened but were denied by late saving tackles. As so often this season, they were failing to threaten the opposition goalkeeper.

Then, when Arsenal's pressing slackened, Spurs took ruthless advantage. Sigurdson slipped through a simple   ball, the Arsenal back four stood and watched, and Bale ran on to knock tidily past Szczesny.

In typical fashion, Arsenal were stupid enough to repeat the same mistake a couple of minutes later. Parker bombed forward, and this time it was Lennon who ran through unmolested onto the midfielder's pass. Szczesny's rash charge out of goal made it so easy for the winger, who took a simple touch around the keeper and slipped the ball into the open net to double the home side's advantage.

There's been plenty of talk already about Arsenal's suicidal high line, inviting punishment by the pace of Bale and Lennon. But there was plenty more about the game to worry about.

Second half, Arsenal seemed to have grabbed a lifeline when Mertesacker's near post header flicked in off Bale. But after a brief period of danger, Spurs composed themselves again, and saw out the game with minimum fuss. Wenger's changes seemed to take the wind out of his own team's sails. Spurs made chances on the break, Arsenal created little.

Jack Wilshere was peripheral. The danger here is that Wenger is repeating a mistake he arguably made with Arsenal's last great central midfielder. After changing to 4-5-1/ 4-3-3, Wenger shifted Cesc Fabregas further forward, and while the captain scored more goals, he also lost some of his usual influence, especially in big games.

Wilshere needs to be in the centre of the pitch. He is a creative player and the temptation, with the current formation, is to play him in a position from which he is relatively free to roam. But when Wenger plays Wilshere in the hole, and Cazorla wide, he takes Arsenal's best two players out of their best positions.

Arsenal now lie well adrift of Spurs, five behind Chelsea, and showing no signs of putting together the sort of run they now need. The impression is that they are finally arriving at a nightmare destination that has threatened them for a long time. Wenger has done well in recent seasons to keep Arsenal in that top four, but he has also shown incredible hubris in refusing to alter his methods, inviting the very situation that the club now finds itself in.

It's been a long time coming. Arsenal are heading for the Europa League, and what lies beyond may be mere mediocrity. Is this the monumental kick up the arse that the club and the manager have needed? Is he still capable of leading the club out of trouble? Even if he does now choose to spend proactively, can he no longer be trusted to spend well?

How Can He Be So Obtuse

"It is very difficult because the level of expectation is very high- people want to see Lionel Messi come in, they don't want to see a promising guy"

In January, during a season that has Arsenal fans more worried than hopeful, this is not what they want to hear.

It's patronising, it's unwelcome, it's unsubtle.

Exaggeration can be a useful tool when deployed at the right time- a bit like Theo Walcott.

But this is not the right time.

All Mr. Wenger's statement does is set fans wondering just how many footballers they have seen recently who are nowhere near as good as Lionel Messi, and yet much, much better than, say, Gervinho.

The time to talk proudly of "promising guys" has surely passed.

For young players, Arsenal Football Club probably represents the promise of development, but not of ultimate success.

Fans have seen over and over that if a promising player develops at Arsenal into the player he wants to be, then he will soon want to leave for trophies, or money, or both.

If a player doesn't quite develop as he would like, he might well stick around, or get loaned out, or be glued to the treatment table, sucking wages out of the club all the while.

So while fans do still, to some extent, appreciate promise, they don't want it to be prioritised over the club's success. 

I do realise that, in a sense, Arsenal are suffering from their own success. Not just the silverware won in the first half of Wenger's reign, but the continued success of Champions League qualification.

We have to accept that that has been the target since about 2008, and to continue to hit that target has been a fine achievement.

But this sort of success has become monontonous to a lot of supporters, because in all sport the highest measure of success is in trophies won. Arsenal have been qualifying for the Champions League, but since 2006, they haven't been within an ass's roar of winning it. We all appreciate that it helps sustain the club financially, but that mantra has grown tiresome as no signs emerge of that financial stability actually leading anywhere new. It is not an end of itself.

Of course we should always take His public utterances with a pinch of salt. There must surely be a recognition that the squad is in need of surgery. And the focus on signing players of potential has happily lessened somewhat. Arsenal's most vital additions last season were probably Arteta and Mertesacker, experienced players who steadied a rocking boat, and the big signings of last summer were Podolski and Cazorla.

Spending more money is not always the answer, but if Arsenal wish to continue the monotonous habit of relative success, then it might prove to be the only answer.

Half a Team, No Chance

Swansea 3-2 Arsenal

Arsenal were awful at Fulham and they were worse at Swansea.

A similar pattern emerged. A good start, an early goal. Then Arsenal lose their way. The hosts take control.

This time the deserved equaliser came a lot earlier than at the Cottage. Ramsey's dopey foul in the box set the tone for a wretched individual performance. Sinclair beat Szczesny from the spot.

If Ramsey had an awful game,he wasn't alone. Arshavin and Walcott were both disgracefully bad. Both provided a single moment of quality- Arshavin's through ball for Van Persie's opener, and Walcott's cool finish to level the game at 2-2- but were otherwise destructive to their own team's chances of controlling the game.

What did not help in this regard was the absence of Arteta. Some know-nothing blowhards have voiced the opinion that the Spaniard only offers conservative sideways passing. Today we saw just how vital that sideways passing is. With Ramsey flitting around and giving the ball away almost every time he saw it, Benayoun seemingly unsure of his exact role, and a lonely Song having an off day, Arsenal were essentially spineless.

The alarm bells were first set ringing early on, when Arsenal were still in front. A single pass from a Swansea defender- who had just collected the ball from his keeper- and the home side were running at the Arsenal back four. Arteta has done a great job helping make Arsenal a more solid unit. Without him, Wenger fielded Ramsey, Benayoun, Arshavin and Walcott. That is a powder puff team for an away game and it got a performance to match. All of those players had stinkers and it's not an unusual occurance for any of them this season (with the exception of Benayoun, who hasn't had much playing time).

And an inefficient midfield is a doubly big problem if said midfield is failing to protect an already iffy defence. Mertesacker has failed to shore up the backline as some had hoped. Miquel and Djourou toiled manfully in their thankless tasks on the flanks, playing out of position and having to deal with Swansea's speedy wingers. Koscielny was brilliant again,though caught out by Graham for the eventual winner.

Looking at the Arsenal team sheet, it is pretty medicore stuff. A team of sometimes capable, but utterly inconsistent footballers. I have talked about complacency a lot over the last few years but today it struck me that this Arsenal team really isn't much better than what we saw today.

They were outpassed for periods. Outfought for periods. By a promoted team. Credit to Swansea for the positive football they play. But there was a time when the thought of a lowly side "having a go" at Arsenal would have you licking your lips in anticipation of the gaps they would leave behind, and how Arsenal would exploit that.

There is scope for improvement this season. Once the defence is pieced back into something recognisable, Arsenal may begin to grind out results again. That is the best we can hope for this season. In truth, glorious football is now but a memory for Arsenal fans. Beneath all the lazy media stuff about Wenger's pure philosophy, the truth is that Arsenal haven't played anything approaching fantasy football in years. Certainly not with any regularity.

Now, they need Vermaelen, they need Wilshere, they need Arteta, and they need to get scrapping again. But 4th place is looking less and less likely. After 21 games, in which Villas-Boas's Chelsea side have encountered serious problems, they still have a four point lead over Arsenal. Spurs, despite their blip against Wolves, will soon disappear into the distance if they keep up their swashbuckling form.

Good Haul?

By Arsene Wenger's standards, it was a spree. But if that's panic buying, it's a pity he doesn't panic more often. Hindsight can be a bit of a pain, but it's hard not to look at the past few seasons and wonder what might have been achieved if similar deals were done then.

Instead, it took a long run of relegation form, culminating in a historic massacre at Old Trafford, to finally force the stingy Frenchman's hands into his bulging pockets.

And still, Arsenal haven't spent much. This constitutes no great betrayal of Wenger's ideals. It's a natural compromise that should have been struck a long time ago- bringing in some older, more experienced heads to help the youngsters along. Before, a hugely talented 24 year old midfielder was being asked to carry some dead wood and some promising but callow youngsters on his shoulders. Now that he is gone, the squad has been given more balance. Arteta and Benayoun are useful players, and although not really in Fabregas's league, they will bring character and they will fit with Arsenal's style of play. Maybe most importantly, they have Premiership experience. They should take a lot of the pressure off players like Ramsey, Wilshere and Walcott. Arsenal were in danger of becoming very reliant on some very raw young talent.

The Korean striker Park Chu Young is a player I know little about. He, like Benayoun and Mertesacker, is captain of his national team. With Bendtner's departure on loan, Arsenal needed a new frontman, and Wenger decided that Park fitted the profile. He was just relegated from Ligue 1 with Monaco, and does not have a history of prolific scoring, but a browse of YouTube (hardly the most accurate barometer of ability, I know) suggests that he has a great work rate and decent vision and touch in and around the box. It's hard for me to shake the perception that Bendtner has been hard done by, but hopefully the Korean can replace him as a useful understudy to Van Persie, or indeed to the first choice wide men, if that is where Wenger plans to use him.

It would have been ridiculous to leave Gael Clichy unreplaced, with Gibbs so clearly unable to stay fit for a sustained period, and to that end Wenger brought in Andre Santos, a Brazilian international who ought to be approaching his peak years. The word is that Santos likes to bomb forward, and may be suspect defensively. A consultation with YouTube suggests that he can only be loosely described as a left back, and comes from the Dani Alves school of adventure. He also has a very powerful left foot which will hopefully help banish the memory of Gael Clichy's years of wastefulness in the final third.

Lastly, Mertesacker. It was a bit of a surprise after the months of speculation regarding Cahill and Samba and Jagielka. It seems a bit of an obvious solution: team with hopeless inability to defend set pieces and aerial attacks signs 6 foot 6 German giant. Maybe this time, the obvious solution will work. Many have written him off because of his lack of pace, and that is sure to be exposed at times- even Vidic at United has had numerous roastings from nippy forward players. But if Mertesacker can provide the kind of consistency and solidity that the Serb typically gives to the Champions, his slowness won't matter much. There is the potential for a nice partnership with Vermaelen, when the Belgian's injury problems are finally left behind, as he is more aggressive and pacey.

What will be more important than anything is that Mertesacker- who is, like Arteta, Benayoun, and Park, a captain- can show his leadership abilities and help whip that defence into shape. They have looked chaotic on a fairly regular basis over the last few years and it needs to cease.

In the summer of 2001, Arsene Wenger made a lot of signings. Richard Wright, Junichi Inamota, Gio Van Bronckhorst, Franny Jeffers... none of those players had a big part to play in Arsenal winning the double that season, but one new signing did. Sol Campbell came from Spurs and helped to form a newly solid defensive unit. If Mertesacker can have a similar impact, Arsenal might yet scramble back into contention.