Steven Cohen: Arsenal's loss to Manchester United could be the turning point for Arsene Wenger
And Arsenal’s loss will not be remembered for Andrei Arshavin’s inability to stay with Antonio Valencia that resulted in the winner. No, Arsenal’s loss will be remembered for the mutiny of the Arsenal captain and the Arsenal fans.
Arsenal has now lost eight Premier League games including three on the trot to Fulham, Swansea and Manchester United. The last is acceptable, the previous two wholly unacceptable for a club that has found a normal home on Tuesdays and Wednesdays in the Champions League.
The substitution of Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain could well be a watershed moment in Arsenal’s already rollercoaster of a season. For Robin Van Persie to visibly be questioning his manager at the substitution of Oxlade-Chamberlain for Andrei Arsahvin will surely have repercussions.
The ground under Arsene Wenger is shaky. When your own fans are singing “There’s only one Arsene Wenger” with just a hint of sarcasm in their tone it is clear to see that Wenger’s time at Arsenal could well be over if the team fails to qualify for the Champions League, as some are predicting.
It has been suggested that Wenger’s obsession with youth has been to the detriment of Arsenal, but to play the other side of that coin it is his very obsession with youth that has brought Oxlade-Chamberlain to our attention. So it is with bewilderment that he chose to substitute the 18-year-old on Sunday in direct opposition of why the youngster was chosen in the first place.
To the neutral and I suspect to the fanatical Arsenal fan the teenager was Arsenal’s best player on Sunday (although Djourou might think otherwise) and did not appear tired, despite suggestions that he had been unwell since last Sunday. So we are perplexed to know why Wenger chose him in the first place and if he was well enough to start and surely at 18 he should be well enough to complete the game. Arsenal has become one long and winding contradiction.
In his press conference after the game Wenger once again trotted out the same old tired comments. He spoke of how his side lacked the maturity and experience against a club like Manchester United. But he does not examine the fact that Arsenal has lost 10 of the last 13 games versus United and he makes these claims as if he has not been saying the exact same thing for the last five years.
Whatever shortcomings Arsenal might have, the responsibility for those shortcomings is his.
It will be only fitting for Wenger to fall on his sword if and when Arsenal fails to qualify for next season's Champions League. In addition, the team would then be surely right on schedule to lose the best finisher in the Premier League. Wenger gambled and he has lost to this point, and with those loses the only thing left are consequences. A season without the Champions League should be a consequence that even Arsene Wenger cannot overcome.
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