At times over the past few years, like when Arsenal lost at home to Aston Villa in the opening match of this season, it looked like the Gunners would never get out of the trophyless rut we found ourselves in. And the only way the fans could see of changing that was for Arsene Wenger to end his long reign as manager of Arsenal Football Club.
It looks like we just needed to have a little more faith in our Frenchman, as he guided the Gunners to a serious assault on the Premier League and provided us Gooners with the FA cup for a long overdue celebration. That has vindicated the faith the club’s owners have put in him to bring the glory days back, but we still have a lot of work to do.
With teams like Man City, Chelsea, Liverpool and Man United making the English BPL the hardest fought in the world, Arsenal cannot afford to sit around clapping themselves on the back. If Wenger is going to make his new three year contract count, he needs the financial backing of the club, not just enough for one top class player. Arsenal chief executive Ivan Gazidis has promised that the boss will get it as well, after talking about his delight and relief at the cup final win.
He told Arsenal Player, “I think we went through all the range of emotions. We’ve probably lived 1,000 lives and I can tell you that to come through that with the strength of character and discipline the players showed was really encouraging.
“We have a good platform to build on – today’s a great day for us to celebrate and we should do that as the Arsenal family.
“But tomorrow we start work again and we’ve got to use this to progress the club, to take it forward. This was a very big step, to have the players understand what it takes to come through that kind of adversity, to get over the line whatever it took is a big step and now we need to take the next step.
“It was very big. It really colours the season. You come out and think we were seven points away from winning the double and that gives you encouragement to move forward and make the improvements we have to make. We know we’re still a work in progress but this is a big step, a big platform and we can build on this, and we will.
“I thought it was a great day for Arsène. He’s been through a lot and you can see that he lives this club – you can see how much he loves it and how much it means to him.
“To see him soaking wet and getting thrown up in the air – he was probably a bit nervous about that – but it was fantastic, it was really great.”
With the players and manager rediscovering the knack and hunger for winning and Gazidis promising to back Wenger with transfer funds, what can we expect from Arsenal next season?