We have poisoned the team we should love and support, plain and simple. This divided house must be united or suffer collapse. Yes, we must all have our opinions and we should all express them. However, the poisonous invective and spittle flecked venom that has been spewed forth is just too much. Of course we are hated by the media, our financial policy goes against the very soul of the banker owned

As a child, I asked my father the meaning of Victoria Concordia Crescit. He was and still is a Spurs fan (hence the irony of a house divided), so he told me, it was something that Arsenal fans told themselves to keep their heads up for supporting a rubbish football team. This was in the ’80s and long before the turn of the century dominance that would seem like some wondrous dream.

These

Where did it all go wrong?

“A house divided against itself cannot stand.”

It will become all one thing or all the other.

These are the words of the great American President, Abraham Lincoln, who for all of his faults, led America out of Slavery at the cost of a civil war.

We are not fighting slavery, but the Emirates house is one that is divided. That very division is destroying this club. I am not arguing for some fascist footballing state where we all tow the party line. But this division that exists has become a malignant growth that threatens to kill the body.

We have to camps that now exist within Arsenal. Those that see the need to carry on walking the path that we set out upon when we moved from the humble house of Highbury, to the world class stage to practice our art that is the Emirates. We see the need to grit the teeth and bare the hardships of failure on the back of a promise of future glory. In essence we see this period as a period in which we are building a strong foundation on which we will grow a dynasty, an empire, an entity so profoundly awesome that all around the doubters will wail and gnash their teeth for lack of this very foresight. And all of this will be achieved without drowning the club into debt.

This may all be too much for some, and this now is the line of division, the ‘slavery issue’ in footballing terms. Is it better to suffer drought today so we can have water aplenty in the days to come, or shoud we forgot tomorrow as it never happens as planned and live solely for today? These are indeed hard times to be a Gooner

“I’m an Arsenal fan but I want Bolton to win today. Wenger simply needs to stop making excuses and start to deliver some long overdue silverware. Time to change policies Mr Wenger – have a clear-out and spend some money!”

These are indeed hard times to be a Gooner, but are our problems so easily fixed as to assume a complete overhaul of the body will make it healthy again? Can we just buy our way to success??? Is it really so easy? If it is that easy, why has it not been the case that a team that has spent SOOO much more than us is still trailing us and battling for fourth place?

Does money solve Arsenal?

In my opinion, money isn’t the solution, however I am a firm believer that the path we are is not a path destined for ultimate failure, but one that is destined for success, but littered on the way with minor failings. What path to greatness is littered with small failures, but ultimately ends with the promised achievement.

Think of the Hebrews and their journey to Canaan or even America and it’s very own civil war. The path to victory is littered with loss. It is that very loss and hardship that strengthens the core and makes it unbreakable.

As fans, we have only ourselves to blame for our teams lack of success. If you look at the table of results, our away success has balanced our failures at home. How on earth is that possible??? How can our home support be so poor?

The fact is, the division is leading to a poisoning of the body. We are so infected with this toxic division we are infecting the very team we are supposed to support. They are no longer comfortable playing at home, because we as fans are making them feel that way.

YES, we do have the right to do that as fans, but this self fulfilling prophecy of collapse does no one any good. What do I mean, simple: too many fans expect (some might even want) an Arsenal collapse so that in some twisted way they can gloat with the i told you so’s. How on earth did we have such terrible home support when we were so close? How were we not cheering until things ripped in our gut? We were second place and fans sat on their seat saying ‘there’s no point supporting, they’re only going to bottle it…’

We have poisoned the team we should love and support, plain and simple. This divided house must be united or suffer collapse. Yes, we must all have our opinions and we should all express them. However, the poisonous invective and spittle flecked venom that has been spewed forth is just too much. Of course we are hated by the media, our financial policy goes against the very soul of the banker owned ‘free press’. Why, as fans, are we playing into the hands of the anti Arsenal media??? Lets keep the unity up and have a little faith and patience, the cornerstones of any grand empire, be it political, social, economic or even football.

Quite simply: VICTORIA CONCORDIA CRESCIT

Mr H

Mean Lean’s Response

Thank you Mr H, a very well written piece and I absoutely agree with you.

To be honest with you I am a little lost as an Arsenal supporter in 2011. Football has changed, the introduction to Sky Sports, the internet and the microwave society we live in today has changed the sport we love, or at least the way we view the sport we love.

We have thousands of frustrated Gooners who all know how to fix our problems, who throw our longer term picture into the loft and pretend that it doesn’t exsist. It is all about here and now and right now the squad, the manager and the board are the worst thing to ever happen to them.

I remember far worse times at Arsenal before the days of Wenger. Graham’s latter years followed by Bruce Rioch and then Stewart Houston. Was the venom and anger quite this bad? I was younger so it isn’t so clear but I cannot believe that it was.

It sounds as if I have a big smile on my face and that I am skipping around my house without a care in the world. Not true at all.

We have managed to get into a good position this season and yes our rivals have dropped a level, even though I believe the rest of the league have also improved considerably. We have collopased at the end when we could have gone on to win silverware. I am very disappointed with that and I expect changes to happen to the squad this summer.

But are things are awful as so many are making out? Are we not in a good position to progress as a squad? Is Wenger not in the position to bring in another Sagna, Vermaelen or Nasri if he saw fit?

I absouteley agree with you about the feeling around the Emirates. We can never say either way but the chances of Arsenal turning a few of those draws into victories if we sang like the away boys would be quite high I would say.

Currently we are surrounded by teams who have spent massively to get to where they are. As long as the squad are improving every season and Arsene is working on improving the squad every season then I will keep hoping that we can make the leap from falling away at the end to winners.