After seeing his team stutter in recent weeks, Arsène Wenger said yesterday that Arsenal’s season has reached the moment of truth. In doing so, the Frenchman raised the unpalatable prospect of the club’s hunt for trophies in their first campaign in the new Emirates Stadium being effectively over by Christmas.
With such talented players at Wenger’s disposal, the manager’s prognosis may seem overly bleak, but it is backed up by a quick glance at the fixture list. This evening’s visit to Fulham is followed by two more intimidating London derbies, against Tottenham Hotspur and Chelsea, sandwiching a Champions League trip to FC Porto in which a draw is needed to guarantee their qualification for the knockout stages.
Sitting 13 points adrift of Manchester United, the Barclays Premiership leaders, after winning only one of their past five matches, Arsenal’s hopes of mounting a title challenge are more forlorn, with Wenger seizing the spirit of Yoda to tell his players that it is time to do or die.
“The period that comes up now for us is the moment of truth,” Wenger said. “It’s the most important time for us. Don’t hide. In front of the obstacle you must jump. I feel they are ready to jump, they have a fantastic leap. If they are not, we have no chance to do it. They will try. I am confident.
“We do not have any basic problem apart from the fact we have not got enough points — and that is a big problem. When you have quality, you always have a chance. We have a period every year where it does not go as well as you want it points-wise. But if this team takes off we can kill teams by four or five goals.”
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Wenger conceded that it would be “pretentious” to think that his team could win the title based on their 3-1 defeat away to Bolton Wanderers on Saturday, but he is not ready to write them off yet. For all Arsenal’s problems, their manager is convinced that it will be easier to win the Premiership this season than in previous years because no team show signs of running away with it.
“At the moment we want to go as far as we can,” he said. “It is maybe much higher than you think we can do. I have seen the other teams as well. There is no team who you can say is not reachable in England. Last year at this time Chelsea were already out of reach for anybody. That is not the case this year.
“It is much easier this year than last season and the year before and also than when we were champions in 2004, when we did not lose a game. This year there is a place to take because nobody has taken all the points. I do not know if Chelsea are inferior or the other teams are better.”
Wenger will welcome back Thierry Henry, Robin van Persie and Tomas Rosicky from injury for tonight’s encounter at Craven Cottage, but he is seething at his captain’s failure to win the Ballon D’Or. The France striker was beaten into third place by Fabio Cannavaro, the winner, and Gianluigi Buffon in the poll of international journalists to determine the European Footballer of the Year, but Wenger believes that the Italy captain’s outstanding performances at the World Cup finals should be discounted.
“The media that vote look only at the World Cup, which is in my opinion the lowest level in football you can see, when you speak about elite football,” he said. “It is a mistake. If you see Italy playing against Togo or South Korea, you cannot say when Cannavaro has a good game, or even Thierry has a good game, that he is the best player in the world.
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“Look at the players he plays against. To be consistent in a big championship like in England or in the Champions League is much more appropriate than three weeks in the World Cup.”