Arsene Wenger has paid homage to Robin van Persie’s leadership skills and stressed that all of Arsenal’s senior players have played a role in getting the club back on track after a rocky summer.
Reflecting on the highs and lows of the last seven months, the boss also made clear that at no point has he felt let down by the attitude of his squad despite some disappointing results peppering the season.
“Personally I never question the attitude of this team, which I may have done in some previous years,” Wenger told the Official Arsenal Magazine.
“But this season, never. I’ve always returned home thinking this team will never give up, they are always ready for a fight.
“The whole season has been eventful, from July onwards. We had negative periods, then a very positive game, then a negative one.
“We had a very difficult transfer market right until the last second of the window.
“Then we had a hard start to the league, a lot of scepticism around the team, and so the Club needed to be exceptionally strong to get through it.
“It was a good test of the mental strengths of the Club, the board and the players.”
Paying special tribute to the more experienced members of his squad, Wenger spoke warmly of the way their fine example has had an effect on the rest of the squad.
“I must say Robin van Persie has done an outstanding job of leading the team, as have many players – people like Vermaelen, Arteta, Song, Sagna – I don’t want to leave people out but the senior players have played a big part in setting the tone in the squad.”
“We have shown an exceptional response, togetherness and belief.”
You have to hand it to RVP and the other mature heads in the dressing-room, they’ve certainly helped steady the ship and inspired a newfound belief not just on the pitch, but in the terraces. That being said there’s a job still to be done and it’s clear for all to see. There are seven games to go, 21 points up for grabs, a third place finish to be secured and Spurs to be put in their place.
Let’s not fuck it up now.
We can win all the remaining games and basically there is no excuse not to.
MENTAL STRENGTH and up the arse!
That’s the one thing we’ve lacked during these previous barren years trophy-wise…that essential mixture of experience and youth. Hopefully it’ll see us safely through to 3rd by season’s end and potentially to trophy glory next season.
Harder to win trophies nowadays though in the age of mercenaries. It’s a much tougher task but that will make it so much sweeter, because we’re not gonna go and never win another trophy again. Even Birmingham won one recently I believe.
1st??
No and you fail because you’re a fool
Mental Strengz
As Theo said recently we should make the Emirates a fortress and I think that is also quite necessary along with players doing their job. Let’s destroy those money bagged cunts on Sunday.
If Arsene says the team are always ready for a fight, then we the fans are always ready to cheer/support our Arsenal. In the fortress we call the Emirates, we will be the 12th man, and we will also let that cunt Na$ri know what passion is all about
that’s the spirit!
Shame he forgot to mention the fans when saying it was a test of mental strength earlier in the season.
Packed away sections at every game, thousands in Milan, in general great support at the grove.
7 years of near misses and broken promises. But we are only fans and pay the dearest prices in Europe so we probably don’t warrant a mention.
Fans have been mentioned at other times when senior players have not. He’s just talking about something else in this interview…
No fans are in the dressing room, so why mention them when it is the senior players that will be trying to fire up the squad each game???
and as stated above, RvP, Walcott, Sagna, Vermaelen, Szczesny, etc… have all mentioned how the fans have helped, especially at the away games.
Kind of like saying it’s really dissapointing that an article on how cunty stoke are doesn’t also comment on how cunty spurs are. It’s common knowledge spurs are cunts, it’s common knowledge Arsenal have a great support base.
Sunday’s game is the perfect fixture for us to have after what happened last weekend. The players were clearly complacent and had began to believe the hype and rubbish written in the papers. So they didn’t turn up at Loftus Road. This will be a much tougher game and we will have to be at the top of our game to win it.
I think that we’ll nick it 2-1 against a side that looks like it has lost its self-belief and discipline.
I must be about to come down with a bout of swine flu combined with bird flu. I actually agree with FatGooner. Where’s my meds?
You know I’m always right.
Ehhh you’re about 70-30.
Mental strength from the board?
I thought they are the ones that fucked up the summer.
But they could also have panicked throughout but they didn’t. They believed and continue to believe in Arsene’s way of working, which with the proper investment (something he had when buying Petit, Overmars, Henry, Vieira, etc…) can make this team fantastic again.
The key being proper investment. This squad does not need much to be a trophy winning team, but we have said this many times in the last few years And instead of buying top quality we have sold our best players and not replaced them like for like.
Last summers dealing has not filled me with optimism about how we go about our business. Just hope they have learnt the lessons.
I’d agree that we seem stronger than we have done in years, but I’m still fucking angry over the QPR result. Cannot believe that the players just gave up and could not be bothered, so for all their talk on mental strength, they need to gain some consistency and show it on the pitch. Don’t get me wrong, proud of them for the runs they’ve been able to string together this season and I’m positive about 2012-2013, but they need to show us that they really want to succeed all the time. Show some fight, like they did against the… Read more »
where was the mental strength against QPR?
I think action speaks louder than words and I hope the team does prove their mental strength by qualifying for CL and getting third place
I don’t recall you complaining about our mental strength when we won 7 league games in a row……
no I enjoyed the undefeated run but at the end of the day it’s only 7 games and judgement on mental strength should be based on how we perform overall over 40 plus games.
very good point. We always hear about mental strength after a win but sadly against QPR, Fulham,Blackburn away for instance it was not apparent. Where were the midfielders for the QPR winnig goal for instance?
The thing I fail to understand is why last year we had one of the best, if not the best away form why not this year?
Tottenham are going to drop point at Sunderland. Lets open up that gap once more!
With NB52 scoring!
Its being written.
To be fair, its the least he could do the cocky bastard 🙂
He scores the winner against the cunts from down the road and I will drive him back down to london.
Ready for a fight? Good, I hope one of them gives that lesbo Nasri a good kick in his cunt Sunday.
Dont be so vulgar!
The word “Nasri” is simply disgusting.
Heh
Nasri actually means support or victory!
Na$ri on the other hand is greedy lil cunt!!!
This smacks of another, we don’t need to buy any players in the summer!