Arsene Wenger has explained why his optimistic nature is so important in the role of a footballer manager, saying it’s his job to pick up everybody at the club when things don’t go well.
Speaking to Roger Bennett of Men in Blazers for a special interview that will air this Saturday in the USA, the Arsenal manager talked at length about his career, his life at Highbury and the Emirates, the ups, downs, trials and tribulations about being 20 years at one club.
I’ve been lucky enough to see the full version, and it really is a fantastic interview. Here’s a piece from it, which really is very informative and does go some way to explaining some of the decisions he makes, and perhaps some of the things he says in press conferences when we all know he must think differently.
Q: Football is dark and full of terrors, how has that sense of optimism not been beaten out of you?
“Honestly, in my job the main quality is to be an optimist. If you see the future in a negative way you commit suicide in my job. You are responsible for the motivation of all the people around you.
“You have to pick up everybody inside the club. You should see what the club is like after a big defeat, it’s like a lost war and everybody is on the floor.
“You have to be an optimist to say, ‘Come on my friends, we are good enough to pick up and win our next game. We can do this together. Remember how good you are.’
“Everybody forgets quickly in life how good he is and how good he can be when things go wrong. I believe my job is to be an optimist.”
Q: You say that despite being a self-admitted, notoriously bad loser. You once said you, “experience every defeat like a death”…
“Yes. Look in my heart here [taps chest]. Every defeat is a big scar in my heart here. We are all people. We love to win. We hate to lose.
“Most of the time the guys who love to win are strikers and the guys who hate to lose are defenders. I think a manager is a guy who loves to win, but as well, above all, hates to lose. When you’ve experienced [defeat], in my job, it’s even worse.
“That’s why I say, ‘When you lose once be very careful not to lose the game after.’ Everybody dreams that you will win the next game and it will all start again. That’s where experience is very important.
“Just don’t lose the next one, don’t dream to win it, just don’t lose it. If you lose two you have more chances to lose three.”
“Once you lose three you are in a super crisis. That is very important. I believe the quality of a manager is to stop the defeats as quickly as possible. When you lose two, the average run loses three or four or five. When all goes well, all the managers in the world are good.
“The quality of a manager is when he stands in a crisis and has to face it, how quickly can they stop it?”
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The full interview airs on NBCSN at 12.30pm (ET) on Saturday October 1st. For more, see Men in Blazers, who have a podcast of some of it out now:
POD SPECIAL: Arsene Wenger on 20 years at @Arsenal, the Premier League's changing landscape and what motivates him https://t.co/0FqJ4aUaDy pic.twitter.com/enCoYs0yue
— Men in Blazers (@MenInBlazers) September 28, 2016
poor arsene wouldn’t have got the GoT reference
Wenger is coming.
“Wenger is coming”
Surely a meme waiting to be created for away games?
Nor did I.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6Us8d5cKoE
Enlighten us…
Arsene Wenger. Love the man to death
I think he’ll do a book eventually, I really hope he does. The press conferences are still must-watches for me, even with the same questions every week. Bit of a tragedy that we have this increasingly fascinating man being interviewed every week and the main aim seems to be to get a headline quote out of him about Mourinho.
Seeing once again how intelligent Arsene is, what makes me really sad is the general level of idiocity in the discussions about Arsenal. Instead of trying to understand what’s going on one has to listen to people claiming that this man needs to be told that e.g. Arsenal needs a striker and when he buys one, it’s because ‘he finally listened to us’.
As well when you’re saying anything positive about the manager, you get auto-labelled by some sections. Need to qualify it with acknowledgement that he’s not perfect- as if anybody thinks he is.
The way he conducts himself in public is a bit of a luxury for us imo. He’s cool as fuck, how many people of his age can you say that about.
He’s not just perfect, he’s an absolute dreamboat!
It’s why we forbid those stupid acronyms that divide people. You can’t have any discussion if you’re being labelled one thing or the other.
Like TGSTEL? 😉
Amazing. That is all
a tell-all book by AW would be a proper eye-opener. let’s hope he’s got one on the boil. although a couple of league titles and a european cup first, please.
“…and then I told Samir to ferme his bouche or I would deliver a nut to his chinless têtê, whether he was in the showers or not. Pat quietly reminded me I wasn’t Mr Pulis and I was a little bit shaken by the whole situation, so I had to have a calming cigarette in the showers with Woj.”
He’s one of the world’s most captivating interview subjects, and Roger Bennett does an excellent job bringing out his qualities and insights.
Rog is often too cerebral for his interview subjects, but a perfect pairing for Arsene.
You know who is not good in a crisis? Mourhino
Wenger in
Mr Bennett, your sting operation to catch Wenger as a pessimist obviously failed. Wenger is a top grade manager.
Agree with your sentiments. Cannot understand people’s furor at media for ‘trapping’ Walrus face. Do they think that these things don’t go on without the media’s undercover involvement or would they rather live in blissful ignorance?
“The quality of a manager is when he stands in a crisis and has to face it, how quickly can they stop it?”
This one’s for Mourinho. Haha. Ha.
Is it just me or is the interviewer a pretentious twat?
No he is actually a really nice guy and does a great pod (meninblazers). His running mate in that pod is a bit of a arrogant rich pompous jerk (and a stinking Chavs fan at that), but rog is absolutely brilliant. Humble, hilariously self-loathing, funny and quirky.
Either one without the other would be insufferable.
“Look in my heart here [taps chest]. Every defeat is a big scar in my heart here”. Fuck the haters. Love the man and always will. Biggest Legend the club will ever have. Dread the day he will leave, hopefully no time soon. Also reports of a 2 year contract circulating this morning. Give him a lifetime contract Gazidis!!!! #OneArseneWenger
4 wins in a row and suddenly everyone wants Arsene for the next decade. Fickle bunch
Quality stuff. I must confess, I have doubted him before however, he still remains the best thing that’s ever happened to Arsenal. For the sake of stability, I will vote and extension for another two years while we search for a good replacement. Hey; what do I know. I’m just a gooner
Anyone with common sense sees that Wenger is arguably the best coach at the elite level presently; in the future people will recognize this. A world class manager has to do three things: (1) win trophies at the elite level, develop young talent and (3) doing all this while having the best interests of his/her players and the club as a whole at heart. Because he hasn’t won major trophies in a while people slag him off undeservedly. The truth is that he has been unfortunate not always having the world class players that his methods require, something that is… Read more »
There’s only one Arsène Wenger!