So here it is people, the first ever Le Grove podcast! I haven’t listened to it back, all I know is the microphones worked and I started and stopped it in the right place.

It was recorded with Alex Fynn who is co-author of Arsenal: the making of a modern superclub (the other half being Kevin Whitcher of the Online Gooner). It’s a truly fantastic read if you’re looking for clarity on the last 10 years of Arsenal. Alex counts Arsene as one of his neighbours and he’s worked around football and Arsenal for years.

We had a good chat about all sorts of stuff regarding the club. We spoke about the United game, George Graham, David Dein (his future), the commercials and the future of Arsene.

Take a listen if you get the chance and drop some constructive, praise-full feedback for me in the comments.

PODCAST

After 4.5 years, it’s here, please enjoy!

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P.S. If you’d like a copy of the book, here is the magic code to get you a discount!

And that Mr Wenger is why the crowd were singing in unison that you don’t know what you’re doing, anymore that is. So instead of leaving it at that you get the shovel out and start digging again, now you want the team to get a pat on the back.

‘I can live with that. I do not think about the fans’ reaction, I think about how we can win our games’

Well we know you don’t care what the fans think, that’s obvious, the people that fund your salary don’t feature with you, we’ve known that on Le Grove for the last 4 years, but if you want to think how your team can win games, stop taking off your best players and stop playing your favourites all the time.

How many goals has Chamakh scored in the last year? Isn’t that what strikers do? Score goals? What on earth are you looking at when you send him on the pitch? He’s rubbish, admit you messed up and replace him, do it with all the hopeless players, we are sick of watching people trot out earning massive salaries when they probably aren’t much better than we are.

In Chamakh’s case you tell us he’s free, well that’s a myth, because what you didn’t pay in transfer fees, you did in salary, plus signing on bonus, plus agents fees, so please don’t tell us he’s there for nothing, another porky I think.

Ok so it’s not looking good for Wilshere, a setback, this is like Djourou, Vermaelen and Rosicky all over again, it’s still January, go and buy some players, go and buy Hazard or Gourcuff, or anyone decent, by the time Jack comes back our season will be over, we’ll need whoever you sign because by then we won’t have Rosicky or Yossi.

How long do we have to listen to the fibs of he’ll be back by x, it happens every year and we end up the worse for it and he’ll blame injuries.

The last thing he said was let’s see where we are at the end of the season, is that like saying judge me in May? Because he said that 3 seasons ago, but of course no one did.

So it seems the FA Cup is our easiest route to silverware this season, let’s hope he puts out our best team tomorrow and not a weakened team, because Villa won’t.

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Have a great day Grover’s our season begins tomorrow!

I mentioned last week that his return was going to be hugely complicated, now that statement has come to fruition, we’re in a spot of bother. The good news is we’re looking to bring in players now. Much like the last window, losses and issues have forced the boss and the club into a corner, so hopefully we’ll see a busy end to the month. You’d have to hope someone creative can be snared and certainly another defender has to be under consideration. Santos is back in the country, but I don’t think he’s anywhere near and return date yet.

This Jack return has all the hallmarks of the Vermaelen return last year, the only stroke of luck is that Jack broke a bone… just pray he didn’t fracture the same bone again because then we’re talking a career threatening problem.

The news isn’t all bad. We should have up to 7 players returning over the next week, I’ve heard that Arteta could be back for Sunday and our full back issue could be mostly under control the week after. Still, a week is a long time in football, so don’t get your hopes up until you see the ink on the team sheet. Sagna returning is the big one for me, we’ve missed his solidity and professionalism down the right. If we can get Gibbs in, at least we’ll have someone mobile in a position that demands it… even if he is positionally weak at times.

Sunday is looking like a massive day for us. An FA Cup would salvage our season to some degree and maybe Arsene’s career. Kenny Dalglish has been receiving lashing of over the top praise from Liverpool loving journo’s in the papers and I’d imagine calls for his head are at a premium, even if his huge outlay only returns a Carling Cup.

We need to take the competition seriously, we need to go at it with the right attitude and we need to get this club back to winning ways. Geoff and I went on a run of FA Cup finals back in the day, some of my best memories are from that competition, from Newcastle in 98, to just about everyone bar the Liverpool debacle after that!

Champions League quarter-final versus an FA Cup win? It’s FA Cup all day for me!

I recorded a podcast with Alex Fynn last night, sadly, it didn’t upload last night, which means I’ll have to sort that out this evening. Hopefully I’ll have that up for you tomorrow morning and with it, a nice offer on his book (Arsenal – Making of  Modern Superclub).

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Right, that’s all I’ve got for you today! Happy Friday!

P.S. Don’t go too crazy on the club before you know what the injury is… the return was complicated, set backs were inevitable, let’s just pray to Herbert Chapman it’s only minor. Before I go,imagine if Arsenal did this to us (Bayern)!

And save stating the obvious that we should do a January swap deal with Real madrid for Jose Mourinhio which we clearly won’t, I want to talk today about what could happen should the ‘odd one’ luck out with this team, the returning players, a spud/chav collapse and if he’s involved in a massive smash up with the ‘abitofcommonsensejuggernaut’

So this is the team we could soon have lining up to pick up the points and win trophies.

Chezzer

Sagna Vermaelen Mertesacker/Kozzer Santos

Diaby Arteta Wilshere

Oxo RVP Gervinho

Bench of Theo, Ramsey, Song, Coquelin and Fabianski

Yes I left out Song for Diaby because with Jack and Arteta we would have a midfield that would and could swap around and be where they are needed, not to mention skill over lack of pace and fundamental absence of any footballing knowledge.

Also, it’s time to bench players if they aren’t pulling their weight, either because they aren’t good enough, aren’t good enough yet, or complacent because they have no competition. Either way we are neither a nursery nor an indulgence, time to man up and manage.

The back four pick themselves but Mertesacker, Kozzer and Vermaelen should be vying for the centre back role and not the full back fill in, with Santos and Sagna back we will be in good shape, with Yennaris and Gibbs as back up as I think Jenkinson has crock written all over him.

The forward line needs someone in it that can attack, cross and find the goal. If the manager thinks Oxo will get fatigued he should have saved himself £15mil or left him in the academy all season.

Now if he did something like that, dropped his hapless favourites and sold his sh!te signings Chamakh, Squillaci, Bendtner, Denilson, Djourou, Park, Almunia and Rosicky we would have the money to reduce season ticket prices, as we know that as long as he’s in charge we won’t buy a decent footballer.

For years Pedro and I were telling him to get rid of Eboue, Senderos and Denilson, he wouldn’t, he played them over and over and over again, he even made up stats for them! (most completed passes in the Premiership was a classic for spinning head) Then one day they slipped out of the door quietly and he said nothing, have we missed them? My ring piece we have!

All I’m saying is he will eventually get shot of the crap I mentioned so why not now?

Ok that was a bit of fantasy but as now the whole footballing world has realised our manager tells porkies, shifts the blame to whoever is nearest, doesn’t listen to his coaching or medical staff and has complete control over our board and football club, then I may as well move onto something else, being proved right eventually gets a bit boring, so I am now going to indulge my fantasies!

I would take Mourinhio, I really would, but Ancelotti would do, anyone would to be honest as long as it wasn’t Phil Brown, Sam Allardyce of anyone connected with Tottenham or David Beckham.

Bergkamp with Steve Bould would do it! There I go again, fantasising!

Barca/Madrid was funny last night, it took Cesc all of 4 months to turn into a nasty Spanish card waving at the ref tosser, way to go Cesc, I hope you feel at home. Who taught you that, or was it in your DNA?

Finally I watched Liverpool and Man City last night, not a kid amongst them, so what chance do we stand fielding them, it’s a waste of a cup the way we play it, good luck Cardiff!

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Have a great day Grover’s next up, Villa in the cup!

Pre summer 2007 we really were in a hole with money and to keep us alive in the Champions League and to get us to a final in the process was an incredible achievement. As many have pointed out, possibly the greatest achievement under his tenure has been keeping the clubs head above water during the move.

Trouble is, coming so close to greatness in 2006 on a shoe string budget scarred his methodology forever, because ever since, regardless of resource, he’s been chasing the low-budget success high he buzzed off that summer Jens Lehmann smashed over Eto’o and killed our dreams.

Since January 2008 he’s has £18million plus to spend in the transfer market. Small fry compared to City and Chelsea, but when have we ever played ball in those markets? Jan 2008 we could have re-signed Anelka, held on to Diarra and we could have picked up a centre back. Instead, we signed no one, sold Diarra for a pittance in case his value fell below £4million on loan and flogged Gilberto.

Summers have generally repeated themselves. Same old problems with promised redress in May with no delivery by September. The result? Often we’d compete with a small squad until February, then things would fall away when injuries set in and mental fragility reared it’s ugly head.

The same coaching staff, the same average players being flogged and the same outcome. Like many scenarios in life, you can forgive mistakes if they’re not repeated, you can forgive them if you see different approaches and a ruthless streak when things are going wrong… But to just watch the same failings over and over again becomes tiring.

This is what many journo’s don’t understand when assessing crowd reaction at the Emirates. Sure the song wasn’t nice, sure booing mid-game isn’t smart when chasing a game, but there comes a point after watching seasons unravel so frequently when you just lose it. Being rational is the easiest thing in the world when you have no emotion invested in a club. It’s easy to stick up for a manager who has kept you in a job with witty sound bites for years. Not so easy when you’re forking out a massive chunk of cash you’ve scrapped hard to find, knowing what you’re likely to see. Like Geoff said yesterday, the UK’s press are up in arms over the pay of the RBS Chief and he’s earning half of what Arsene is at the moment… £7million a year and he’s not doing his best to give us a competitive team.

Arsene Wenger is the root of these issues. Don’t believe the stories about Dick Law bumbling around messing up Wenger’s deals because they’re simply not true. Wenger’s indecisiveness on players is the problem. As reported at the AGM, he values the players and he decides what to pay them. If he didn’t, he’d be elsewhere… as he’s said on many occasions before.

Trouble we have at the club is a power issue. Wenger controls too much. He was given more power when Dein went because most of the current board had too much trust in him. It largely paid off, the issue is that now he’s not doing so well, it’s hard to wrestle the power back.

So what is going on at board level? Are they giving him the rope to hang himself? It makes sense doesn’t it. Gazidis only has power when it comes to the commercial side of the business, the rest of the board are old, bereft of energy and ideas and their satisfaction of Champions League every year to fatten their eventual pay off has caused a malaise in the club which has filtered into the first team. Do you think the current set up suits Ivan Gazidis and Tom Fox. Do you think the commercial team relishes a squad they’re struggling to market? No way… but they can’t remove a legend unless the fans say so.

Why do you think the board chose Stan to take over? Because he’ll stay in America, come over once and year and keep the status quo. What do you think Usmanov would be doing now? What benefit would he see on £50mill profit bar a tax liability? He’d come in, he’d change the board (the old boys), bring in fresh blood and give Arsene the funds needed to transform his squad.

The only demand? Win something. As someone in the comments pointed out yesterday. Football clubs don’t exist to make money, they exist to succeed.

Changes need to happen at Arsenal. I said after the last collapse that the next dip in form will see a far quicker backlash. It proved true. Wenger should have acted in early Jan, that could have saved him a whole load of grief. Sadly we are where we are now. Our relationship with Arsene is damaged forever, regardless of how many guilty ‘there’s only one Arsene Wenger’ songs we sing at the weekend. Gazidis said to me at the AST Q&A that ultimately, the manager was accountable to the fans. Well, things aren’t looking good are they?

As for Madrid coming in for Arsene. You have got to be kidding me? If Mourinho is getting grief after over taking Barca to the top of La Liga, what would they think to Wenger bringing in super class talent like Silvestre and Park Chu-Young? He’d last half a season anywhere like that and he’d be a giant hypocrite if he went to a financially doped club and started spunking money up the wall like Kenny Dalglish at an English Players supermarket.

Right, that’s you lot. Geoff back on tomorrow… whilst I’ll be recording the first podcast for Le Grove!

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P.S. Chelsea fans are all class eh?

What he does have to do however is justify his actions to the fans, but he doesn’t do that either. When asked what cost Arsenal the game, he said a tactical error, I thought at last, he is admitting he screwed up by taking Oxo off, unfortunately what he meant by a tactical error was in fact Arshavin’s inability to defend.

He blamed Arshavin! I like Arshavin, but this season he has been arguably our worst player, so why put him on? That was like the time he subbed the sub, Eboue and Eboue got booed instead, very cynical Arsene, very, very cynical.

He can’t even admit when he screws up, the fans sure let him know though didn’t they? Apart from the poor sods in row D that were ejected for trying to unfurl an anti Wenger banner, a bit like they do in Syria eh?

This was Wenger’s explanation…

…I can understand that the fans are upset about the substitution, especially when it doesn’t work, but he (Oxlade-Chamberlain) had started to fatigue

He was sick in the week and Arshavin is captain of the Russia national team. You have an 18-year-old kid making his first Premier League start and a player who’s captain of his country and they are querying the substitution? Let’s be serious.

I’ve been a manager for 30 years and have made 50,000 substitutions. I do not have to justify every decision I make to you (the press). I stand up for it. People pay for their tickets and express their emotions. We have to deal with that, it doesn’t mean they are always right.

First of all the Southampton captain said he spoke to Oxo after the game, he tweeted he wasn’t ill and didn’t have fatigue.

Secondly yes, you may well have made 50,000 substitutions but how many of those were made between 67 and 74 minutes eh? Most of them I suspect. Obsessive compulsive, or co-incidence we needed them just at that time? I could write a list of strange calls this season, like taking Oxo off and leaving Chamakh on when we pinned Man City to the wall and ended up losing, or in years gone by like taking Bergkamp off for Senderos when we were beating the Mancs and ended up losing, the list goes on.

The time has come Arsene, greatness doesn’t last forever, Britain used to be the richest country in the world, we aren’t now,  you used to be the best manager in football, not any more you aren’t, Brian Clough ruled the world once but if history teaches us anything, nothing is ever forever.

This season started with selling our two best players and the best one had three years left on his contract and you sold him cheaply, this was followed by an 8-2 thrashing and the worst panic buying in the history of the EPL, now we need players and your head is buried in the sand.

It’s Ok people like Ian Wright saying we should get behind the team, but we have been behind the team our whole lives, but this manager has lost it, he has had 7 years of failure and in that time had £40mil+ in salary and that my friends is a joke, if a banker got that, the whole country would be going nuts.

I dare say we could still win trophies, but had we signed what we really needed this past 7 years we could have won a shed load by now, as Graham Souness said on Sunday, we are now a feeder club, but not because we have no money, but because the money we have is being spunked up the wall on mediocrity. On kids that never make it and management.

That’s how I feel, if you don’t like it then best not comment today, try and defend anything I have criticised here today by all means, I would be amazed if you could, what I witnessed on Sunday was beyond belief, ask Robin, and that was followed by a pack of lies.

And someone needs to explain the purchase of Park to me in detail, why did we buy a player that is going in 18 months, not play him for six, then realise he’s no good?

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Have a great day grovers and see you in the comments.

Chesney was called into action when Song fell over tracking Evra, the Frenchman cut back to Nani who drove a low shot at our near post, our keeper getting down quickly to keep it out. United ramped up the pressure and had a penalty shout ignored when Song tugged at Rooney’s arm in the box. It would have been a harsh penalty, but I’ve seen the given.

Djourrou was having a nightmare at right back, he flew at a loose ball out wide like a wild man, missed, which let Nani maraud into the box shooting wide. The warning signs were there.

Vermaelen made a hash of a clearance, Theo couldn’t deal with it, Ryan Giggs was found out wide, JD ran out and stood him up rather than challenge, Giggs took his time and picked out Valencia who flew in with a diving header and scored.

Half time came and the boss pulled off JD and brought on Yennaris. Good shout and a decision made early for once.

Our play picked up straight away, we had far more balance and the players looked interested. We didn’t take long to start eeking out chances, Smalling slipped and Rosicky was first to the loose ball, he found Chamberlain who played a perfect pass to Robin in the box, however, the Dutchman against all the odds shot wide. The equivalent of an open goal for him.

The pressure from us continued mostly because of the sharpness of Chamberlain. He gave us width, pace and creativity. He gave Ramsey a window of opportunity, but he fired over. Koscielny turned creator when he freed up the ball in the middle of the park for Chamberlain, the end product was a shot wide.

Down the other end, Wellbeck broke free of Per, he turned his shot past Szczezny, Per chased it down and just kept it out. Great effort!

We pulled level when Koscielny made a perfect tackle on one of the Brazil twins, he played out to Rosicky who picked out a wonderful pass to Chamberlain. He waited for the Robin run, weighted a lovely ball into the Dutchman and watched him finish with precision! Perfect we thought, keep up this pressure and we could nick it.

Well, Wenger had other thoughts. He brought on Andrey to replace our best player Chamberlain. The crowd erupted in boos at the decision, and I could understand why. You don’t need a questionable attitude and work rate when you’re chasing down a win against United. Wenger said it was due to Chamberlain cramp, people who were sitting by the bench refute that claim. Even Robin complained.

Well, it didn’t take long for the game to go the way the we all knew it would. Andrey failed to make proper attempt at tackling Valencia, he waltzed into the box, one two’d with Park, passed to Wellbeck who smashed home for their second of the day. Devastation.

We had a few half attempts after that but the damage was done, we had no threat on the pitch and we were spent.

The whistle went and with it, a crescendo of boo’s… Arsene had made his worst decision of the season and he’d cost us points in our race for top four.

Positives

Yennaris had a very good second half after coming on for Djourrou. The reason JD was so bad is that he’s built like a WWF wrestler and he’s being asked to run and run and run. He was destroyed by half time. Yennaris came on, passed well and more importantly crossed well. He looks a far better prospect that Jenkinson and I’ve only seen him play twice.

Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain is clearly a star in waiting. He’s fast, he’s intelligent and he’s bold. He made a couple of naive mistakes, but going forward he was tremendous.

Koscielny also had another superb game, he’s been one of our star performers this year. He was first to most balls yesterday, he passed well, tried to get forward and deserved to be on the winning team. I also thought Rosicky had one of his better games, his end product is questionable, but no one can doubt his ability to keep the ball moving in midfield in a very efficient manner.

Negatives

Theo Walcott was complete dross again. He has no footballing intelligence and he really let himself down by not covering for the lumbering Johann Djourrou. I felt sorry for him but standing up a player who is 37 years old and quite good at crossing is completely ridiculous. I have no idea why he did that, but it cost us.

I’ve stood up for Aaron Ramsey over the past few weeks but after another duff performance, it’s becoming difficult to continue to do so. He’s playing like Theo at the moment, running into dead alleys and losing possession like it’s on trend. This is where video analysis and a good old fashion bollocking needs to come into play. Is someone sitting down with him and showing how often he loses possession by not passing it quick enough? Is he being coached? Because after watching him do similar things all season… you have to wonder. Alex Song wasn’t much better, he played like a clutz, falling over and knocking people down when it looked easier to make the tackle. Like a few of the others, he thinks he’s big time before he’s won anything.

Conclusion

That substitute decision made no sense at all. I hate to say this, but it’s like Arsene does things like that out of sheer petulance to spite the fans sometimes…. why else would you bring on a player who has been totally awful all season, in the dying minutes against the best team in the country, for a player who was having an absolute blinder. People say that Andrey isn’t a defender and I’d agree. That’s not the problem though, as soon as he was taken off, we lost the flow of our play. Barcelona’s best form of defence is attack, with Chamberlain on, we were unpredictable, we were stretching United and we had them on the back foot. Theo Walcott was diabolically awful as usual, yet the manager leaves him on? I’m baffled… but at least it speeds the realisation process among fans about Wenger… he’s losing the plot and he’s past his sell by date.

The fans booed the substitution, Robin can be included in that. I’ve never seen a decision booed like that before. Utterly amazing. What made it worse, is that the fans were right. I don’t know a Gooner in the land that didn’t know what was coming after that. If there is one thing fans hate, particularly in the UK, it’s a lazy player who doesn’t give a crap. To bring someone with that character on in an important game is utterly shambolic.

All the ingredients are there for a change. The manager has lost the trust of the fans, he’s lost the trust of his captain and he’s making terrible decisions with much more regularity these days. He looks a broken man, if we’re seeing that, what are the players seeing? This 3rd league loss on the bounce is frustrating, but it’s not like it wasn’t on the cards. To expect such a small squad of players to maintain winning ways from September was always going to be a big ask. The one ray of hope we have in the race for top four is that Chelsea are almost as bad as us. With our players coming back to fitness, and a favourable fixture run, I don’t see why we should give up hope. The problem Wenger has is that this type of rut happened last year and it took about 26 games to get through it. We can’t afford for that to happen this year… certain players need to up their performances and a certain manager need to have a long hard look at themselves and start thinking about the club over childish personal agendas.

I’m out of the loop, so all I know is Vermaelen and Arteta are doubtful, that leaves us with a very tough task, forcing our hand into using players who are often the equivalent of warm flat coke.

If we’re short, we should adapt to a system that takes our strengths into account. The chances of that happening are slim, so we’d best hope that faith and luck weigh in to turn this around. This is career defining for many, can they justify their existence in a squad that offers little value out of a fit 14? A big match on many levels!

I’ll leave the comments section to give the rest of the post, enjoy the game!

It was good to read, the passion of an Arsenal fan, the worst result of the century and what it meant to him, losing, it went on to say he had the micky taken out of him by Welbeck, Smalling and Jones and that was walking off the pitch, then it went on with text messages on the bus.

I would have Lansbury in our team over half of those we currently have, he has heart, skill and bags of stamina and he would rather go out on loan that warm the bench at Arsenal, Wenger take note, that’s what this team needs, some backbone and grit.

Although he plays for West Ham, he is going to the game tomorrow and hopes to watch it from Theo’s box, Theo’s box! Doesn’t that tell you something, years ago players gave a few friends and relatives a free ticket to the game, nowadays they get to sit in their luxury boxes, further evidence of the pampered life of an Arsenal player.

I wonder if they still get a win bonus? We need to start winning again, stop whinging about injuries, buy new players if the ones we have are broken and try and buy players that don’t keep getting crocked.

Pretty simple really, tomorrow we need to show the Mancs that we are a top team, we need to show the fans that too and beating those arrogant mancs would send a real message out to the rest, win the home games against the teams above us and we will qualify to play in the Champions League, fail to do that and we won’t, tomorrow will show us if that’s possible.

Injuries have been a factor with us for the last 7 years, if the manager can’t deal with that then perhaps it’s time to step down. That or change the training methods, as it’s either that or the inabiliity to buy the right players, you decide.

Have a great day and let’s hope the results all go our way and we have a chance to banish last weeks game to a bad memory.

And don’t forget, revenge is a dish best served cold!

So if we bought, say Carlos Tevez, we could probably then qualiify for the Champions league and get that money back, not even touch the Cesc /Nasri money that has been set aside for staff bonuses so not upsetting the board or Arsene, they still get their big trough to firk around in.

Also by saying we don’t need to qualify, he has taken away another hurdle from Wenger, you can earn £7mil, win nothing for 7 years and not even qualify for the competition the manager said was essential for a club this size. Amazing, I want his job, constant failure rewarded by big wages, I didn’t think that was possible for anyone outside the banking industry, oops sorry I forgot, we are in the banking industry.

Moving on, rather than talking about injured players, let’s talk about the fit ones. RVP, Theo, Arshavin, Chamberlain. Ramsey, Song, Rosicky and Yossi. Djourou, Mertesacker, Kozzer. Chezzer.

So that’s what it’s looking like, with Vermaelen and Henry possibles and Park, who know one seems to know why he’s here and Squillaci.

I still wouldn’t be surprised to see us turn the Mancs over, because although they are at the top, they haven’t been great, and that’s why I get so fed up, because had we just bought a few top talents, we would be challenging for the title, infuriating.

Chamakh is vowing to prove himself, great, he thinks you can be shite for 12 months and then show us you are Ok, all for £90k a week, I wonder where he got that idea from? It’s time we just got rid of players that play on reputations and spent the money on players that we know can make a difference.

I would have Tevez all day long, screw the attitude, how many have we got with attitude, Pedro told you yesterday about one of our kids with it, Bendtner puts his wages on his back, Song has one, I could go on, Tevez knows where the net is, could turn our season around and is affordable, and after what he’s been through, would be a very humble man, and he’s still very young.

We have the money Arsene, show us some intent. Have a great day Grovers countdown begins!