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Arsenal Fan View: The point of no return

Jack Wilshere of Arsenal looks dejected following defeat to Brighton and Hove Albion at Amex Stadium
Jack Wilshere of Arsenal looks dejected following defeat to Brighton and Hove Albion at Amex Stadium

Being speechless after a game is often the best feeling for a football fan. It generally reflects that your side has done so well, you have no words left to express your happiness. In our sport, it happens a few times in a season for nearly every team. What does not happen this often, is having no words left to express your misery.

Arsenal fans around the world are known to be one of the most loyal and immune to yearly suffering. The club has, over the years, made it a point to raise fans’ hopes and use the age-old ways to smash them later. Not this year, though – this time Arsenal took it to another level.

Forget the form of the team in any competition. The run of defeats is not even the worst part of this season. Not the consistent notion of #WengerOut, fans being disrespectful to one another, nor the schadenfreude of the entire media out there.

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The worst part for this season surely is the way the club fails to respond to any given situation, both on and off the pitch. Take for example, enemy number-one, Arsene Wenger – his staunch stature to protect his players under any circumstances is a ploy that is as over-played as him.

His belief that things will fall into place just because he won’t wither from his stance used to work in the early 2000s, but that was because of the guts his players had. Does he really think players like Mustafi, Xhaka and Ozil have the same mental strength as that of his old guard?

Over time, Wenger has managed to fit different sets of athletes into a system they can all profit from, but even that always needed a leader, a focal point. Thierry Henry, Cesc Fabregas, Dennis Bergkamp, and even recently, Alexis Sanchez provided the beaming light to look towards on the pitch.

But as has been proved on numerous occasions this season, there are literally no leaders in this Arsenal squad anymore. I say squad because even Per Mertesacker has no real leadership qualities left in him to inspire this team.

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang reacts during the defeat to Brighton and Hove Albion
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang reacts during the defeat to Brighton and Hove Albion

Inspiration, in fact, seems to have been sucked out of each and every player at the club. What is funny is that you can’t actually pin-point just when it happened. Despite their bottom-club level performances, Arsenal have managed to make a cup final, be in the Europa League’s round of 16, break their transfer record twice and make millions for their FanTv.

And while some clubs have to rent out to play at Wembley, Arsenal’s regular visits there haven’t been enough to inspire confidence. The same confidence which Arsene Wenger tells us is running extremely low at the club.

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What he does not realize is that feeling is shared by the fans as well. We are at point of such low self-esteem in supporting the club, that there are only so many ways left to express it. Even rage and vanity have gone beyond the reality of the situation now.

The fans have reached a point of no return for this club. Speechlessness has become a weekly feeling and not in the good way it used to be. Whatever happens from now on, the people in-charge of the club will be tending to a lot of broken hearts for years to come.