Now, some might accuse me of only posting when something goes wrong. Nothing could be further from the truth; plenty has gone wrong in the intervening period. However, Sunday was a nadir and possibly a watershed - or at least it might be if the owner of the club displayed any interest in its welfare!
This is of course what I'm talking about. The FA Cup debacle in Nottingham on Sunday.
I and many Arsenal fans have been losing the faith for weeks/months/years now, and after Sunday I've taken some time to think about where the club are right now, compared to when the Manager arrived, 21 years ago (and counting). I am afraid that I have reached the conclusion that he has now taken the club full circle - a big upward swing culminating in two doubles and an unbeaten season, full of flowing, devastating, beautiful football, followed (for all that 'blame' can be pointed at the stadium move and at the influx of 'dirty' money) by an inexorable decline, now gathering pace, which has taken the club back to where it started - and to make things worse moving in the wrong direction.
I'm not talking about where the club is physically, or even financially. Apart from the sentimental loss of Highbury, Arsenal are better off than they were in 1996. In a much bigger stadium, with more money than could have been envisaged, and with a beautiful training facility to boot. I'm talking about its ability to compete with its competitors, and the negligence at Management and Board level that has led to inertia and the team's tumble out of real contention. And this in a competitive climate which shows no less than 5 serious domestic rivals - in those days there was just the one massively dominant force in the Ferguson-led Manchester United - and that gap was breached for a while. It's going to be so much harder now.
Compare the current squad to that of 1996-7. Then, Arsenal had its famous Back 4 in place, the likes of Bergkamp, Platt and Merson to back up Ian Wright up front, but a deficiency in central midfield which Wenger filled very quickly with Patrick Vieira. Nicolas Anelka was bought to eventually replace Wright, and in the next close season Petit and Overmars arrived, followed soon after by Henry, Ljungberg and Pires (amongst others). Glorious days ensued, helped by Wenger's knowledge at that time of the untapped French market. We all remember what followed, starting the following season by winning The Double, but do you really need a history lesson? What was clear, however, was that the team and club were moving forward. How many of the current squad would get into the 2002 or 2004 side, let alone the 1996-7 tram that Wenger inherited?
And so to today. A squad which, whilst incredibly talented on paper, is riddled by injuries, psychological defects and contract issues from back to front. Nowhere in the squad can anything be said to be settled or organised, and this is backed up by increasingly muddled tactical thinking and planning, with no discernible 'plan' for the rest of the season and beyond. It is only by dint of the amount of latent talent in the group that the team finds itself (just about) around the top echelon of domestic football, but the fall out of the Champions League will be seen to be a disaster for the club; and on current form how can the team break back into the Top 4? Because all over the field there are issues.
At goalkeeper, the squad possesses a formerly great keeper coming to the end of his career, another international who patently doesn't want to be at the club, and two callow youths - one currently out on loan in Spain but not getting any playing time.
Defensively, the team is a laughing stock. Whether in a 3, 4 or 5 there is dysfunction. Bellerin has no credible back-up, the left back/left wing back position is confused, our best central defender is playing on one ankle and is clearly in decline, backed up by a pot-pourri of either reckless, slow, or young central defenders bereft of confidence. Wenger doesn't know how to set them up, and clearly isn't letting his assistant coach them.
In front of them in central midfield Xhaka is continually exposed - and it's not really his fault. He never was, is not and never will be a mobile, energetic defensive midfielder, but that's the role into which he has been thrust. And the opposition pick on him continually as the most deep-lying midfielder.
Alongside him, Ramsey and Wilshere are talented but fragile, and Elneny and Coquelin (the latter on the verge of being sold, after only a year ago having been given a long-term £100k a week contract; such muddled thinking and a ridiculous amount of money to pay such a limited player) are not of the required quality. The biggest and most glaring squad deficiency since the departure of Vieira has been the lack of a 'beast' in central midfield; looking back, the Fabregas/Flamini combination is probably the best the team has had since then; followed by Cazorla/Coquelin - a combination stumbled upon by Wenger. Yet year after year it is not addressed. And Santi; how we miss you :-(
Out wide and up front it's an absolute mess. Ozil and Sanchez - world-class individuals - in the last 6 months of their contracts. Words absolutely fail me! Around them, Lacazette must wonder what he has come into, and whilst Giroud is limited but useful, suffering unfairly by comparison to Henry and van Persie. And I despair when I see the likes of Iwobi, Welbeck and Walcott on the field.
On top of all this, injuries are once more hurting the squad in a big way. For all the lack of organisation and tactics (apart from the well-known sideways, sideways, sideways, back, back, sideways, sideways, attempted one-two and trot lazily back when the ball is invariably lost) there is enough talent in the squad to get results. Yet Koscielny, Mustafi, Monreal, Kolasinac, Xhaka, Ramsey and Giroud are all likely to miss out this week, Ozil's knee is risky and Sanchez's mind is clearly elsewhere. Other top clubs - perhaps Manchester United excepted - don't have these regular problems.
In short, the team is in turmoil and needs a focus and direction clearly now beyond Arsene Wenger. The squad needs a massive overhaul and the club faces years in the wilderness - with, lest we forget, no less that 5 more attractive destinations than Islington for incoming talent to the Premier League. For all the 'signings' of Mislintat and Sanllehi to the backroom staff are welcome, their arrival could conceivably be too late, as a result of the prevarication of Kroenke and his Board, and the latent power that Wenger wields at the club. I, amongst more and more fans, am extremely concerned - yet I'll still be at Stamford Bridge tonight - such a glutton for punishment! Meanwhile, Kroenke will feel that he has more important things to worry about as The Los Angeles Rams were eliminated from the NFL playoffs at the weekend.
Two things to add. Firstly, the dichotomy which means that those people who have most berated the Manager for 'only winning 3 FA Cups' in the past 4 years are the most upset by the Forest defeat. I can't make any sense of that. Except to say that there was absolutely no excuse for taking the risk of putting the likes of Akpom, Da Silva and Osei-Tutu (I have actually never heard of him) on the bench and completely resting the likes of Ozil, Sanchez, Lacazette and Wilshere. That's a lack of foresight and clear thinking (alongside a good dollop of arrogance) that is hard to take.
Secondly, I'll leave you with this from Ivan Gazidis in 2011:
To use the vernacular: 'Nuff said!
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