Arsene Wenger: Ignore excessive critics, Arsenal are still in the title race

'Everybody has freedom of opinion and I enjoy very much that people care about my future'

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has much to think about (Getty)

Somewhere between the outrage of his critics and the stubborn entreaties of Arsène Wenger, that all is well with Arsenal, the truth resides.

The successive defeats to Barcelona and Manchester United were linked and represented a bad week, nothing more, according to Wenger. Tuesday morning he pointed out that Arsenal were only five points behind Leicester, whom they beat just over two weeks ago, and just three behind their north London rivals Tottenham.

A win against Swansea at the Emirates tonight and at White Hart Lane on Saturday and the world will be a different place, Wenger maintains. That Leicester have emerged from nowhere to mount a thrilling and credible title challenge and Spurs have walked past them on a sustained upward trajectory is part of the cut and thrust of sport, he argues, and should not be used as a gauge by which to measure and condemn his work at Arsenal.

In other words Wenger is right and those who would shout him down are wrong. He acknowledges, in that debonair way of his, their right to comment. And the killer condescension, he welcomes their concerns. This only serves to enrage his critics further and convinces them that Wenger is more removed from reality than even they thought.

“Everybody has freedom of opinion and I enjoy very much that people care about my future. I thank them for that. Apart from that, in my life, I always taken care of myself and my future. I’m never surprised by the criticism that comes. That’s part of the media today. Part of the opinion is always a bit excessive and emotional, but we have to deal with that and I don’t complain about it,” he said.

“We live in a society where the excess is permanent but when the excess is permanent it becomes ineffective. You become immune to it. In life you have to focus on what can influence your life. People are entitled to their opinion but what can influence my life and the life of the club is putting a good performance on.

“We are professional and we want to focus on how we respond to the defeat. We lost 3-2 at Manchester United, we are not happy with the result but if you analyse the game we had two lapses of focus that we paid for. That made the game difficult for us after.”

Across the football firmament, from the neutral ground occupied by Graeme Souness to the partial space filled by Piers Morgan, there is a body of opinion that the Wenger regime has exhausted its potential. The club continues to repeat the sins of previous campaigns, promising the world on the days when the dots are joined and failing predictably when the demand creeps up and character, not beauty, is the requirement.

Souness claimed Arsenal lacked backbone at Old Trafford. Wenger says his team is full of leaders. Indeed, he encourages leadership in every position. This Arsenal dance around football’s abstract dance floor returns to the same position every season, it seems. But surely this is different, with the advent of Leicester as credible challengers from nowhere and, worse still for Wenger, Spurs emerging as a team of real championship substance.

The league table will be the ultimate arbiter, of course. If Arsenal fail to respond to the challenge of Leicester and Spurs in a season when the emasculation of Chelsea and United has heightened possibility, and the numbers as well as sentiment stack against Wenger, the noise about his continued tenure might even be heard in the boardroom.

In the meantime he continues on his merry way, with head held high, or, depending on your point of view, in the sand. “People forget that we’ve always been at the top. What other English club has spent 20 years always in the top four? Can you give me one? No. I give my best, and do my job. My job is always to get the maximum out of the potential of the team, and I always focus on that.

“We’ve just beaten Leicester, lost at Man United OK, and you wonder sometimes about the excessive reactions. Do people think football is only winning, and never losing any more games?

“I’ve fought for that idea for years, that football is unpredictable and teams like Leicester can come in to the top four. At the end of the day let’s fight with them. If on the last day of the season they are in front of us we congratulate them and say well done. They can also be behind us so let’s fight, and hope they are behind us.”