Arsenal fans aren’t quite sure what to make of Alex Iwobi’s Instagram message about bouncing back from his side’s 1-0 defeat to Spurs.
Iwobi came on for the final 25 minutes against Tottenham on Saturday and didn’t do a fantastic job. Granted, the 21-year-old wasn’t Arsenal’s worst player and was ‘only’ dispossessed once but his performance was definitely lacking.
The winger’s form has been poor for a while and Arsenal fans began to turn on him months ago.
Fortunately for Iwobi, Alexandre Lacazette seemed to take the brunt of the fan fury at the weekend but the Nigeria international has put himself in the firing line with what appears to be a heart-felt message on his Instagram story.
On Sunday, while the entire Arsenal team apart from Jack Wilshere went into hiding, Iwobi apologised to the fans.
Sort of.
While Iwobi never actually said sorry, you do get the feeling that this was the message he was trying to convey.
It’s very nice and all, and most fans appreciate the youngster reaching out, but it’s hard to take his words at face value when they’ve been said, either by him, other players or Arsene Wenger, countless times in the past.
Iwobi wants us to ‘trust’ that Arsenal are working hard to bounce back but how can we do that when the team haven’t before?
It seems most Gooners echo my thoughts on the matter.
Some are even convinced that the forward’s message is just PR designed to get the fans back on side.
“I don’t wanna be cynical because I really like Iwobi, he really does seem like a genuine guy… But it’s definitely easier to be mature in hindsight after getting a lot of criticism (and abuse unfortunately),” says Reddit user Flyingsubs. “That, plus the fact that his team and family seem to bring him down to Earth after ‘controversies’. Hopefully they can keep him grounded, he’s still only 21 and has a lot of learning/growing to do.”
Tportelli2000 chimed in, “(He) created the only clear cut chance in the whole game and played for only 25 minutes. Scapegoating him shows how stupid you are.”
Here’s what Twitter had to say:
The problem I have with the likes of Iwobi is that they do tweet things like that which is good but at the same time if you can't then follow up on that tweet or message in your performances it's not good enough.
— GoonersRelated (@GoonersRelated) February 11, 2018
Iwobi’s message means nothing, it’s got PR written all over it, how about you start talking on the pitch and not on social media!
— MR DT © (@MrDtAFC) February 11, 2018
Regardless of whether he is sincere or not, I will give the kid credit for trying. The problem with this team is they just don’t seem to care about fans nor the club but just want to earn a paycheck.
— David (@selfdestruct77) February 11, 2018
https://twitter.com/49WithStyle/status/962695066744651776
Genuine, he’s one of us bro
— P¹⁸ (@RedLacazette9) February 11, 2018
Regardless of whether he is sincere or not, I will give the kid credit for trying. The problem with this team is they just don’t seem to care about fans nor the club but just want to earn a paycheck.
— David (@selfdestruct77) February 11, 2018
You can apologise all you want, the sad matter is Arsenal are in decline & our future ambitions look like we will be hoping for a top half table/midtable finish, forget about top 4, titles & Europe !! We aren’t even competing!!
— wayne molyneux (@WaymolWazza) February 11, 2018
Talk is cheap!
— mike bristol gooner (@MichaelSelway) February 11, 2018
What a load of rubbish, same old messages week in week out from our players
— Jon Davis (@JonD_AFC) February 11, 2018
Tired of all this rubbish. They will play badly and come here to tell us we are sorry. Sell the average players. #afc
— Ibidapo Atoyegbe (@dapato011) February 11, 2018
Arsene Wenger has trained these guys in giving speeches like this. Bellarin does the same. He said the loss to Swansea was a wake up- are they always asleep in away games?
— Akinropo Ishola (@akin_ishola) February 11, 2018
1. Have a bad game.
2. Apologise and commit 100% next game.
3. Repeat.— Truth_Afc (@truthhurtz449) February 11, 2018
It’s meaningless though. They’re all “one of us”, post a crap message (Cech, Mustafi, Özil, Bellerin just to name a few) and then next week it’s the same cycle. All of their words are meaningless at this point because it doesn’t change anything.
— W. Ramzil (@Wayne_Writes) February 11, 2018
It’s no different just because he’s a youth product. It means nothing coming from any of them because they do the same crap over and over
— W. Ramzil (@Wayne_Writes) February 11, 2018
Have to agree with this although I do think the players need to come out an apologise for that shocking performances so I respect Iwobi for that. Looks a bit too much of a PR message now I read it again…
— GoonersRelated (@GoonersRelated) February 11, 2018
The problem I have with the likes of Iwobi is that they do tweet things like that which is good but at the same time if you can’t then follow up on that tweet or message in your performances it’s not good enough.
— GoonersRelated (@GoonersRelated) February 11, 2018
Big up iwobi for that message on snap
— Kieran🇯🇲 (@itz_Niles30) February 11, 2018