Ian Wright can see problems at Arsenal but his scatter gun approach to punditry is beginning to backfire.
Like many pundits on TV, Wright sells himself as a man who “tells it like it is”. He goes out determined not to let anything filter his opinion.
It’s all from the heart.
For a while, that approach was endearing. When the criticism of the club mounted, Wright was a rare, positive voice.
Recently, though, he’s adopted an entirely different stance.
It was bizarre watching him on Match of the Day as threw out several comments with no real substance.
After our 3-1 defeat at Swansea, he claimed the players were no longer responding to Arsene Wenger.
“They [the players] seem to be not responding to this manager at the moment,” he said, as reported by Give Me Sport.
Yet, that result came just a week after the club defeated Chelsea in the Carabao Cup semi-final – a result that was credited to Wenger’s changes at half-time.
There’s evidence that the players are very much still responding to the manager. Wright knows this as well.
He put the problem down to inconsistency.
“You see how the guys can play when they want to like against Chelsea and we’ve seen in certain games, against Man Utd and that, they raise their game,” he said.
“When you look at them, it’s the inconsistency of the performances.”
He then made a vague comment about Wenger being around for another two years, saying: “I have been very loyal and I know that Arsene Wenger will probably be there for another two years.”
Yet, that position doesn’t align with his thoughts on what’s going on behind the scenes.
“You know that there is things going on in the background with [Sven] Mislintat and [Raul] Sanllehi and [Ivan] Gazidis and you know that there’s a war going on.
“There has been a lot going on and I would like to see [Stan] Kroenke come over and actually get the people to get together and work for the club.”
If there’s a war going on, can anyone say with any certainty that Wenger will stay? All we know is that not everyone at the club wants Wenger there, as reported by the reliable David Ornstein.
He’s not wrong about there being issues at the club, but he also seems determined to ignore any good news in favour of being negative.
His reaction to Mesut Ozil’s contract extension was revealing for it’s sheer lack of consistency and generated a furious response on Twitter.
He used to defend Ozil, and said that he’d do well at Manchester United so you’d think he’d be happy about his new deal.
He seemed anything but, saying: “…he’s played a couple of decent games and now he’s signed a contract? Didn’t see many clubs beating down the door and he was free. Let’s hope he’s as consistent now he’s signed.”
On the whole, it seems Wright is twisting himself inside-out to get out that controversial nugget.
A pundit who once seemed to have his finger on the pulse of the Arsenal fanbase, he suddenly appears very out the loop.
If these are his real opinions, then fair enough. But they’re not going to earn him many friends and might lose him plenty.