Arsenal’s two games against Manchester City this week told us quite a lot about where Arsenal are as a club and a football side, and it’s not a pretty place.
Well, it perhaps confirmed it more than revealed, but there is no denying that this week the club, players, supporters, and press all seemed to cross the Rubicon.
There can be no going back…
4Organised fan protests are not as effective as organic ones
There was no denying the message sent to the Arsenal board by Arsenal fans on Thursday night. Never have so many spoken so loudly by saying nothing and staying at home.
Although the weather gave the club some sort of wiggle-room to defend the awful turnout at the Emirates, nobody was fooled.
The club, as usual, said that the attendance was over 58,000. Around 30,000 of those fans clearly brought their invisibility cloaks to keep them warm.
For years, various pressure groups have dreamed of an Emirates as empty as the one we saw on Thursday night but fans were never going to vote with their feet until things got beyond unbearable and even then, Arsenal’s fanbase is so loyal they were never going to convince everyone to stay away.
The fans who turned up to see Arsenal lose against City are the real hardcore fans, and it was they who booed the team off at the end of each half and, more telling, on at the start of the second.